Scotland with Hannah

07/10/2023

You might've heard that it was a little bit rainy in Scotland today... Big shoutout to our driver Donald for getting us through it safely!

29/09/2023

I stopped off for lunch between tours today in the Kenilworth on Rose Street. This is just one of many beautiful Victorian pub interiors you can see in Edinburgh - but this one also happens to have a secret history.

In the mid-20th century, the Kenilworth was one of several city centre bars known as places where men could meet discreetly. It wasn't a "gay bar" as we understand it, because homos*xuality was illegal at the time, but the community always found a way!

Most people who walk through the doors today are probably unaware of its past. But there's something lovely about sitting admiring this gorgeous space and knowing that gay men in the 50s and 60s sat under this same ceiling, ordering drinks at this same bar, forging connections that lasted a night or a lifetime.
ℹ️ Hello! I’m Hannah, a qualified Blue Badge Guide for all of Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

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***rhistory ***rscotland

30/08/2023

Escaping the festival crowds a couple of weeks ago, I was out at Tantallon Castle in East Lothian. These kinds of evocative ruins are always my favourite historic sites!

Tantallon also has great views over the area, including this one of the Bass Rock. It's home to the world's largest colony of gannets (the rock itself is not white - that's a combo of seabirds and their poo!) and you can often see these elegant birds diving for fish in the coastal waters.
ℹ️ Hello! I’m Hannah, a qualified Blue Badge Guide for all of Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

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14/02/2023

Meet Edna! Here she is enjoying the sights and smells of Holyrood Park. Edinburgh is an incredibly dog-friendly city, and many hotels, restaurants and pubs are happy for you to bring along four-legged pals on your trip. And with walks like this in the heart of the city, there's plenty for the dogs to enjoy too!
ℹ️ Hello! I’m Hannah, a qualified Blue Badge Guide for all of Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

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14/12/2022

Looking to learn more about Scotland's q***r history? I've created a whole section on my website to help you out! Head over there to find my new VoiceMap audio tour of q***r history in Edinburgh, blog posts, an interactive map and more.

Learn about Scottish q***r history and find virtual tours and more from Edinburgh tour guide Hannah Mackay Tait

23/11/2022

Fancy a q***r history tour in Edinburgh this weekend? Join me as part of St Andrew's Fair Saturday! Tickets available below, with 20% of all proceeds going to support MermaidsUK.

Join local tour guide Hannah Mackay Tait for a 90-minute walk through Edinburgh’s Old Town to discover the city’s hidden q***r history.

24/10/2022

The National Galleries of Scotland have produced a wee podcast series that takes you on an Edinburgh walking tour, visiting places with connections to the art in their collections. You can hear me in the first episode talking about Dr Elsie Inglis and the hospital she opened at 219 High Street, where it's hoped a statue will be erected in Elsie's memory.

Discover Edinburgh through art with our City Walking Tour. This podcast series travels along the historic Royal Mile by exploring stories and places connected to Scottish artworks in the National Galleries of Scotland collection.

09/09/2022

I’ve just come back from the loveliest week-long tour up north, visiting some of the most stunning places in Scotland. And let’s be honest, that means some of the most stunning places in the world! Thanks to and for such a delightful itinerary and a very fun group of people!

This is a bit of a photo dump because I just couldn’t choose a favourite picture from the week! 1) The view from the chairlift at ; 2) a bonus random bagpiper we met at the top (thanks for the tunes, Duncan!); 3) the beautiful Cille Choirill church; 4) me and one of my new sheep pals; 5) Eilean Donan castle; 6) the view from in Skye; 7) looking down the Quiraing pass (with thanks to our intrepid coach driver Dave for driving up that road!); and 8) a very talented working sheepdog we met
ℹ️ Hello! I’m Hannah, a qualified Blue Badge Guide for all of Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

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29/06/2022

When your coach driver on tour is also a piper! Big thanks to Blair for giving us a few tunes in Glencoe, much to the delight of our group and the other visitors!

ℹ️ Hello! I’m Hannah, a qualified Blue Badge Guide for all of Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

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27/06/2022

This is a view from North Berwick out to the Bass Rock - although in this brief window of sunshine you could almost think you’re in the Algarve!

