Glasgow Lands Scottish Festival

Glascow Lands Scottish Festival







This is the opening ceremony of the Glasgow Lands Scottish Festival that is held in Florence/Northampton MA every year about this time and the time for it was this past Saturday. We all jumped in the family van and headed North for this one. 1st of all we're all Scottish; 2nd of all is that we were involved with the festival a few years ago as vendors; thirdly our daughter Ellen is a member of a dance troupe called "The Small Planet Dancers" and they were performing and I was to take pictures for their website. [actually 3rdly should have been firstly] . The video, you first encountered, when you clicked on this posting, is of the Opening Ceremony last year but I wanted you to have a feel for this festival. I don’t do my own video yet but I need to get moving in that direction as it has a lot to offer. We old 4x5 press camera photographers are a hard lot to change.
The pictures that I took are the following ones of The Small Planet Dancers and my daughter. They needed to be on an entertainment stage not a performance stage as they were with all of the young ladies being judged for dancing skills and their parents. This was their 1st year and were willing to take what they could just to get in. Next year they have been promised advertising and appearance schedule with the other entertainers. The troupe performed very well even if some of them pointed their toes the wrong direction.
We all had brought our portable chairs as we knew it was going to be a long hot day and it was. Temperature was in the 90’s as was the humidity and breathing was tough. I found a nice shady spot between the food venders and set up our chairs, which come complete with attached side table. It was an excellent location to people watch as most of them were in Scottish garb because their was band performances, individual Highland dance, bagpipe and drum competition. A lot of the Clans were represented with tents where you could join, learn, buy clan things or just visit. We were picnicking between the Fireman’s hamburger tent and the ice cream trailer, next to the information booth and across from the fish vendor. The only problem they had was the lack of tents for people to get out of the heat but the night before a microburst hit and wiped out most of the tents, destroying them. Tough on a not-for-profit where all of the money they make is promised to local charities.

If you see an add for a Scottish Festival I highly recommend that you go. If you're not into the dancing you can go watch the various Highland Games, tossing small telephone poles, big rocks, etc.