Edinburgh’s Summer Festivities

We are having a glorious few days here in Edinburgh at the moment.  Such good weather creates the perfect backdrop for enjoying all that our wonderful summer festivals have to offer.

All fingers and toes were very much crossed for the opening of the Edinburgh International Festival.  This was an event called Deep Time, and it was projected onto the side of Edinburgh Castle.  Here is a recording of this amazing creation:

Back in May, when we also had a great run of weather, I took some photos of one of our favourite festival venues – Pleasance Courtyard.  In ‘normal life’, this area is part of Edinburgh University’s campus.  You can see from these shots that it looks pretty unassuming most of the time:

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And now for ‘spot the difference’.  Check out these shots of the same area, now pulsating and buzzing with atmosphere on the first weekend of Edinburgh’s Fringe Festival:

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Quite a contrast!  This is but one example of the way in which our fabulous city transforms itself to accommodate all the festival marvels.

We have already seen a few shows here, and have some more planned for next week.

In addition, I took my first of several 2016 trips to the Edinburgh International Book Festival this morning.  I had a ticket to see the recording of BBC Radio 4’s Open Book.  Below is a shot of the stage before everything got going.  You can see the featured guests listed on the screen.  In fact, they were also joined by novelist Benjamin Markovits.  The panel spoke very interestingly and thought-provokingly about how novels can help us understand changing times, on both a political and human level.  As a result, I now have all three of their latest books inked onto my ‘to read list’.  It was also great to hear the input from Nick Barley, the Festival Director.

And to round things off, here are a couple of shots of Edinburgh’s Charlotte Square, which is usually just a pleasant green area, but is transformed for Book Festival purposes during the summer – fabulous! 🙂