BREE PETERS

I have Scottish ancestry so I know a few things for sure; my clan, my tartan and what a “Numpty” is, but aside from that I wasn’t too sure what to expect of Edinburgh. On a normal day Edinburgh is rich in history, culture, castles, whisky and Irn-Bru. And during the 2014 Edinburgh Fringe festival when I was there it was all this, plus a few thousand performers and many more tourists. During the festival I was either working or sleeping but I managed to fit in a few things. If you ever get the chance to go there, here are some must-dos:

Walk the Royal Mile then nip into a pub that is older than time for a pint.

Take a Whisky Tour. It’s Scotland. Scotch. They wouldn’t name it after themselves if it wasn’t good.

Tour Edinburgh Castle. In fact, drink the whisky and then do the castle.

Climb Arthur’s Seat one morning to watch the sun come up. Maybe quietly quote a line from to yourself. You know the one.

Take the 45-minute train ride to Glasgow for the day, eat a deep-fried Mars bar and ask a local where you should go for lunch. Chances are they will walk you there themselves.

Before you do any of this, hit up Primark. You will need a raincoat. My Glaswegian pal once told me, “In Scotland, summer is on a Tuesday”.

Trainspotting

I feel bad talking about bad times travelling because I think that you can have a bad time anywhere. You just need the perfect amount of rubbish circumstances and then you are there . . . in hell, living out of a suitcase and running out of toothpaste. But I will say that it is a particular talent of mine to get food poisoning in every country no matter how sterile, five-star or exotic the location. Here’s a tip, if anything has the word “Roadside” in it, don’t eat it. Abort.