Bus Tour Set to Take Passengers Within Feet of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s Montecito Home Axed After Backlash Over Invasion of Privacy Concerns

(Image credit: Getty)

published 23 August 2023

Marie Claire reported a few days ago about the invasion of privacy—oops, misspelled “guided tour of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s Montecito home and hangouts they frequent” (hate when that happens)—that was scheduled to begin imminently. The tour, which was being run by a friend of Meghan’s estranged father, Thomas Markle (though Thomas seemingly was not involved in the venture other than to say it was a good idea), would take passengers on a “royal tour,” driving them within feet of Harry and Meghan’s Montecito estate for the cool sum of £958.84 (so that’s $1,200) for a group of six. In addition to getting as close as a tour bus can get to the couple’s home, the tour also promised a sightseeing trip around Harry and Meghan’s favorite hangouts around town, such as, for example, the Santa Barbara Polo and Racquet Club where Meghan kissed Harry last year. The tour would also take participants to Meghan’s old Los Angeles-area homes and schools (she grew up there) and, in a random twist, would also take folks by the homes of Katy Perry and Cameron Diaz.

It all seemed really icky, and, after much blowback about privacy invasion concerns (and rightfully so), it appears the tour has been cancelled. The bus tour was advertised as “Royal Celebrity Tour of Los Angeles and Montecito” and was being led by photographer Karl Larsen who, in the description for the tour, wrote “I’m the world-famous celebrity photographer Karl Larsen, a best friend of Thomas Markle (Meghan’s father) and the guy with a stunning exclusive portfolio of pictures of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle together in Montecito.” Larsen billed himself as the “only person in the world” who “knows the truth about what happened between Meghan Markle and her father” ahead of her 2018 wedding. “I am the only person who has an open communication pathway between Meghan’s camp and the rest of the Markle family,” Larsen wrote. “There is nobody on the planet that knows more info that [sic] me and I’m the only person that’s qualified to put on such a tour.”

Per The Independent, “as fans caught wind of the Royal Celebrity Tour, many people took to social media to share their disapproval of the bus tour.”

Christopher Bouzy, a tech entrepreneur who appeared in Netflix’s Harry & Meghan docuseries, said the tour could open the couple up to “harassment” from tourists (his tech firm, Bot Sentinel, led research into online trolls who targeted the couple). “The harassment of Harry and Meghan is escalating, and now these deranged people are taking their harassment offline while trying to profit off their harassment,” he wrote on his social networking site Spoutible. “This is sick.”

The tour was listed on Tripening and it has now been removed from the website.

Larsen clarified to Newsweek that he had “no intentions” of going past Harry and Meghan’s home, just locations where Meghan grew up around the city. “I want to have the tour be available where she grew up,” he said. “We’re going to go to Montecito but just places they go to, restaurants they go to. It’s a custom tour, so if people want to go see other sites, that’s what we’re going to do, but we will not go past Doria’s house [Meghan’s mother Doria Ragland] and we will not go past Harry and Meghan’s.”

Bouzy, speaking to Newsweek, said “The recent incident where a celebrity tour was being organized to visit the neighborhood of the Duke and Duchess’s residence is a concerning escalation of online harassment transitioning to the real world,” he said. “The problematic listing was an act of targeted harassment, and it jeopardized the safety of the Duke and Duchess’s family. The rise in online harassment underscores the urgent need for robust legislation to counteract this escalating problem that affects everyone.”

Larsen at one point was also working on expanding the trip to Rosarito, Mexico, where Thomas Markle lives. And Larsen said that the backlash about the tour won’t deter him: “This is not going to be the end of the tour,” he said.

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Rachel Burchfield is a writer, editor, and podcaster whose primary interests are fashion and beauty, society and culture, and, most especially, the British Royal Family and other royal families around the world. She serves as Marie Claire’s Senior Celebrity and Royals Editor and has also contributed to publications like Allure, Cosmopolitan, Elle, Glamour, Harper’s Bazaar, InStyle, People, Vanity Fair, Vogue, and W, among others. Before taking on her current role with Marie Claire, Rachel served as its Weekend Editor and later Royals Editor. She is the cohost of Podcast Royal, a show that was named a top five royal podcast by The New York Times. A voracious reader and lover of books, Rachel also hosts I’d Rather Be Reading, which spotlights the best current nonfiction books hitting the market and interviews the authors of them. Rachel frequently appears as a media commentator, and she or her work has appeared on outlets like NBC’s Today Show, ABC’s Good Morning America, CNN, and more.

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