The Queen’s passion for horses has spanned more than 90 years — and she will soon have some new riding companions. Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis are trotting about on their first ponies.
The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s children have become avid riders in recent months, practising their skills at their home in Norfolk, where they have spent much of the lockdown. The Queen, 94, who has continued riding her fell ponies during lockdown, is understood to be taking a close interest in her great-grandchildren’s progress in the saddle.
When the lockdown eases, George, 7, Charlotte, 5, and Louis, 2, are expected to join “Gan Gan”, as they call her, for rides at Windsor and Balmoral in the summer.
The Cambridge children are understood to have been keen on having their own ponies for some time. Charlotte’s enthusiasm was evident on her first day at Thomas’s school, Battersea, in southwest London, in 2019, when she sported a unicorn charm on her school bag. George is previously reported to have taken riding lessons on a Shetland pony belonging to Prince William’s cousin, Zara Tindall.
William, 38, and Kate, 39, are keen for their children to learn to ride, with the proviso that they should take a “hands-on” approach, helping with the grooming and mucking-out.
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The ponies are thought to have eased the children’s sadness over the death of Lupo, their cocker spaniel. “He has been at the heart of our family for the past nine years and we will miss him so much,” William and Kate wrote in an Instagram post after Lupo died in November.
William, an accomplished horseman who regularly fox-hunted before the ban came into force in 2005, and still plays polo for charity events, is said to be “thrilled” his children are enjoying a hobby that he and the Duke of Sussex shared as children. The Prince of Wales and the late Diana, Princess of Wales took William and Harry riding at Highgrove, Charles’s Gloucestershire home.
The Queen has been a devoted equestrian since 1930, when her grandfather, George V, gave her a Shetland pony called Peggy for her fourth birthday. Her love of horses has been inherited by several family members, notably the Princess Royal, who won an individual gold medal at the 1971 European eventing championships and competed at the 1976 Montreal Olympics, and her daughter, Zara Tindall, the 2006 eventing world champion and a 2012 Olympic silver medallist.
The Queen’s head groom and riding companion, Terry Pendry, has described his boss as “a fountain of knowledge in all things equine — you might say a living encyclopedia”.
The Earl and Countess of Wessex’s daughter, Lady Louise Windsor, rides with the Queen at Windsor and Balmoral. A royal source said: “At weekends Louise is often at the stables, helping out Terry and the team with the horses, mucking out and just getting stuck in.”
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John Warren, the Queen’s racing manager, has said: “The greatest asset you need to have with horses is patience — which, luckily, the Queen has in spades.”
That patience may be gently tested in the coming months, with three novice riding companions.https://twitter.com/RoyaNikkhah
