A royal surprise! Prince Harry left his Montecito mansion to attend a rodeo in Texas.
The Duke of Sussex, 37, was photographed at the Stockyards Championship Rodeo in Fort Worth, Texas. However, the photos have since been pulled from social media. The accounts did not offer any explanation for why the photos were erased.
Cindy Reid, the secretary of the Stockyards Championship Rodeo, shared a photo on Monday, March 7, Entertainment Tonight reports. “Where was Prince Harry Saturday night?” Reid captioned the since-deleted pic. “Oooooh, just hanging out behind the bucking chutes at the Stockyards Championship Rodeo!! Loooove it!! Thank you for the visit!!”
Meanwhile, Melton Bull Co. — owned by former bull rider-turned-trainer Cory Melton — shared the same image before deleting their post too, Page Six reports. “Prince Harry hanging out at the rodeo this week … We get a lot of rodeo royalty but this is the first prince I’ve seen,” the caption read. “Said he was going to enter the bull riding but the airline lost his rigging bag…”
The candid snap showed Harry in conversation with a small group. The Archewell cofounder wore a sage green shirt with his sleeves cuffed up to his elbows. He topped off his outfit with an olive green hat (which was more of an Indiana Jones-style fedora than a true cowboy hat).
He was surrounded by others in flannel shirts and cowboy hats, but wife Meghan Markle was not pictured.
The attraction, which is advertised as “the world’s only year round rodeo,” features bull riding, tie down roping, team roping, barrel racing, bronc riding and break away roping. The Stockyards website also advertises “calf and mutton scrambles” for children, but the England native may have left Archie, 2, and Lilibet, 9 months, at home. Neither of the little ones were pictured with him.
The British expat is getting quite a bit of American culture in 2022. He was spotted watching the biggest American football game of the year in February as he attended Super Bowl LVI alongside his cousin Princess Eugenie in Los Angeles.
The tour of iconic American events comes nearly two years after moving permanently to the U.S. Harry and Meghan, 40, stepped down from their duties as senior royals in early 2020 and relocated to Los Angeles before purchasing a $14.65 million home in the Montecito enclave of Santa Barbara, California, in June 2020.
During a February 2021 appearance on The Late Late Show With James Corden, the military veteran explained that he and his wife live a fairly normal life after stepping away from royal duties.
“Depending on how the day’s been, we do Archie’s tea, give him a bath, read him a book, put him down, go downstairs,” the prince explained at the time. “Meg might cook a meal, might order a takeaway, go upstairs, sit in bed, turn the TV on, watch some Jeopardy!, maybe watch a little bit of Netflix.”
