Edinburgh Festival

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We had a fab weekend at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival! It was so nice to catch up with Nathan's friend Danilo - who had kindly said we could stay with him for the weekend. The weather co-operated and it was fine and pretty hot some of the time. We set off up the M6 on Friday morning - then stopped at the country's favourite Service Station - Tebay.

 It's pretty nice to have a bit of lunch by a duck pond and then visit the farm shop afterwards. It made a nice break!  We carried on to Edinburgh - coming off the motorway over the border to take the scenic route. Saw a lot of wind turbines!

Lunch at Tebay

By afternoon we'd located Danilo's flat and managed to get a parking space in the next street. I like the sound of Orwell Place - not sure if George Orwell had connections with Edinburgh? There were a couple of roads named after him.

Then  we walked the thirty minutes or so into the centre of Edinburgh - which was packed with people and swelteringly hot! We had to pick up some tickets in the main festival box office in the High Street. It was so full of music and performers and all manner of dressed-up people trying to give us flyers for their shows - it was difficult to move!



Susan Calman

We had pre-booked tickets to see Susan Calman - and also the Festival of the Spoken Nerd - Full Frontal Nerdity. The first of these was early Friday evening - so we got the tickets and set off for the New Town to find the venue known as The Stand III. It turned out that it was in the basement of a hotel! We managed to get a nice cool cider full of ice in the hotel bar  - before going into the packed room below.






It was worth it - she was very funny. She's just come back from a trip to Venice on the Orient Express. I didn't realise that when you book a trip on that train you get a massive handbook through your door - all about the etiquette and dress code for the journey. Sounds wonderful!!



Nicely Chilled White :-)

When we emerged from that it was time to meet up with Danilo who had finished work and was on his way! We headed for the outdoor bars in George Square, where they were promoting a strange drink called Aperol - it was a liqueur made from oranges and apples - I think! The promo girl saw us waiting in the queue for the bar and told us that they'd run out of ice and the drink tasted "disgusting" without it. She offered us each a free pair of bright orange sunglasses if we would wait until the ice arrived. We waited for the sunglasses.....

We went off to another bar soon after and got a bottle of chilled white wine instead! Danilo suggested a very fine restaurant called Gusto, for dinner. There was a bit of a wait - but more wine in the bar waiting area went down well - until we got a table. It was worth the wait as the food was sublime! I tried calamari for the first time (well - just nicked a bit of Danilo's starter!) It wasn't as bad as I'd feared - nice and crispy in fact :-) I had chicken with polenta chips. It was lovely.

We did chat for quite a long time and it was after midnight when we finished and walked home.

Saturday was not quite so hot - but still no rain! We had some porridge made by Danilo - which was just gorgeous. He says you have to learn how to make porridge properly if you live in Scotland - but wouldn't divulge the secret recipe! He made it in a pan - not microwave - and I did see him put some butter in! It certainly set us up for a very busy day!

Busy Edinburgh - from upstairs at Garfunkels

We strolled into the city centre once more to see what was going on. We paused for a while to watch a very funny half-naked man with a red Mohawk haircut - juggle with a chainsaw. he was quite impressive - although he did remind me of Keith from the Prodigy in  his Firestarter days. We wandered through the main streets and squares, looking at the stalls in the Grass Market and by the time we decided to stop at Garfunkels for some early lunch we had a bag full of flyers to look through.

Just before we got there though we saw a Victorian-looking gentleman standing in front of us - with nothing in his hands. As each of us passed him though - he magically produced a calling card with the details of his show. We all decided there and then we'd have to go and see it.

We had also had a chat with a friendly chap with a coffin outside there. He told us about his play, on at 9.10pm that evening, in which a hypochondriac is tragically diagnosed with immortality. "It's a comedy - honest!" he said. We put that on our "to-see" list too!






