Basics - The Rough Guide to Scotland - page 35

Mid- to late Jan Celtic Connections, Glasgow
W celticconnections.com. A major celebration of Celtic and folk
music held in venues across the city.
Last Tues in Jan Up-Helly-Aa, Lerwick, Shetland W visitshetland
.com. Norse fire festival culminating in the burning of a specially built
Viking longship. Visitors will need an invite from one of the locals, or you
can buy a ticket for the Town Hall celebrations.
Jan 25 Burns Night. Scots worldwide get stuck into haggis, whisky and
vowel-grinding poetry to commemorate Scotland's greatest poet, Robert
Burns (see boxes, p.37 & p.165).

Late May Atholl Highlanders Parade at Blair Castle, Perthshire
W blair-castle.co.uk. The annual parade and inspection of Britain's last
private army by their colonel-in-chief, the Duke of Atholl, on the eve of their
Highland Games. Also Burns an' a' That ( W burnsfestival.com), a modern
celebration of poet Robert Burns, including gigs by contemporary pop acts.

JUNE JULY
June-Aug Riding of the Marches in border towns such as Hawick,
Selkirk, Jedburgh, Langholm and Lauder. The Ridings originated to
check the boundaries of common land owned by the town and also to
commemorate warfare between the Scots and the English.
June Beginning of the Highland Games season across the
Highlands, northeast and Argyll. Also, the St Magnus Festival,
Orkney, is a classical and folk music, drama, dance and literature
festival celebrating the islands ( W stmagnusfestival.com). The
Edinburgh International Film Festival ( W edfilmfest.org.uk) runs
from mid-June for 10 days.
Late June Royal Highland Agricultural Show, at Ingliston near
Edinburgh W royalhighlandshow.org. Old wooden boats and fishing
craft gather for the Traditional Boat Festival at Portsoy on the Moray Firth
coast ( W stbfportsoy.com). Glasgow Jazz Festival ( W jazzfest.co.uk).
Early July T in the Park W tinthepark.com. Scotland's biggest
outdoor music event, held at Balado near Kinross, with a star-studded
line-up of contemporary bands.
July Scottish Open Golf Championship. Held each year at Loch
Lomond golf course, just before the British Open tournament, which is
played in Scotland at least every alternate year.
Late July The Wickerman Festival Festival of alternative music held
near Kirkcudbright ( W thewickermanfestival.co.uk).

FEB MARCH
Feb Scottish Curling Championship W royalcaledoniancurlingclub
.org. Held in a different (indoor) venue each year.
Feb-March Six Nations Rugby tournament. Tournament
between Scotland, England, Wales, Ireland, France and Italy
( W rbs6nations.com). Scotland's home games are played at
Murrayfield stadium in Edinburgh.
March 1 Whuppity Scourie, Lanark. Local children race round the church
beating each other with home-made paper weapons in a representation
(it's thought) of the chasing away of winter or the warding off of evil spirits.

APRIL MAY
April Scottish Grand National, Ayr W ayr-racecourse.co.uk. Not quite
as testing as the English equivalent steeplechase, but an important event
in the Scottish racing calendar. Also Rugby Sevens (seven-a-side
tournaments; W melrose7s.com) in the Borders and the entertaining and
inclusive Edinburgh Science Festival W sciencefestival.co.uk.
April 6 Tartan Day. Over-hyped celebration of ancestry by North
Americans of Scottish descent on the anniversary of the Declaration
of Arbroath in 1320. Ignored by most Scots in Scotland, other
than journalists.
Early May Spirit of Speyside Scotch Whisky Festival
( W spiritofspeyside.com). Four-day binge with pipe bands, gigs and
dancing as well as distillery crawls. Shetland Folk Festival
( W shetlandfolkfestival.com). One of the liveliest and most entertaining
of Scotland's round of folk festivals.
May Scottish FA Cup Final. Scotland's premier football event,
played in Glasgow.

AUG SEPT
Aug Edinburgh Festival W edinburghfestivals.com. One of the
world's great arts jamborees (see p.101). The Edinburgh Military Tattoo
( W edinburgh-tattoo.co.uk) features floodlit massed pipe bands and
drums on the castle esplanade. There's also the World Pipe Band
Championship at Glasgow ( W seeglasgow.com/piping), and plenty
more Highland Games.
Early Sept Shinty's Camanachd Cup Final W shinty.com. The
climax of the season for Scotland's own stick-and-ball game, normally

HOGMANAY
When hardline Scottish Protestant clerics in the sixteenth century abolished Christmas for
being a Catholic mass, the Scots, not wanting to miss out on a mid-winter knees-up, instead
put their energy into greeting the New Year, or Hogmanay . Houses were cleaned from top to
bottom, debts were paid and quarrels made up, and, after the bells of midnight were rung,
great store was laid by welcoming good luck into your house. This still takes the form of the
tradition of “ first-footing ” - visiting your neighbours and bearing gifts. The ideal first-foot is a
tall dark-haired male carrying a bottle of whisky; women or redheads, on the other hand, bring
bad luck - though, to be honest, no one carrying a bottle of whisky tends to be turned away
these days, whatever the colour of their hair. All this neighbourly greeting means a fair bit of
partying, and no one is expected to go to work the next day, or, indeed, the day after that.
Even today, January 1 is a public holiday in the rest of the UK, but only in Scotland does the
holiday extend to the next day too.