Lady Louise Windsor Drives Late Grandfather Prince Philip's Carriage During Royal Windsor Horse Show
Lady Louise Windsor is the first child of Prince Edward and Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh.
July 5 2021, Published 9:51 a.m. ET
Always thinking of her late grandfather. Lady Louise Windsor paid tribute to Prince Philip by riding his horse carriage during the Royal Windsor Horse Show.
Lady Louise loved horses, just like her grandfather.
So much so, it was reported that Philip left his two beloved fell ponies and dark green carriage to Lady Louise, 17.
The teenager will continue to regularly exercise the two black ponies — Balmoral Nevis and Notlaw Storm — at Windsor, the Daily Mail reported.
Philip — who had been designing horse-drawn vehicles since the 1970s — was thrilled that his granddaughter shared the same interests as him.
“He [Philip] was so pleased when she took the sport up because I took it up — I was at the beginning of my carriage driving career and I fell pregnant with Louise so I had to hang up the reins," Lady Louise's mother, Sophie, Countess of Wessex said. “So, I was really delighted when she decided that she wanted to have a go and my father-in-law was always so good at encouraging."
“He was really encouraging of Louise and when she not only said can I have a go, but then showed a flair for it, he was just brilliant with her," she added.
Philip — who died on April 9 at 99 years old — competed in several horse competitions over the years — and didn't stop until he was in his eighties.
"I am getting old, my reactions are getting slower, and my memory is unreliable, but I have never lost the sheer pleasure of driving a team through the British countryside," he previously shared about his passion.
Sophie made it clear that the royal family was having a hard time coping with Philip's death.
"Well, he has left a giant-sized hole in our lives," she told BBC Radio 5 Live. “I think the pandemic has unfortunately slightly skewed things in as much as it's hard to spend as much time with the Queen as we would like to. We’ve been trying to, but of course it's still not that easy."
“And of course the normal way of things isn’t normal yet so we’re not necessarily doing the things that we would normally have done with him," she continued. “So I think the whole grieving process is probably likely for us to take a lot longer. It may be the same for many other families out there. Because if you’re not living with somebody, 24/7, the immediate loss isn’t necessarily felt in the same way, as if somebody was in the house with you all the time.”