A Weekend in Edinburgh

On Friday, a group of us (13 in total) ventured off to Edinburgh, Scotland for the weekend. The highlight and whole purpose of our trip was to attend the famous Military Tattoo.

This event is so remarkable and spectacular that one must reserve tickets at least 6-12 months in advance since every single performance sells-out. The Military Tattoo takes place twice a day in the evening for a duration of 3 weeks. The Edinburgh Castle where it is held can hold up to 12000 spectators for each show.

Having heard about the heightened airport security on Thursday, we didn't really know what to expect at the Geneva Airport. Lucky for us, departure on Friday went very smoothly and on time.

I have been living here in Switzerland for a little over 10 years now and I have travelled tremendously in Europe as well as overseas. I had never experienced Scotland up until this past weekend and was completely shocked at the thousands of tourists roaming the city. As far as sights are concerned, Edinburgh doesn't exactly have the reputation of being a "must-see" city.

However, Edinburgh hosts TONS of interesting festivals in the summertime, which is why so many tourists flock there. A brilliant idea to boost ones' economy to say the least.

We had a great time and MANY good laughs. We visited the Edinburgh Castle, did a guided city-tour, a little shopping, some pub-crawling, lots of eating and of course attended the amazing Military Tattoo. I simply must add here that the Top Secret Drum Corps from Switzerland stole the show, as well as the New-Zealand Army Band.

One thing in particular that I kept hearing over and over (as well as saying it over and over myself), was how Edinburgh is so incredibly expensive. It's almost like they try to squeeze every last penny out of the tourists. If Swiss people, who are used to paying high prices for everything complain about how ridiculouly expensive Edinburgh is, then you know it is très cher!!!

We departed on Sunday and then and there, at the airport, the théâtre began. Tons of line-ups, delayed flights as well as cancelled flights were the "ordre-du-jour". We were given plastic bags in which the only alloted items to place into them were wallets, passports, eye-glasses without the case and baby food. Many people probably thought that this was a joke and checked in their baggage before placing the "forbidden" items into it. They were caught immediately and were forced to leave many items behind, including cell phones, Ipods, palms, blackberries, food, drinks, books (what the hell??), magazines, toilettries etc. I have rarely seen so many garbage cans overfilled in my life. What a major waste!!! With all of this hoopla going on around us, our return-flight ended up departing 2 hours later. Oh well, c'est la vie I suppose.

While it is clear that certain measures have to be taken for the sake of "terrorism", are we really headed in the right direction here?

Pic 1 : Thousands of people waiting patiently to go see the Military Tattoo;
Pic 2 : The beginning of the show with the bagpipers of 13 different units (Scotland, Ireland, Royal Air Force, Gurkhas, Cape Town (South Africa), and Queensland Police from Australia);
Pic 3 & 4: Band of the Coldstream Guards together with the Band of the Scots Guards;
Pic 5: Coldstream Guards, Scots Guards, Royal Regiment of Scotland, Gurkhas, New Zealand Army Band and the Army Band of Chile;
Pic 6: All 1000 musicians together for the great finale playing the National Anthem, Auld Lang Syne and the Day Thou Gavest;
Pic 7: Sandra and Mat in a Pub:
Pic 8: View from the Castle;
Pic 9: Parts of the Edinburgh Castle