It was Anna, her trusted sidekick, that her mother had chosen to accompany the coffin on its journey from Balmoral and fly with it to RAF Northolt from Edinburgh. On her arrival in London, in just 120 words, Princess Vasiliki last night described what had been an extremely emotional few days. “I was lucky enough to share the last 24 hours of my dearest mother’s life,” he wrote in a touching tribute. “It was an honor and a privilege to accompany her on her final journeys.” She went on to thank the mourners for their love and respect and the British public for the support shown to her brother the new King. She ended her statement simply: “To my mother, the queen, thank you.” The Princess Royal had been in Scotland for two days when she was due to go to her mother’s bedside at Balmoral Castle to see her for the last time. Having visited Tarbert, a village in the west, before spending the previous day on the Isle of Skye, the Queen’s only daughter was due to perform a series of engagements in Perthshire last Thursday morning when news of her mother’s worsening condition reached her her. . She quickly informed her siblings of the situation, urging Charles to get a helicopter to travel from Dumfries House, where she was staying, to Royal Deeside. If there is any consolation in Queen Elizabeth’s unexpectedly quick death, it is that her son and daughter were already in Scotland and could be with her at the end.
