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Queen Elizabeth always seems to behave impeccably when she meets personalities from around the world. The monarch, however, greatly alarmed a foreign leader during his royal visit to the United Kingdom. The man in question was King Abdullah, the former King of Saudi Arabia. He came to visit the Queen in 2003. The royal couple met at the Queen's Balmoral estate in Scotland – but it was an alarming rendezvous for the Saudi monarch.
Her surprise was triggered when Queen Elizabeth offered to drive away during the visit.
What King Abdullah was not prepared for was that the British monarch intended to drive himself.
The queen is no stranger to engines and, in fact, trained as a mechanic during the war.
However, it does not have a driver's license. She is the only person in the county who does not have one.
While women have long been able to drive in the UK, women in Saudi Arabia have not been allowed to drive until 2018.
The meeting of the queen and the king taking place well before that date, Abdullah was shocked to be led by a woman.
Sherard Cowper-Coles, former British ambbadador to Saudi Arabia, described the episode in the book "Ever the Diplomat: Confessions of a Mandarin Ministry of Foreign Affairs".
After the queen offered to take them to the Balmoral field, "the crown prince climbed into the front seat of the Land Rover," Cowper-Coles wrote.
"To his surprise, the Queen climbed into the driver's seat, switched on the ignition and started.
"Abdullah was not used to being driven by a woman, let alone by a queen.
"His nervousness only grew when the Queen, a wartime army driver, sped up the Land Rover along the narrow roads of the Scottish estate."
The Saudi royal even asked, through her translator, if she could "slow down and focus on the road ahead."
The Queen has been known to arouse surprise among those around her on her travels abroad on other occasions.
During a trip to the Royal Yacht Britannia in the royal family in the Pacific, a pantomime was organized, the Queen acting as a wardrobe badistant.
"This meant that the squire took the party of a Polynesian beauty," said diplomat Roger du Boulay in Robert Hardman's book, Queen of the World.
"I remember him sitting on the floor and the queen kneeling on the floor.
"It was put on the waist and she adjusted a brewery. It was an extraordinary sight! "
During other informal family vacations, Prince Philip has revealed himself to have an improbable talent. "The royal family loved sailing on the west coast of Britain. The main thing was to be able to move anywhere on a whim and down to land with ease, said Hardman.
He continued, "Meanwhile, Prince Philip would love the opportunity to sit on his barbecue in the most unimaginable places – and cook everything that goes through his head.
"He drove down with the whole BBQ kit and the queen would come later with the salad and all the side dishes," says Sir Robert Woodard. [a former Commander of the Royal Yacht Britannia].
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