I said a little while ago i was going to start a blog to keep a record of the lead up and my trip to the Edinburgh Military Tattoo this year so here it goes...
I suppose I should start at the very beginning...
I applied a little while ago to go to the Tattoo and on the 4th of November 2011 I received my congratulatory email and contract to say I'd been selected as one of 24 dancers to represent Australia at the 2012 Edinburgh Military Tattoo. For those of you who are unfamiliar with this Scottish extravaganza see www.edintattoo.co.uk. I was stoked to hear that another dancer from my class had also been selected so I had a travel buddy! I was able to negotiate 6 weeks of annual leave over winter... so after the completion of the tattoo I could spend some time travelling with the family who have decided to fly over and meet me there :)
Skipping forward a month or two over Christmas....
There was a workshop held in Bathurst for tattoo dancers to meet each other and begin to learn the choreography. Thanks to my co-workers for shuffling shifts to allow me to attend!
So a few weeks ago Jess and I headed off with her mum on the long drive to Bathurst... leaving at 6am on Friday morning and after some interesting sights along the way... rear to kerb parking, emus, bikies sprawled on the pavement outside pubs in tiny towns and Jess running over a lizard we finally made it to Bathurst at 9 ish pm! The lovely Laura's mum was kind enough to put us up for the weekend!
So we had a peek at the costumes, learnt a lot of the choreography,met some of the other dancers and even squeezed in some shopping and treats at the french bakery! All in all it was a great weekend and it was of great benefit to us to be able to make it over! So after two full-on dance sessions we headed off home at lunchtime on the Sunday after doing a lap of Mount Panorama! We made it to Mildura by 10ish pm and were up bright and early the next morning to do the last leg home! Making it home tired, weary, and just in time for work!
So apart from practicing and practicing and more practicing to make sure we have it down pat and are up to scratch... not much else happens on the dance front until we arrive in Edinburgh in July!
On the travel front...
Flights are booked and partially paid for!
The family got together over Christmas and a list of must see places was established!
We then got the maps out and roughly made up a route!
Leaving Edinburgh and travelling up through Scotland to Inverness, back down to Glasgow then across to Ireland then a quick trip to Paris before returning back to Oz!
After much emailing back and forth between families we have booked all accommodation for the 12 nights we will be touring around in our minivan and flights in between countries also booked!
It's starting to get exciting but there is still a fair way to go and many important events before the big adventure!
22 weeks and 4 days or 157 days...not that anyone is counting :p
