Queen's Diamond Jubilee 'will be better than Olympics': London Mayor

London, Jan 19(ANI): The Mayor of London, Boris Johnson has vowed that the centrepiece Thames river pageant Queen's Diamond Jubilee weekend be "more exciting than the Olympics"

Johnson said he had been struck by the huge turnout at the Jubilee as the landmark event of 2012.

"Millions of people will be there and perhaps hundreds of millions will be watching around the world, so let's have a fantastic party ... who knows, it may even be more exciting than the Olympics," The Telegraph quoted Johnson, as saying.

The Jubilee weekend will come to a climax on June 3 with a seven-mile flotilla of 1,000 boats, making up the biggest gathering on the Thames in 350 years.

The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh will be at the centre of the water-borne procession on the royal barge, while senior members of the Royal family will travel on other boats.

The pageant master, Adrian Evans said the flotilla would take 90 minutes to pass any given point.

He said the event would "reclaim the Thames as a theatre of pageantry", and promised London a "Canaletto moment", referring to an 18th century painting of a Thames flotilla by the Italian master that helped inspire it.

Evans said that the ships would be offered as competition prizes later in the year to ensure the participation of the public. (ANI)