Both the Queen and Prince Philip have always loved photography, and the Queen was famously filming an old rhino at the salt lick on her cine camera at Treetops in Kenya at almost the moment her father died. Philip had the latest and most professional still camera equipment and used to get very irritated with photographers when they were slow when shooting official portraits. Cecil Beaton was subject to many caustic comments during his sessions, and years later cockney photographer Terry O’Neill recalled Prince Philip’s brusqueness at the christening of Princess Eugenie at Sandringham. ‘Haven’t you taken enough?’ he kept asking. ‘I can’t believe anyone can take so long just to take a few boring photographs.’

More recently Prince Philip was at a lunch at the RAC Club in Piccadilly after a fly-past to commemorate the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Battle of Britain. The duke was in an official photograph together with the Duke of Cambridge, the Earl of Wessex and the Duke of Gloucester and six remaining veterans of the day. Becoming more and more agitated at the slowness of the photographer, he said, ‘Just take the f***ing picture.’ In the age of social media, the video footage of the moment went viral.

Even in their old age, the Queen and Philip retain their separate interests. The Queen loves walking her dogs, playing patience and completing complicated jigsaw puzzles. She keeps her photograph albums up to date and is meticulous about writing her diary every night. Philip is just the opposite and gets frustrated when he is not doing something physical.

Even he, however, has had to bow to advancing years. In 2011, he received treatment for a blocked coronary artery after he was taken to hospital suffering chest pains. He was fitted with a stent to keep the artery open, because of which he has had to give up shooting. It was considered that the recoil of a gun was too dangerous as it could dislodge the stent. Fly fishing for salmon and trout has since become Philip’s favourite pastime at Balmoral. Despite his age, he is still steady enough to stand in the river Dee and, together with a ghillie, can spend hours in the water, wearing chest-high protective waders, only breaking to join the Queen and guests for lunch or tea in one of the huts near the river. The Queen used to be a keen angler, having inherited her love of fishing from her mother, to whom, being a Scot, fishing was second nature, but she has not fished for several years.