Sounds like Prince Harry will have a very chilly Valentine’s Day this year. Not only will his royal duties take him 200 miles north of the Arctic Circle on February 14, but there’s no word that pregnant Duchess Meghan will tag along.
Kensington Palace announced the 34-year-old’s unromantic Valentine’s Day plans on Twitter on Monday, January 28.
“The Duke of Sussex, Captain General @RoyalMarines, will visit Exercise Clockwork to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the operation in Bardufoss, Norway on Thursday 14th February,” the palace said in the tweet, making no mention of Meghan or the typical significance of the date.
The palace did, however, provide more information about the royal engagement taking Harry away from London that day. “Clockwork is the traditional name of the annual winter exercise, based in one of the world’s most demanding environments 200 miles inside the Arctic Circle, which has trained over 16,000 @RoyalMarines and @RoyalNavy sailors and airmen since 1969,” a follow-up tweet explained.
While in Bardufoss, Harry will “meet military personnel living and training on the base, view some of the specialist outdoor severe weather equipment and training that is conducted at Clockwork and talk with expert aircrews and engineers,” the palace added.
This February 14 will be the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s first Valentine’s Day as a married couple, but Meghan has a good reason to stay in the relative warmth of London: She’s expecting the couple’s first baby at the end of March or in early April.
Meanwhile, Harry might be trying to save Meghan from the more rigorous aspects of royal life as she weathers a storm of negative press about her supposed feud with sister-in-law Duchess Kate. “Meghan made a huge sacrifice by moving across the pond, away from her mom and friends,” an insider exclusively told Us Weekly earlier this month. “Marrying into the royal family isn’t anywhere near as glamorous as it seems, so in a lot of ways Harry feels responsible for Meghan being so miserable.”
The royal couple married announced their engagement in November 2017 after about a year of dating, and they married in May 2018.
