Princess Leonor of Spain arrives in New York after five months at sea

New York Post

a day ago

Princess Leonor of Spain has touched down in the Big Apple!
The 19-year-old royal arrived aboard a Spanish Navy training ship in New York City on Wednesday, dressed in a crisp white uniform adorned with black insignia.
The Crown Princess — who is the heir to the Spanish throne, followed by her younger sister, Sofia — appeared in good spirits alongside fellow cadets as she saluted onlookers aboard the Juan Sebastián de Elcano.
6 Princess Leonor of Spain arrived aboard a Spanish Navy training ship in New York City on Wednesday.
Stephen Lovekin/GTRES/Shutterstock
Leonor, who had kick-started her military training in 2023, will not be returning to Spain via the ship. Instead, she will fly back and rejoin her peers in Gijón on July 7, EDATV News reports.
The princess will join the Spanish Navy's guided missile frigate Blas de Lezo there, where she is set to undertake a key segment of her naval training.
Over the past two years, Leonor has been undergoing training at the General Military Academy in Zaragoza.
Later this year, she will begin Air Force training at the General Air Academy in Santiago de la Ribera to round out her military education.
6 The royal, 19, was dressed in a crisp white uniform adorned with black insignia.
GTRES/Shutterstock
In March 2023, the Spanish royal house announced that Leonor was set to undergo three years of military training.
'As in all parliamentary monarchies (the heir) has to have a military background and a military career,' Defense Minister Margarita Robles said at the time.
Leonor completed her high school degree at UWC Atlantic College in Wales, UK that year.
6 The Crown Princess appeared in good spirits alongside fellow cadets while saluting onlookers.
ZUMAPRESS.com
'In due course, the commander-in-chief of the armed forces will be a woman, and in recent years we have been making a very important effort to incorporate women into the armed forces,' Robles added.
The government and the Royal House have agreed that her 'very intense' military training will precede university studies, following in the footsteps of her father in the 1980s.
The Spanish monarchy has been struggling to repair its image after a series of scandals over the past decade, mainly linked to the former king Juan Carlos, who abdicated in 2014 in favor of his son, King Felipe.
6 Over the past two years, Leonor has been undergoing training at the General Military Academy in Zaragoza.
GTRES/Shutterstock
Juan Carlos abdicated amid a tax fraud case involving members of the royal family and following a scandal over his elephant-hunting trip in Africa at a time when Spain was going through a deep recession.
The former monarch has been living in Abu Dhabi since August 2020, when he left Spain after several investigations were opened in Spain and Switzerland into alleged fraud. The investigations have subsequently been dropped.
Meanwhile, Leonor's parents King Felipe and Queen Letizia have also been rocked by drama after veteran journalist Jaime Peñafiel made a slew of shocking claims about the pair's marriage.
6 The princess and her fellow cadets arrived via the Juan Sebastián de Elcano.
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Peñafiel, who has covered the royals for decades, claimed that Felipe was 'crushed and destroyed' over his wife's alleged infidelity with her ex-brother-in-law Jaime del Burgo.
In his book 'Letizia's Silences,' released in May, Peñafiel claimed the king of Spain was 'aware that Letizia was cheating on him in real time' as her bodyguards must report on her whereabouts.
The royal author alleges that bodyguards joined the queen on a trip to New York back in 2011, during which she was accompanied by her rumored 'lover' del Burgo.
Letizia, 52, reportedly dated del Burgo before meeting King Felipe in 2002.
Peñafiel alleged that the pair, who have been married since 2004, had a rocky relationship in the years before the alleged affair began.
6 Queen Letizia and King Felipe with their two daughters in Mallorca on July 31, 2023.
AFP via Getty Images
Del Burgo — who was married to Letizia's sister from 2012 to 2014 — has since claimed that he is still in touch with the Queen in an interview with Argentinian newspaper Clarín.
'We have shared many years of our lives together,' he told the outlet. 'We have been a family. As I have always said, ours was not a relationship of lovers. The lover would be him, in any case. I mean Felipe.'