God Save the Queen

The locals all seemed nonchalant about it Thursday and Friday, but by 3 PM Saturday, when the maroon Bentley pulled into the stadium, the excitement was universal, and none were more thrilled by the event than Vicki and I. Though she stayed for an hour, it was hard to take our eyes off her and members of the royal party. Somehow, we continued watching the games, stealing glances, and not a few pix. What an experience!

HM The Queen's reviewing stand; takes about two weeks to

decorate in Highland fashion

About 2:30, all members of the press are herded into one place

About 2:50, the maroon Bentley and two other vehicles

appear

She was that close!

And the Duke of Edinburgh and the Prince of Wales, and

Princess Anne

Honors and congratulations

More honors and congratulations

Departure, precisely at 4 PM

Escorted by the massed bands

Royal Highland Games

Highland games have been going on in Scotland for 900 years, they say. The Braemar Gathering, originally and still a charitable undertaking--indeed, the UK's oldest "friend" society--was begun in 1822. The Braemar Gathering became the Royal Highland Games about 20 years later, when Queen Victoria offered royal patronage, an arrangement that continues today. We knew of the games, which occur the first Saturday of September, from previous visits, and, again, Vicki was able to obtain two more tough tickets to another unforgettable event.

The events go on throughout the day, dancing, drum and pipe bands playing, individual bagpipe competitions, the "heavy" events (tossing a variety of unusual objects), tug of war, conventional track and field, sack races for the kiddies, etc., generally five or six events going on at any time.

Opening procession, Wrights' Walk

Hammer throw

Backward toss (50lb weight, over the bar)

Dancin'

Hornpipe dancin'

Winning the hill climb

Tug of war, constantly, all day long; mostly military service

teams, e.g., the 43rd Highland Artillery, RAF Oldham Field,

etc.

Up closer

Band and baton toss: there was a band playing on the field

almost constantly throughout the day; above the Glenfiddich

(sponsor of heavy games) banner, you'll see a drum major's

baton in the air, with a drum major below rushing to catch it

...another competition

Noon massed bands

Tossing the caber...sort of a telephone pole you toss up in the

air so that it turns 180 degrees and lands at a perfect 

perpendicular; sure, I know it sounds easy...

A pretty good landing; as I recall, it's the number of seconds

the caber stands there before falling that determines the

winner

Ascent of Morrone Hill

The hill immediately above the village of Braemar is Morrone, and climbing it is one of half a dozen short walks one can do out of Braemar. I climbed it Friday afternoon in a couple hours. Little did I know that its summit and return is the "hill climb" of the Royal Highland Games, and Saturday I would see someone do the complete circuit in 17 minutes!

Morrone Hill, from the Duck Pond above Braemar

Compass

Below, the Royal Princess and Duke of Fife Memorial Field, where the annual 
Royal Highland Games take place, and to the right of the fields and stands, the 
village of Braemar

In the distance, Invercauld Castle, owned by the Farquharsons, the local nobility, 
who sold Balmoral (a few more miles down the Dee) to Queen Victoria

Highlands

After touring the Britannia, we drove north into the Highlands, stopping at Braemar, on the rivers Dee and Clunie, in the Cairgorms, Scotland's central mountain range. We rested mostly for two days, studying up on Scotland...mostly reading, but Vicki watched Braveheart (which I detest) and together we watched the old Ian McKellen version of Macbeth (that was Gandalf?!). As expected, even in early September, it was wet, windy, and cool. But the place is enchanting. And it got better.

Purple mountains' majesty....the heather was in bloom

everywhere

Highlands, nearing Braemar

Campsite, on a lay-by over-looking the River Dee, all to

ourselves

Cairngorm view, from near Braemar

The River Clunie, in the village of Braemar

The area is world-class salmon fishing country (and hunting,

and walking, and climbing, and skiing

HMY Britannia

Thursday we packed up and left Mortonhall, driving through Edinburgh to its port of Leith, to tour Her Majesty's Yacht Britannia, now permanently berthed there. Britannia was in commission from 1954 to 1997 and carried the Queen and family members to a variety of official and holiday destinations, as far as Australia, as near as the Western Isles. Touring the ship provided a rare glimpse into more casual moments of royalty as well as a sense of personal tastes and interests. The Britannia was manned by a crew of 240, Royal Navy and Marines, and commanded by an admiral.

A painting of HMY Britannia

The Queen's stateroom

The Queen's office/study

The state dining room

Sitting room

Family photo aboard ship; one of many

The Royal Barge (44 feet)

Strangely enough, the American movie replica of HMS

Bounty was nearby

Elephant House and a Flying Dutchman

The Elephant House, where J. K. Rowling wrote the first several

tomes of Harry Potter; it is on George IV Bridge amid the

museum, national library and related buildings

The view out the back room windows is stunningly inspirational

Me, seeking inspiration; it did not come from the MacLachlan

ale, the worst beverage I have ever had

Vicki, who has read all the books and seen

all the movies, also was inspired

The decor is mostly representations of, um, elephants

We moved on at length to Usher Hall, where we saw and

heard a performance of Wagner's Flying Dutchman, by the

Hamburg Opera (part of the Festival); oratorio style, but

with the singers acting their roles as much as the setting

permitted; the conductor (conductress?) was a bit of a

dancer, but I guess that's the style these days; she obviously

had the respect of the musicians, and it was a memorable

performance, received gratefully by the fullest hall I have

ever seen

Gimme That Old-Time Museum

Our experience at the Museum of Scotland was a disappointment. The building itself is a curiosity, at least in its setting. The museum is less chronological than theme-oriented, the themes don't work all that well (there's much they don't capture), the language tends toward nine-year-olds, the displays are odd and sometimes poorly lit or identified. All this in a structure and exhibition that is merely a decade old. Not a place to get your Charles, James, Bonnies, and Jacobites all in proper order. Nor to get much more than an oddly episodic and strangely organized notion of Scottish history. Oh well. We moved on.

Museum exterior on George IV Bridge

There were perhaps twenty of these "life-sized" transformer-

beings grouped together in the paleolithic area; look closely--

they are each holding or carrying displays of barely labeled

paleolithic artifacts

Drinking and driving...a Pictish depiction?

The Lewis chessman--from the Western Isles, the oldest

known chess-set (wait a second; I thought these were in the

BM...)

Corliss steam engine

Uniform associated with 1745, Bonnie Prince

Charlie events