Queen travels to Scotland for start of her summer holidays

The Queen has travelled to her private Scottish home of Balmoral for the start of her traditional summer break.

Scotland has been a welcome place of sanctuary for the royal family since Queen Victoria’s day, where they relax and enjoy country pursuits in the stunning setting of the Scottish highlands.

The Queen is unlikely to be alone for very long as members of her family are invited to spend time with her at Balmoral every summer.

A picture released following the Duke of Edinburgh’s death in April last year showed the Queen and her late husband surrounded by their great grandchildren at their Scottish home.

Outgoing Prime Minister Boris Johnson may travel up to Aberdeenshire for the premier’s annual visit to the monarch’s Scottish home, if the new Conservative leader is not chosen by the time of the get-together.

Prime ministers are traditional invited to stay with the Queen at Balmoral and in the past Harold Wilson, who is said to have “got on like a house on fire” with the monarch, would join members of the royal family for riverside picnics at Balmoral.

But things were very different with Baroness Thatcher, who reportedly found the traditional September weekend at Balmoral painful.

One observer wrote: “A weekend in the country with aristocrats who enjoy riding, shooting, sports and games is Thatcher’s idea of torture.”

Mrs Thatcher could not abide the charades that she was expected to play after dinner at Balmoral.

During a gathering of six of her premiers, the Queen once joked about “the party games which some of you have so nobly endured at Balmoral”.