The Bass Rock is home to the world’s largest colony of gannets, a type of large diving seabird. The rock appears white in the sunshine, but the colour is a combination of tens of thousands of gannets and the many tons of poo they’ve produced over the years!
ℹ️ Hello! I’m Hannah, a qualified Blue Badge Guide for all of Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

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25/06/2022

The Old Town was a sea of colour for Edinburgh Pride today! The march must have filled the whole Royal Mile - tons of trans flags on display and lots of noise and joy 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

If you’re in Edinburgh and fancy a relaxed activity tomorrow afternoon, join me at 3pm for a q***r history tour! See my story to book.

ℹ️ Hello! I’m Hannah, a qualified Blue Badge Guide for all of Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

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***rrights ***rhistory

14/06/2022

Looking for something to do in Edinburgh on Pride weekend? I'm running one of my q***r history tours on the Sunday afternoon!

Join me on the 26th of June at 3pm from Johnston Terrace for a 90-minute tour of Edinburgh's q***r history, from 17th-century royal love stories to ground-breaking le***an doctors in the Victoria era.

Tickets are £16.50, with 20% of proceeds going to support the Scottish Trans Alliance. Hope to see you there!

Edinburgh has centuries of q***r history hiding in plain sight – you just have to know where to look.

14/06/2022

I’ve got to do a few tours through in Glasgow recently, and it’s always a joy to get to show off this city - especially when the sun comes out!

This view from the Necropolis looking down over Glasgow cathedral is one of my favourites. The cathedral was the heart of medieval Glasgow, the origin point of the entire modern city, and the founding place of the back in 1451. You could have stood on this same hill over 800 years ago and looked down on this building under construction. I wonder what the monks of the cathedral back then would think of the vibrant, multicultural city that Glasgow has become in 2022?
ℹ️ Hello! I’m Hannah, a qualified Blue Badge Guide for all of Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

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04/06/2022

Happy Pride month, everybody! 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

Scotland had its very first Pride march in Edinburgh back in 1995, in a time when LGBTQ+ people couldn't marry or adopt kids, schools legally couldn't talk about q***r people, and the city was being ravaged by the HIV/AIDS crisis.

Through the hard work of activists down the years, we've come a long, long way since then. LGBTQ+ people have marriage equality and legal protection against discrimination. We have out politicians at every level of our parliament, and schools are required to teach LGBTQ+ history as part of the curriculum. HIV is now a manageable condition that can be treated to the point where it becomes undetectable and untransmissable - a phenomenal advance in medical science.

We still have a long way to go before Pride no longer needs to be a protest, particularly when it comes to equality for trans people. But every year, LGBTQ+ people and their allies refuse to be silent, and new Pride marches have popped up all over the country. Some places, like the Isle of Arran, are having their very first one this year, in glorious sunshine!

01/06/2022

Glencoe is one of my favourite places to show visitors, because who could fail to be impressed?! I got to go here with a group the other week and it still takes *my* breath away every time.

Like so much of Scotland’s landscape, the dramatic peaks and valleys were formed by ancient volcanoes and glaciers into what we see today.

The brooding nature of the glen fits its tragic history as the site of a notorious massacre in 1692, when troops sent on behalf of the king slaughtered members of the MacDonald clan in the midst of a snowstorm. If there are ghosts anywhere, it’s Glencoe.

ℹ️ Hello! I’m Hannah, a qualified Blue Badge Guide for all of Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

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27/05/2022

I finally made it to Skye for the first time! I don’t know how it took me nearly 34 years - I’ve been missing out. It was just a flying visit this time to check out some places for a tour I’m taking there later this year, but I’ll definitely be back for longer.

