Edinburgh and Festivals

On Saturday morning in Edinburgh, we woke to another brilliant blue sky. To improve further on the day, our friends from London met us in the breakfast room so that we could all start the day together!

When we booked our tickets for Edinburgh, the only thing we'd planned on was attending the Military Tattoo. We soon found out that August was basically the season of festivals in the Scottish city. Everywhere we walked, we ran into another event - festivals for books, politics, foods, the arts....even a festival for stone-carving (ok, that was just an exhibit at the arts college).

The Fringe Festival was the most obvious and popular of them all. Created in 1947 when eight theater groups showed up uninvited to the arts festival and took to performing in the streets, today's Fringe is organized enough to close down part of the Royal Mile and play host to hundreds of groups from all over the world. Nearly 250 Edinburgh venues play host to 2000 theater and musical performances. Performers spend their days in the streets of the Royal Mile, handing out advertisements for their show and re-enacting scenes in the street.

Also along the Royal Mile (and beyond) were scores of shops, selling Scottish cashmere, kilts, shortbread...just about anything you can think of - including tartan formal ware!

We were able to attend the Foodies at the Festival event twice during our trip - the first time on Friday when we popped in, soaking wet, for a chef's demonstration and some hot soup. On Saturday, we sampled Scottish whisky and cheeses while one of our friends hunted down local oysters.

Popping into the Parliament building (with its contemporary architecture, pictured above), we viewed the media photography exhibit while the Politics Festival went on. It wasn't all festivals and food though. We went into Holyrood Palace (photo at top), the Queen's Gallery and the Camera Obscura museum and enjoyed not only the illusions inside but the amazing views of Edinburgh from the roof.