JDF soldiers from the First Battalion Jamaica Regiment will today take up duties in mounting The Queen’s Guard at Buckingham Palace, on alternate days for a month.

The Jamaican soldiers will also on Friday, Sunday and next Tuesday guard Windsor Castle, the centuries-old castle west of London widely seen as the Queen’s favourite residence.

“Competition for the opportunity of coming to London to mount The Queen’s Guard has been fierce, training has been intense and the best of my men are looking forward to the honour of guarding Her Majesty,” the regiment’s commander Colonel Derek Robinson was quoted yesterday in a release from the Jamaica Tourist Board.

The duties are a part of Exercise Red Stripe Calypso Hop, where a contingent of 140 officers and men of the First Battalion Jamaica Regiment were deployed to the United Kingdom to participate in an annual training exchange between the Jamaica Defence Force (JDF) and the British Armed Forces. The Jamaican contingent began its deployment to the UK on July 2 and the British troops started arriving on the island on July 8. The exchange is scheduled to end on August 28.