A rare moment when Queen Elizabeth was allowed to be an “ordinary woman from the countryside”.

[If Queen Elizabeth had not been born into the Royal Family, she might have lived a different life. A lifelong horseback rider, most at home strolling the misty grounds of Balmoral, she “would have made a good farmer's wife,” longtime groom Terry Pendry said on the Rosebud podcast.

One can't help but imagine the Queen in her headscarf and Bubur jacket, climbing into her trusty Land Rover, but this week a selection of Queen Elizabeth's vehicles are on display at New York's Rockefeller Center. The exhibit, which runs through Sunday, October 20, offers a glimpse into the lifestyle that the late Queen Elizabeth loved.

Mike Bishop, chief historian for Jaguar Land Rover North America, told Marie Claire that he has seen glimpses of a very “normal” Queen Elizabeth when off duty.

“A few years ago I attended the Royal Windsor Horse Show. Earlier that morning, I went with a colleague to see the pony exhibit and saw the Queen show up in her 2009 Range Rover,” Bishop said.

Explaining that this was “before we got ready for the day's festivities,” Bishop says Queen Elizabeth “looked completely at home, like a normal woman in the country.”

Of the casual queen, Bishop says, “Riding and caring for horses was her lifelong hobby, and she seemed to want to leave early to spend time with her pony before the day began.”

A car expert watched Queen Elizabeth “get into her Range Rover with a few team members” and said, “Just watching her leave, you could tell she loved to drive and was very confident behind the wheel.”

The bishop was impressed by her skill; in fact, Queen Elizabeth told “Marie Claire” that she “had the same composure and mannerisms of a professional driver.”

This testimony is consistent with what Samantha Cohen, Queen Elizabeth's former private secretary, recently told The Sunday Times, that the queen was a “ballsy” driver. Cohen added, “She used to drive fast around Balmoral.”

Some of the late monarch's cars had very brand-like features, such as customized ones for her dogs, and in the case of the Range Rover the queen owned in 2009, it even had a “handbag holder,” the historian revealed.

As for Queen Elizabeth's reviewing car (think of the days when she stood and waved from her open-top car), it “incorporates a resting platform designed to match Her Majesty's height and shoe height, with a place to actually sit or lean, but standing It makes it look like you're standing, even though you actually have a place to sit or lean,” Bishop said.

Historians add that Elizabeth's car and her love of driving were a very important part of the person of the queen, especially as someone who served the country in World War II.

He praised the Queen as someone who “dedicated her life to service and was the first female member of the royal family to volunteer for military service,” adding that Queen Elizabeth's “specialty” during the war was driving and maintaining military and relief vehicles.

“It is said that it was at this time that her love of driving and the mechanical aspects of vehicles was ignited, which lasted a lifetime,” Bishop told Marie Claire.

The Vehicles of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, produced by Interluxe Group, is on display at Rockefeller Center in New York City through October 20. The exhibit will move to the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles from November 15 to November 16, and then to Destination Defender in Malibu, California from November 22 to 24.