Tartan Day Parade: Bagpipes and Belhaven

Once a year, the entire Scottish community of NYC (top-to-tail in tartan) congregates in Midtown to march ten blocks, from W45th up 6th Avenue to 55th. I’m not even Scottish, but I signed up with my Glaswegian pal Morvern (Girls who drink together, march together… err, said no-one ever).

THIS GUY HAS A SWORD

What a surreal experience. Firstly, I didn’t actually realise we would be marching in the parade. I thought we’d just be waving a few blue and white flags from afar. So walking down the middle of 6th Ave, with hoards of Americans whooping and cheering from the sidewalk, was not what I was expecting when I woke up that morning with a slight hangover.

Who let these scamps in?

I’m still not quite sure why they allowed us to get involved. Quite frankly, we did not fit in with the uniformed groups of professional-looking bagpipe-players.

Dad's Army

And at one point, we were so busy taking pictures of each other on the traffic-free avenue that we got left behind and had to run to catch up… and the crowd clapped us along. God Bless America.

Probably the closest I will ever come to running the NYC marathon

After the parade, a group of us dedicated Scots headed to Shake Shack* in Grand Central for some much needed replenishment. Marching is exhausting.

*If you have never been to Shake Shack, you are missing out. Get on a plane, and go. It is the food of the Gods. Like mega-NOM.

And to top off Morvern’s special day of Scottishness, we went to a bar where it was free-drinks for all of the parade marchers.

Morvern's 'special' day

Now a free bar is generally like sweet bagpipe music to my ears, except that the flyer omitted to mention that the only free drink was a form of Scottish stout called Belhaven.

A word to the wise: Never, ever, drink a pint of Belhaven after a vanilla shake. It is not big, and it most certainly is not clever.