“I thought: now it really has to happen.”
On February 2, 2002, King Willem-Alexander and Máxima tied the knot. But how did the king actually propose to his great love?
Champagne and roses
It shows once again that Willem-Alexander does not like half measures. For example, he had hidden champagne and roses in the bushes for his marriage proposal. Before that, he first went skating with – at the time – his girlfriend on the pond at Huis Ten Bosch. “It was a beautiful Friday afternoon and I thought Máxima should learn to skate, what could be more Dutch than skating,” the king shared in an old interview with NOS.
After the couple had been on the ice for two hours, Máxima felt cold. She wanted to go in and have a chocolate milk. “I thought: now it really has to happen. So I went out to get the champagne and roses,” the king continued.
The big question
The king admitted that he had practiced endlessly on what he wanted to say. “But in the end the sentence never comes out the way you think it would. But I said something like: I’m asking this for the first time in my life and the only time.” The king had determined in advance that he would make his proposal in English. Máxima did not speak the Dutch language fluently at the time. “I didn’t want her to say: what?!”
Fortunately, Máxima immediately understood the question and the king received a resounding ‘yes’. “Without thinking,” Máxima imagines. “I thought I would never find someone who would be so in love with me and me with him.”
Source: Things for Women | Image: NL Image
