‘It was amazing, surreal, extraordinary and very special’: Co Armagh family delighted after royal visit from William and Kate

The McKeevers — Catherine, Alanna, Patrick and Peter — run Long Meadow Cider, an award-winning family-run farm in the heart of the Orchard County.

Kate and William visited the farm as part of their first joint visit to Northern Ireland since October 2022. Today’s unannounced joint visit was their first to Northern Ireland in three years.

“It was amazing, surreal, extraordinary and very, very special for us as a small family-run business that they wanted to come here to our farm to meet us as a family, to be interested in us as a family, and to be concerned about us as a family — particularly after Storm Amy and how it affected the farm,” Catherine said.

Long Meadow has been owned by the McKeever family for three generations and has been cultivating premium-quality apples since 1968.

The McKeevers have since diversified significantly, with the support of the family’s younger generation, and now produce craft ciders, apple juice and apple cider vinegar.

Their products are being sold in major supermarket chains across Northern Ireland and Long Meadow is now also a thriving tourist destination for orchard tour experiences and produce tastings.

The family organised a “very special and bespoke” tour for the royal visitors.

They observed the apple cider vinegar production process, before seeing how the apples are pressed and bottled on site.

“They expressed an interest and a lot of what we are doing here at Long Meadows. They were particularly interested in the apple cider vinegar, because of all the health benefits, and the apple juice too, because our apple juice is all natural,” Catherine said.

The family then took the couple apple picking in their orchard, where Kate playfully scolded William for dropping some.

The pair seemed to enjoy the orchard, with William saying: “It’s like something out of Harry Potter.”

“They were so welcoming, so relaxed. They’re just a mum and dad. They spoke about their children throughout, their home life, baking at home with their own children,” Alanna said.

“As the visit went on and it became so much more relaxed, it was a very enjoyable experience. I don’t think we’ll ever top it.”

The Prince and Princess then visited the McKeever’s Bramley Barn, where Catherine taught them how to make potato apple bread.

“They got so much more relaxed when they came into the barn and enjoyed the bread making,” Catherine said.

“And it’s lovely to see that relationship that they had together as well in the barn.”

Catherine said her royal namesake and her husband enjoyed a bit of banter.

“You’ve got to really feel the love and the banter — that fun side was coming out of both of them,” Alanna added.

Catherine said the visit made her realise the couple are much more relatable than she initially believed.

“You knew they had done it [baking] before, maybe not so much William, but you could tell that they do this at home with their own children,” she said.

Early in the day, William and Kate visited a dairy farm and toured the NI Fire & Rescue Service’s new Learning and Development College near Cookstown.

At the fire training college, William and Kate saw some of the training given to the next generation of firefighters.

Both appeared impressed by the facilities, officially opened in May, which can replicate a range of dangerous scenarios in the safety of a learning environment with instructors at hand.

The couple were taken a short distance across the 50-acre site in the red engine, but travelled at a sedate pace — much to Kate’s dismay.

Newly-qualified firefighters Caoimhe McNeice, (25), and Piarais McCaffery, (32), joined the royal guests for part of the visit, and revealed how the princess had wanted to act out a 999 call.

Ms McNeice said about the driver: “He got us there safely. I think he was on a limit for his speed.

“The princess wanted the sirens on, but he was strictly told no.

“It was just a bit of banter, she said, ‘I’d love to drive at the real speed and have the sirens on’.”

Kate also wanted her husband to take the wheel, Ms McNeice said. “She wanted the prince to drive, but the driver got us there anyway.”

In the afternoon, William and Kate visited Mallon Farm near Cookstown in Co Tyrone, a dairy farm for generations before turning to flax growing in 2020.

Helen Keys and Charlie Mallon showed them flax fields and explained their efforts to promote a sustainable linen industry.

Kate tried an old mechanical technique of breaking bunches of flax to soften it, before being shown a large restored 1940s machine, which she said was like a hairbrush.

Full-time carer Tiernan Stuart said he was inspired by Henry VII banning Irish gentry from wearing more than 22 yards of linen to make a mini spinning machine in his spare time.

Showing them the mini machine, he said he would like to see children encouraged to try and make something similar.

“It sounds like you should be launching a design challenge,” William told him.

“Amazing designers would be able to come through and produce something.”