On survey days, the women wake up early, finish household chores and gather at a base camp before travelling by vehicle as far as the terrain allows. From there, they trek several kilometres to reach camera sites, often at altitudes above 14,000ft (4,300m), where the thin air makes even simple movement exhausting.

However, the leader of Norway’s Green Party, Arild Hermstad, who is a republican says the email exchanges point to a monarchy that is not working: “It really puts not only the royal family in a big squeeze, but also for Norway itself, how do you actually solve this? At least she has to be very…