Where else would you find a queue containing the St John's Ambulance cycle response unit, a giant figure representing Queen Victoria's Seaman's Rest, and a truck full of people dressed as pandas for the Zhejiang Association (which promotes closer ties between the UK and China)?
The answer is the Lord Mayor's Show, which lays claim to being the world's oldest civic pageant, and it has been causing traffic problems in London for more than 800 years (Samuel Pepys complained about it in his diaries).
It dates from the reign of King John, who allowed London to appoint its own mayor on the condition that the mayor travelled from the City of London to Westminster to swear loyalty to the Crown.
In the present day, it is the Lord Mayor's role to be an ambassador for the City of London's financial and professional services, which means that the parade contains representatives from the armed forces, charities, private sector organisations, schools, and the trades and guilds that have thrived in London for centuries. https://lordmayorsshow.london/2018