The weather couldn’t have been worse tbh, but it was still the most breathtaking place I’ve ever been in my life. And the upside of the rain was we had everywhere practically to ourselves!
ℹ️ Hello! I’m Hannah, a qualified Blue Badge Guide for all of Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

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23/04/2022

If you've been on one of my q***r history tours, you've heard me talk about Lavender Menace. They were Edinburgh's first q***r bookshop - and only the second in the UK! - back in the early 80s. Now the former owners are fundraising £5000 to open a q***r book archive/reading room/event space in the city. Q***r spaces (and book spaces!) are such important places, please consider supporting them if you can ❤️

We are Lavender Menace Q***r Books Archive, and we're raising money to establish a safe events q***r space and… Bob Orr needs your support for A Space for Us

23/02/2022

Tickets are selling well for our Elsie Inglis fundraising tours! Join me or one of my Blue Badge Guide colleagues from 5th–13th of March to discover Elsie's story. £2 from every ticket sold is going towards a statue of Dr Elsie Inglis in Edinburgh – the very first statue of a named woman in the city centre. Help us put this amazing chapter in our history back on the map!

Join us on a walking tour to learn Dr Elsie Inglis' story and help to raise funds for a statue in her memory

23/02/2022

Thanks to my mum for sending me this gorgeous picture she took at Ousdale Broch in Caithness last week! These ancient structures are unique to Scotland, and Ousdale is one of dozens scattered across the country. This one is thought to be around 2200 years old.

Because the people who lived here back then didn’t leave us a written history, the purpose and meaning of brochs will probably never be fully understood. They are very sophisticated buildings for the time, with staircases ascending within their thick drystone walls, doorways with lintel stones, and often other small rooms or cells inside. The fact they were built without any mortar or cement makes it all the more remarkable that so many of them still litter the landscape.

Brochs are very evocative places to visit. When I was a wee girl, I was fascinated by Carn Liath broch near Golspie (swipe for a pic of that one too!), and I loved imagining what it would have been like for a child living there thousands of years ago. As an adult, it’s still an amazing feeling to stand where the people who built this stood, looking out at the sea they fished in and the land they hunted on.
ℹ️ Hello! I’m Hannah, a qualified Blue Badge Guide for all of Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

🤩 Join me on a walking tour of q***r history or women’s history this January! See scotlandwithhannah.com/walkingtours for more

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17/02/2022

I'm working with some colleagues to run these fundraising walking tours in March! Spread the word, come along, and help us put a statue of Elsie Inglis in Edinburgh - the first EVER statue of a named woman in the city centre.

Join us on a walking tour to learn Dr Elsie Inglis' story and help to raise funds for a statue in her memory

11/02/2022

Scotland has a long history of storytelling, and many of our traditional folktales have origins stretching back hundreds of years. They change a little every time they're told, weaving in new ideas and elements, differing from place to place.

In celebration of the many , 2022 is VisitScotland's Year of Stories. I hope you'll enjoy my own retelling of one of my favourite Scottish folktales: the selkie wife. Head over to my youtube channel to listen (captions available too) and let me know what you think!

2022 is VisitScotland's Year of Stories, celebrating . As a tour guide, I usually tell stories about history, but I thought this was a great ...

09/02/2022

It might not quite be spring yet, but the first signs of life are returning! These delicate wee snowdrops are usually the first flowers to come up in January and February. Sometimes you even see them battling their way through actual snow on the ground!

09/02/2022

I've just added more tickets for my walking tours this week! They're on Friday 11th and Saturday 12th of February, with women's history at 11am and q***r history at 2pm both days. See below for links to both events and I hope to see you there!

Uncover women’s hidden contributions to Edinburgh – and the world

08/02/2022

It was such a treat to have an evening visit to Rosslyn Chapel last week. You’re not normally allowed to take photos inside, so it was especially exciting to get to take some pictures of the incredible carvings.

Rosslyn Chapel was founded in 1446 as a personal church for the Sinclair family, but it fell out of use in 1560 when the Protestant Reformation shut Catholic churches. We’re incredibly lucky that this beautiful place survives today, having lain in semi-ruin for over 300 years until restoration work first began in the Victoria era - partly inspired by a visit from Queen Victoria, who fell in love with the place.

The chapel is once again a working place of worship, now a Scottish Episcopal church. But the fortunes of this amazing building really turned around when it was featured in Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code, where coded information was hidden in its intricate carvings. The success of the book and film brought new thousands of new visitors, who help to fund the upkeep of the now nearly 600-year-old building. It’s definitely worth the short trip out of Edinburgh to see it for yourself!

