Royal | News - Prince Ricardo De La Cerda
The monarch, 75, was “delighted” to be told he had dodged the naughty section and even got a hug from the festive legend when they met at a Christmas market.
Santa Claus said: “I asked The King if he was at Sandringham this year and he said he was.
“I asked him if he had enough room for the sleigh to park and he said, ‘Yes.’
“I remarked that he looked very well and the King said he had ‘never felt better’. And I told him that he was at the top of Santa’s very good list. He said, ‘Really?’ and sounded delighted.”
Charles’s secret Santa visit to Ealing Broadway Shopping Centre in west London had not been announced – but word soon got around and huge crowds gathered to take photos and shake his hand.
Meanwhile, the Queen managed to keep smiling when she arrived at a museum to hear a quote about unhappy families – amid the fall-out from Endgame, Omid Scobie’s controversial book attacking the Royals.
Camilla was at the Garden Museum in south London as part of its Winter Flowers Week.
In his welcome speech, director Christopher Woodward used Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy’s opening line from Anna Karenina: “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” He later said he meant it as a declaration that flowers bring joy.
Camilla, 76, certainly looked happy when she met Mr Wood-ward’s son Max, three, who shook hands using his toy dinosaur.
The Queen also learned about artist Frank Walter, who kept a photo of a young Charles on his sideboard.
When Camilla saw the snap, she joked: “I recognise the face.”
She later attended the cancer charity Maggie’s Carol concert at St Paul’s with Dame Joanna Lumley and Dame Prue Leith.