Guyana’s president tried flattering King Charles III with a photo of a much younger monarch, and the king shut it down in two words.
The moment came at the Global Biodiversity Alliance Conference in Georgetown, Guyana, where Charles toured the exhibits with the country’s president, Dr. Mohamed Irfaan Ali, during a nine-day, three-country Caribbean tour that ran from Oct. 27 to Nov. 4, 2026. Accounts of the exchange, with video, emerged Thursday, Nov. 5, a day after the tour wrapped up.
One of the stalls had a screen showing pictures. Among them was a shot of Charles taken on his 2000 visit to the country, when he was still Prince of Wales.
“Who is that young man in the magazine?” the president said. “Handsome-looking young man back in the day.”
The king gave no answer. Ali placed a hand on his shoulder and said, “You have not changed much at all.”
Charles turned around. “Keep trying,” he replied.
The arithmetic behind the compliment is not subtle. Charles turned 52 in November 2000. He turns 78 on Nov. 14.
A Return After 26 Years
Charles’ previous trip to Georgetown was 26 years ago, as Prince of Wales. This time he came as king, and at a state reception during the visit he was presented with a specially produced Guyanese rum created in his honor.
Camilla Joined Only in Antigua
Charles worked the Bahamas and Guyana legs alone. Queen Camilla flew out only for the final stop, in Antigua and Barbuda, an arrangement that was always the plan, although the palace has not said why she skipped the first half of the trip.
HELLO! royal editor Emily Nash pointed to the grind of a long tour. “She doesn’t love long-haul travel,” Nash said on “A Right Royal Podcast,” adding that the queen, 79, finds “being out in the heat all day quite draining.”
No Umbrella in the Downpour
The compliment in Georgetown was not the image that traveled furthest from the tour. On Nov. 1, in Antigua, Charles was caught in a torrential downpour with no umbrella, and the king’s frustration at being left unprotected dominated coverage of the trip.
Asked how the 77-year-old monarch was holding up under the schedule, an aide said Charles copes with the demands better than the aide does, despite being the older of the two. The same aide said the work is what the king was born to do, and that he feeds off the reaction he gets from the people he meets.
The aide described the visit as complex, challenging and exhausting, but judged it a success, saying Charles had shown his statecraft in both word and deed. Sending the king, the aide said, is a secret weapon, because he reaches places politicians cannot, and the delegation came home with heads held high. The tough parts of the job, the aide added, are the parts Charles relishes most.
A senior aide said Charles and Camilla laugh together at the end of each day, and sometimes at the end of each engagement, about whatever went a bit wonky — a habit that aide traced to the strength of their relationship and their determination to keep going despite age and circumstance.
A new portrait of the couple by longtime royal photographer Chris Jackson was released Nov. 5, the day after the tour ended. It was taken Nov. 1 in Antigua and Barbuda, outdoors in the sun, before the rainstorm hit.
By the king’s own tally, the trip came to three nations, four speeches, nine days and more than 40 engagements. In a message posted after he landed, Charles wrote that he returned home with treasured memories “and one slightly damp suit!”