After our breakfast, it was actually more like a brunch, we retreated to the Info Centre to catch the shuttle bus up to the Standing Stones. More about the Stones in a later post. The Stones are the site of the Festival activities. There are a few videos in this post, those reading via an email should go back and click on the link at the top of the email ‘read on blog’ to see the videos. You should do this anyway!

Now, festivals have a number of common elements. Food, drinks, music and stallholders trying to sell you stuff.

The Festival also tries to have a unique activity going on to attract people. The Celtic Festival does this so well. Some Highland Games events, jousting and medieval hand to hand combat!

After that breakfast/brunch we didn’t concern ourself with food, drink or the people trying to sell you stuff.

We took to the jousting, hand to hand combat and highland games, plus of course the music!

Here is some of the caber tossing on the next day.

Following the Caber Tossing was the ‘weight for height’ event. A bit like a high jump except you toss a weight over the high bar, not yourself. In the open event the weight is 56 lbs (25kg) in the over 40s age it is 42 lbs (19 kg). The colours of the weights ensure there is no confusion! We watched a few characters have a go at this. Some succeeded and some fell short. Bit of strength is involved in this! The ladies have a go at this too for some reason, half the men’s weight.

Here are some pics and video, pictures tell it all!

Now some video to show the technique!

The world record for this category is 19.5 ft, Terry had a go! 19 kg toss (?).

All pretty hectic. The music will have to wait till next time folks.!