We Saw The Queen!

We saw the Queen! I know the majority of this post is about the Braemar Gathering Highland Games and all the unique Scottish events, but we saw the Queen! Christa was about four feet away when she snapped this picture of the Queen leaving in her motorway and we can't get over how close we were. The kids could have given her a high-five, but I'm happy to say they didn't reach out suddenly and try.

The games themselves had traditional events such as sprinting, tug-of-war between branches of the military, tossing the caber, hill racing, long leaping, throwing the hammer, putting the stone, and highland dancing.  One thing that makes the Braemar Gathering so popular is the fact that the Royal Family is usually in attendance (did I mention we saw the Queen?). As the luck of the Scots would have it, the rain cleared just as we arrived to the games and we had beautiful weather throughout the day.

Relay races

Royal tug-of-war (Air Force Team)

Ainsley overlooking the games

Ainsley picking heather.

The Queen arriving at the Royal Box.

Tug-of-War Championships (Queen looking through her bag)

The Queen presenting the trophy to the Caber Toss champion.

The winning toss

Weight over the bar competition

Cairngorm National Bark (home of Braemar Gathering)

Cairngorms National Park

Who would have thought Christa would be the first to try Haggis (veggie-haggis that is)

Gillian (Scottish Teacher Club), me, Noreen (Edinburgh exchange), Nicole (England exchange), and Jennifer (Crief exchange)