text:  the Second World War she was taken up to Balmoral to keep her safe from the Blitz and apparently the late Queen Mother tried to cheer her up by learning Czarist era boat songs and sort of having a sing along with her so there's intimate sort of fun details like that but also you know these are places where Churchill and Thatcher went for meetings with Elizabeth II and it has been a place that really does embody more the private life of the royal family but there's still that political heft to it