Prince William and the Duchess of Cambridge, née Kate Middleton, had to watch their step during a daring disembarkation from a Canadian steam train on day five of their royal tour. The royal couple followed in the footsteps of the Queen and Prince Philip as they boarded a historic locomotive during a visit to Carcross, a tiny hamlet in Yukon.
After walking through a cloud of white smoke, they clambered inside the cab and took it in turns to loudly blow the whistle as they chatted to the driver. William was told how his grandparents had travelled in the last carriage of the very same train, which was specially kitted out with a marble table for their 1959 visit.
William and Kate made a daring exit from the historic train in Carcross
The Prince then gallantly helped his wife climb back down on to the tracks and they carefully sidestepped along to the front of the engine. The train had stopped close to the end of a railway bridge that crossed over a stretch of water, and although the drop below was not a long one, there was no rail to step the couple from falling.
First Nation chief Andy Carvill, of the Carcross Tagish, who hosted William and Kate during their visit to his settlement, said: "The Duke asked if he could go in and they got inside the train and blew the steam whistle. I told them about the Queen's coach and they were pleased to hear that."
Earlier in the day, William and Kate made history by sending their very first joint public tweet – with a twist. The couple used a Morse code telegraph machine connected to a computer to send their virtual message during a visit to Yukon's history museum in Whitehorse.
The dots and dashes were tapped out by 90-year-old Doug Bell, but the royals both held down the lever to send the tweet, posted under the Twitter account Telegraph to Tweet, which read: "The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, September 2016, Whitehorse Yukon."
© Photo: RexThe royal couple had earlier sent their very first joint public tweet - via Morse code
"Ah, there's a spelling mistake,” William joked to Doug after he had typed out the text.
Mr Bell, a former Commissioner of Yukon, went on to tell the couple about the time he had met William's parents, Prince Charles and Diana, Princess of Wales in the early 1980s during their visit to Ottawa. "It seems pretty much everyone has met my family here!" the Duke remarked.
