Throughout the day, the coaches kept arriving.
Thousands of mourners, clutching their bouquets of flowers, made the walk across the River Dee and up to the black and gold gates of Balmoral Castle.
Bowing their heads, they paid their respects to Britain’s longest reigning monarch and the first to die in Scotland.
Inside the castle, the Queen’s coffin, covered with the royal standard of Scotland, was reportedly placed in the Balmoral ballroom to allow household staff to pay their respects.
It is a room that many of them would have known as the site of the Ghillies Ball, an annual ball that brings together staff, members of the local community and senior royals for a night of Scottish dancing.
The young Princess Elizabeth was first allowed to attend at aged 12 and had loved it ever since.
Paul Anderson, 52, a fiddle player who had played often for the Queen, was at the ball only a few weeks ago. “It would surprise folk how laid back it is,” he told The Independent outside Balmoral castle.
“The Queen wasn’t able to attend this year but all the other senior royals came, Charles, Edward, Anne, and you see them totally relaxed and happy.
“All sorts of people are invited, the butcher of Ballater comes along, it’s a real cross-section of the local community.”
He recalled the Queen’s love of traditional Scottish music, adding that he often played for her at services in Crathie Kirk, the royals’ home church when they were staying in Balmoral.
“I took part in a wee religious observance for her at Balmoral in the first year of Covid, when the churches weren’t open, but things had opened up enough that she requested a small service,” Mr Anderson recalled.
He said that the Queen would stay seated till the very end of the services at her local church, tapping her foot along to the music. “She would always look across and give me a wee smile,” he added.
Speaking about her death, he said: “I can’t really put it into words. It’s a numb feeling, a shock. She had been so obviously in public view with the prime minister coming up and she was doing her duty until the very end. Then pretty much the next day she was away. It’s hard to get round that change.”
Shona Donaldson, 37, who has sung for the Queen on multiple occasions, said that the people coming to Balmoral were mourning a member of their community, a local resident.
“She certainly was part of the community round here,” she said. “She went to church and you would often see her and other senior royals out and about.
“The Queen was just part of the parish,” Mr Anderson added. “Apart from sitting on the royal pew she wasn’t treated any different.”
Piles of flowers and tributes built up at the gates to Balmoral throughout the day and the weather stayed clear for the well-wishers on Friday.
One message left with a bunch of flowers read: “We will miss her greatly, but it is so wonderful to have her example of constancy, patience and warm leadership. She has seen us through many trials as a nation with courage and faithfulness.”
The Queen’s coffin will now reportedly stay at the Scottish estate until Sunday, when it will be driven to the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh. It will then travel to London to lie in state in the Palace of Westminster.
Andrew Day, 49, travelled 40 miles to Balmoral because his mother, who died four weeks ago, was a keen royalist.
Speaking about her death, Mr Day told The Independent: “That emotion for me is still very raw, but there is a lot of comfort from coming here today. There is a shared grief in a sense. My mother loved the service of the royal family.
“The Bishop in her funeral spoke of her duty and her commitment to service – very much like Her Majesty the Queen. So I really felt like it was my duty to come here today to pay my respects.
“I’ve written a card to Charles and in it I explained about my mother. I told him: ‘People will tell you lots of things, I’ll keep it quite simple, be sad and cry a lot because that’s the natural order of things. It’s quite simple.’”
Many visitors to the castle were brought to tears as they reflected on the Queen’s life. One mourner, Aga Kanska, broke down as she spoke about why she had travelled to Balmoral.
“We’ve been living in Scotland the past 17 years. She was a part of our lives too, even though we are Polish. But we feel like she was our Queen too,” she said.
Melissa Dutson, from the Cotswolds, was visiting her son in Perth and felt she had to pay her respects. “We have the deepest respect for our Queen and we are mourning her loss,” she said.
“I was devastated, shocked, filled with overwhelming sadness when I heard the news. She has been an integral part in all of our lives.”
She was confident that King Charles would follow in his mother’s footsteps, saying: “He is my hero, always has been. He will do an amazing job and we will be as proud of him as we are the Queen.”
