Page 9 - Microsoft Word - Guiding lights final version 0841 1007 big print.doc

In 1928 there were guides at the castle but it wasn’t always possible to buy a guidebook.
In a letter to the Scotsman, F.S.Graham of Aysgarth in Yorkshire, said he was disappointed at being unable to purchase a guidebook at the bookstall within the castle gates when he visited it in 1927. A year later he visited it again and was informed by the ‘courteous lady at the bookstall that she had no guidebooks for sale and had not been able to procure a supply for four or five years.
‘At Edinburgh, it appears, one can hire a guide to tell the tale...but there is no guide book to the old castle round which Scottish life and history has surged for centuries,’ he wrote.
Whether this was a plot by guides to make sure their services were always needed is not something we can prove!
Today more than two million people a year visit the castle and some of them are taken around by tourist guides from China, Russia, Japan, France, Germany and numerous other nationalities who visit Scotland every year with their guests.
But, more often than not, companies will hire members of the Scottish Tourist Guides Association, who proudly wear blue or green badges depending on their qualifications, to do tours.
Blue Badge guides are qualified to take their clients all over Scotland whereas Green Badge guides focus on particular regions north of the border.
Many Blue and Green badge guides also speak a variety of foreign languages. And unlike other tourist guides - there is no restriction on the profession in the UK - they are properly qualified to look after their guests having undertaken a rigorous 18 month-long course where they study subjects ranging from archaeology to art and from geology to genealogy as well as learning how to do walking tours safely. They also keep their passengers entertained and informed on coach and car excursions around Scotland.
The origins of Scottish Blue Badge guides go back to 1959 when the Scottish Tourist Guides Association was formed in Edinburgh by Bill Nicholson, secretary and manager of the Scottish Tourist Board. Nicholson was arguably ‘Mr Tourism’ in Scotland having headed the STB’s predecessor the Scottish Travel Association since its formation in 1930.
Michael Glen who was appointed Information Manager by Bill Nicholson in the late 1960s said he was ‘Mr Scotland’.
‘I remember saying to Bill (I called him Mr Nicholson of course) “Why is everyone everywhere you go dressed in tartan? Why can’t we get away from it?”
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