London: Queen Elizabeth, her fortunes revived after a turbulent decade for the royal family, turned 80 on Friday demonstrating all the stamina she needs to become Britain's longest-reigning monarch.
With a decade to go before she would rival Queen Victoria's 64 years on the throne, this sprightly working grandmother shows no signs of slowing down and seems to have genes on her side -- her mother died at 101.
Crowned nearly 53 years ago, she firmly rules out abdication and opinion polls suggest republicans face a losing battle calling for the abolition of the monarchy while she is still alive.
In an ITV News survey, she was rated the most popular royal.
Bottom of the pack came Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, who last year married the queen's eldest son Charles after a tortuous 35-year romance.
The queen will celebrate two birthdays this year, her actual birthday (April 21) and her "official" birthday (celebrated June 17). She celebrates her real birthday privately with friends and family; her official birthday is marked by ceremonies at Buckingham Palace.
She sent a congratulatory message to the Apollo 11 moon-bound astronauts in 1969. The container was left on moon’s surface.
She has received more than 3 million items of correspondence thus far. She has sent more than 2,80,000 telegrams to couples in the United Kingdom celebrating their 60th wedding anniversaries and nearly 1,00,000 telegrams to centenarians.
According to a 1324 statute, the queen owns the sturgeons, whales and dolphins in the waters around the United Kingdom. She has received many unusual gifts, including jaguars, sloths, beavers and even an elephant.
She also continues the royal family's long association with racing pigeons. In 2005, she claimed ownership to 88 cygnets on the River Thames. But the two animals most associated with Her Majesty are horses and dogs.
The queen has owned more than 30 corgis. She also introduced a new breed of dog, the "dorgi," after mating of one of her corgis with a dachshund that belonged to Princess Margaret.
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Low key celebrations
Britain's most famous octogenarian has opted for a strikingly low-key day of celebrations to mark her personal milestone.
She will be spending the day at Windsor Castle, ravaged by fire in 1992, the year she memorably called her "annus horribilis" after the marriages of three of her four children broke up.
Stepping out of the castle, she will head off on a walkabout among her subjects -- a tradition she first adopted in a tour of Australia and New Zealand in 1970.
On the advice of police who expect a major turnout, the route has been extended so she can meet as many well-wishers as possible.
Asked what she wanted for her birthday during a visit to the BBC on Thursday, she said "a nice sunshiny day -- that would be nice."
The queen, who has received 20,000 birthday cards and 17,000 e-mails, said: "I have been very touched by what you have written and would like to express my gratitude to you all for making this day such a special day for me."
Any doubts about her stamina were firmly squashed by her second son, Prince Andrew, who told Sky News: "She is probably one of the fittest 80-year-olds you could ever wish to meet."
On Wednesday evening, Charles is to host a private family dinner for his mother. The two are much closer now that his tangled love life has finally been sorted out.
His first wife Princess Diana, killed in 1997 in a Paris car crash that provoked an outpouring of grief from Britons, had always blamed Camilla for the breakup of her marriage to Charles.
The queen, born in 1926, suffered a backlash from her children's disastrous marriages but now public opinion is broadly pro-monarchy - at least until she dies.
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