Today, Thursday September 15, William and Kate, the newly appointed Prince and Princess of Wales, joined crowds of well-wishers outside Sandringham, ahead of Queen Elizabeth II's funeral on Monday.
Arriving just after lunchtime, the pair visited an array of floral tributes left by those wishing to pay their respects to the late Queen in King's Lynn where the Sandringham estate is situated.
While they were there, the couple, who also retain their titles of Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, spoke to members of the crowd, thanking them for their kind words and commiserating on the loss of Britain's longest reigning matriarch.
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According to one Twitter user, Prince William could be heard telling an attendee that following the Queen's coffin was 'particularly difficult,' because it reminded him of having to make a similar public march for his mother Diana's funeral in 1997, when he was just 15-years-old.
According to the same witness, when another woman told him she was close to tears, he replied: 'Don’t cry now - you’ll start me.'
As the couple moved past the flowers and towards the gates of Sandringham, William placed a protective hand on the small of his wife's back, in a rare show of affection for these sorts of formal, sombre engagements.
Queen Elizabeth's state funeral will be held on Monday morning at Westminster Abbey, following which there will be a private service for just her family, at the King George VI Memorial Chapel, where she will be buried next to her late husband the Duke of Edinburgh.
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