Her Majesty's Yacht Britannia

Good morning from a cool but sunny Edinburgh. I had hoped to post this last night but the internet got the better of me! After a false start on Saturday I spent Sunday getting oriented around Edinburgh, visiting the Royal Yacht Britannia which is now an historic vessel moored at Ocean Terminal. The city of Leith (where I’m staying) won the right to house the ship (as I would count it more as a ship than a yacht) when she was decommissioned and have seen it as the spearhead in a rejuvenation of the Edinburgh docklands. The area reminds me somewhat of the White Bay/Pyrmont area of Sydney with some contemporary apartments springing up in the midst of an industrial wasteland. In the midst of this is Ocean Terminal- a large, very contemporary shopping centre with its own Royal Yacht.

Britannia is apparently one of Scotland’s most visited attractions and although a bit sceptical I must say it was a great tour. Each visitor is handed a handset with a keypad to dial up the commentary at each stopping point so that you can choose to listen to it all or move on. I was impressed that as well as a good range of languages, the tour was also available in Visually Impaired (I presume this was an audio description), Basic English/Learning difficulties and Child. The tour was quite revealing about the queen’s lifestyle, including the fact that she and Prince Phillip have separate bedrooms. I did wonder how I would feel revealing such details of my life whilst still around! I was quite amused by the fact that there was a tea room positioned halfway through the tour and a lolly shop a little further along- clearly the Britannia have a good sense of playing to their audience!