07/02/2022

I've got a new wee blog post up today to celebrate LGBT History Month, looking back at when Scotland passed equal marriage legislation eight years ago. Check it out!

Edinburgh tour guide Hannah Mackay Tait dives into some Scottish q***r history with a look back at 2014 and the passage of equal marriage legislation

05/02/2022

Q***r history is all around us, even if it hasn't always made it into the history we tell. Join me on a q***r history tour in Edinburgh tomorrow, 6th Feb, to discover more of the city's q***r sites.

This building on the Royal Mile, at 192 High Street, used to be the police chambers for the city centre. In oral histories of the '60s and '70s, gay men tell of being brought here after being arrested for cruising on Calton Hill. One man recalled being paraded in front of police staff to humiliate him as he was released after paying a hefty fine.

The police put a lot of resources into arresting gay men at cruising spots. S*x between men was illegal in Scotland until 1981, even in their own homes. The force even deployed so-called "pretty police" – handsome younger officers – to entrap people. Fewer resources went into stopping those who preyed on gay men, and it wasn't uncommon for them to be robbed and beaten in homophobic attacks, too afraid to report it.

Even after gay s*x was legalised in private, men were often arrested for "lewd" behaviour from hand-holding in public to a flirtatious look at the wrong person. As late as 1999, men were still being prosecuted for consensual private s*xual behaviour, like B**M practices.

04/02/2022

February is LGBT History Month, so there are a few extra pride flags around town just now! Great to see the progress pride flag flying on Old College at Edinburgh Uni today (against a darkening sky moments before a hail storm started!)

Join me on a Q***r History Tour at 2pm this Sunday, 6th Feb, and discover stories of pioneering figures from Edinburgh's q***r past. Q***r history is Scottish history - you just have to know where to look! Check out scotlandwithhannah.com/walkingtours for details.

01/02/2022

Did you miss my walking tours in January? I've just added more tickets for this Sunday, 6th February! Women's history at 11am and q***r history at 2pm - check out my website for all the details, and I hope to see you there.

Join Edinburgh tour guide Hannah Mackay Tait for a small-group walking tour of the Royal Mile, or explore Scottish LGBTQ+ history and women's forgotten stories

31/01/2022

This beautiful painted ceiling inside Riddle’s Court off the Lawnmarket dates back to the 16th century. The mansion was then the grandest house in the city, home to Katherine Hutcheson and her family. Katherine was the widow of Baillie John McMorran, a town magistrate who had died in a riot in 1595, and the town council chose her magnificent home to host two diplomatic banquets with King James VI. The paintings on this ceiling, now more than 420 years old, were created for the occasion in 1598.

It must have been an exciting and stressful time for Katherine, who as lady of the house must have been involved in the planning of the event. Hosting the king was a huge honour, but came with enormous pressure for things to go well! And all of this while she was quite new to widowhood, having lost her husband in a sudden and traumatic fashion just three years earlier.

Although we tend to associate old buildings like this with the grand and important men who put their names into history, women have always been there too. Their stories didn’t always go in the history books, but that doesn’t mean they weren’t living fascinating lives!

Join me for a walking tour of women’s history in Edinburgh this Sunday at 11am and uncover more of the amazing women whose stories are buried in our buildings. See scotlandwithhannah.com/walkingtours for more info!

26/01/2022

This is the interior of St John's Episcopal Church last year during their Peace Cranes exhibition. Tens of thousands of origami cranes filled the space, folded by people around the world as they contemplated peace and the 140,000 victims of the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

A focus on social justice and peace is embedded in the work of St John's, who also regularly raise awareness about topics such as refugee rights, food poverty, and the climate crisis. The church is also an important LGBTQ+ history site, as it hosted the first same-gender wedding in the Scottish Episcopal Church in 2017. For deciding to allow equal marriage within their churches, the Scottish Episcopal Church was sanctioned by the Anglican Communion to which it belongs.

Join me to discover more hidden stories with a tour of women's history or q***r history this Friday and Saturday! See scotlandwithhannah.com/walkingtours to book