Nick Hall - from Watford

After lunch we headed over to the Gilded Balloon venue - as that is where we were seeing the Full Frontal Nerdity later. We were once more accosted by a leafleter - who told us of a free show, starting in only 15 minutes in the pub across the road. It was a comedian who had been part of a comedy group called the Three Englishmen - but was now striking out on his own. We had nothing on - so went over, got ourselves drinks and stood (as the place was packed) to watch Nick Hall. He seemed a little nervous and was obviously used to performing in the evenings as he kept saying "tonight" instead of this afternoon. But once he got going he was very funny. Basically told us of his life so far - starting off in Watford where he was born and raised. It was very clever as at the end he managed to précis it all and give us a very positive message at the end. He was great - and got a big cheer after the hour was up. He passed a milk jug round for contributions :-)





In Rastamouse's Tent

We had a little time before the Victorian Magicians Morgan and West - so went to investigate what was going on in the BBC area in Potterow. We sat under the welcome shade of their big pink tent and watched the Rastamouse show. He made a brief appearance towards the end - but it was mainly embarrassed BBC employees singing and dancing and trying to get the little ones to join in. It as quite funny to watch :-)




We did get the "Make a little pie" song in our heads for the rest of the weekend though!



Morgan..or West...

Soon after that we were queueing outside the Dining Room in the Gilded Balloon, having our tickets checked, for the amazing Morgan and West.

As we entered the theatre there was one of them (sorry - not sure which is which..) sitting writing his journal on the stage. There was lots of magic - but the best thing about the show was that there was a story - and they were both very funny as well as being great magicians. Nathan told me afterwards that it said on the leaflet that they had won that show where magicians tried to trick Penn and Teller.

We liked it so much that we are thinking of going to see them again when they come to Stafford's Gatehouse Theatre on 2nd November. Want to come with us? It will be great!!




One funny part of the show was that they kept trying to sell us a tea towel with their names on as a souvenir. I guess they didn't do t-shirts in Victorian times! We liked it so much we bought one at the end :-) It has pride of place in our office now. No - we are not going to use it to dry up with!!

After that show it was very nearly time for the one that Nathan and Danilo had been looking forward to the most. Over in a lecture theatre at the University were the Spoken Nerds - consisting of a stand-up mathematician Matt Parker, a geeky songwriter Helen Arney and experiments maestro Steve Mould.

I have to say - as a non-scientist - it as very funny, especially when the experiments went wrong. I have yet to see a pickle plugged into the mains - as it fused when they tried it! Seems it would have gone yellow like a street light - I think!

It was really good and I think I kept up. Matt's binary scarf knitted by his mother was very impressive. There was just a joke at the end I was perplexed by - something to do with...I don't know. But it spelt out N E R D anyway. I think it was maths....
Definitely a good show - I would recommend it to anyone :-)



Yes - it really was a comedy!

By that time we were getting hungry and wondered if there was maybe a curry place in the centre of Edinburgh. Dan wasn't sure - but then we looked across the road and there was a man with a big sign saying Indian/Thai Restaurant this way. We followed the arrow and found ourselves above the High Street looking down on the crowds  and eating some very fine chicken satay and coconut rice, in my case.


We had ordered starters too - then realised that in less than 40 minutes we had to be across the road in time for the start of Life Sentence. The play about immortality.




Fun for all the Family!

We had to keep quiet and concentrate on eating - and we just made it across the road in time for.. well actually we were late. The play had started but they let us in quietly and we managed to get the last three seats. I don't think that we had missed much - we soon picked up what had happened and went with it. it was unusual - but very thought-provoking.

By now we had seen four very different and enjoyable shows - and we were too tired to stay out late. We walked home and went to bed!




Nathan and Danilo in Gusto

Me and Nathan in Gusto


 

 



The Forth rail Bridge

On Sunday morning, after porridge, we decided to go to South Queensferry for the morning before we went home.

Dan said we'd be able to see the Forth Bridge and maybe have lunch in a fish restaurant. We drove over there and it turned out to be a very pretty little village - houses all painted pastel colours. I did sneak a peek in through the library's window - to see how they had decorated it for the Creepy House Summer Reading Challenge. Could only spot a lame skeleton (not even life-size like ours!) and a cut-out picture of a witch.






Nat and Dan putting the world to rights :-)

It was a lovely place though - smelled salty and seaside-y. We had a walk and then gazed at the sea and the bridges. We had lunch at The Boat House, which had a lovely view over the sea. There was lots of fish on the menu - I had haddock and Nathan had fish cake. Scotland does very good food :-)

Sadly after that we had to get back on the motorway and wend our way back to England and home.

A Beautiful Day