I feel like a professional wedding guest. I’ve been to dozens of weddings. Literally. DOZENS. I’ve seen people go through all the emotions of weddings: joy, family feuds, friendship break-ups, financial grief, joy again, followed by more financial mourning. Despite attending numerous weddings for years, I somehow had never been to a destination wedding.
Then finally, one summer I graduated to the wedding equivalent of a black belt and I got my first destination invite! Now when I hear destination wedding I instantly think of a drunken resort wedding in Mexico. It turns out this wasn’t a destination wedding like that – It was a destination wedding in Edinburgh, Scotland. I know what you’re thinking….CLASSSSSSY!
I was invited to Scotland because my childhood friend had gone for a school term there several years ago and met a Scottish dude. Scottish bloke? Wanker? Lad? (Confession: All my British slang is from Harry Potter and Downton Abbey and cannot be trusted).
She met him a few weeks before she came back to Canada and he had already planned to move to Canada to work before they even met. Apparently it’s quite common for people from the UK come to Canada to travel, find themselves, marvel at the wide open spaces of Canada, and soak in the attention their confusing accent gives them. He was planning to work at a ski resort in British Columbia, learn to snowboard, and gain the confidence to say things like “pow day” and “shredding it” with a straight face.
My friend and him spent several weeks in Scotland and when she flew back to Ontario they decided maybe he should move to Ontario instead of British Columbia. Ultimately he never did learn to snowboard, but they did end up getting engaged several years later. It honestly sounds like something out of a super dramatic romance movie. Of course there were lots of drawn out issues with immigration, but for the purposes of my story it really is the rom-com of my dreams and the reason I was getting invited to a wedding in his hometown in Scotland.
Initially I was worried a flight to Scotland would be too expensive and……well, it was expensive, but flying to the UK is essentially the same price as flying across Canada, but with the benefit of, you know, not being in Canada. Instead I’d be in the land where it was acceptable to be drunk in the streets at 10am and where I would be the one with an accent FOR ONCE (although it turns out literally no one cared). It also offered the possibility of meeting a guy with an accent so thick that I could convince myself that he *might* be saying all the things I want to hear! (Spoiler alert- I met no one).
I started planning my trip and decided to visit a friend in London first and then make my way to Scotland. I had explained my plan to my parents who were typically skeptical of my plans, but to my surprise my Mom actually asked if she could come to Scotland with me. I agreed and we decided my Mom would join me as my plus one at the wedding in Edinburgh and from there we would travel around the Highlands and live out her Scottish dreams from reading the book series Outlander and me confirming my limited knowledge of Scotland based purely around Merida from the Disney Pixar movie Brave.
We were originally planning on renting a car to drive around the Highlands and stop at airbnb’s along the way, until one day my Mom called to let me know that she found a bus tour that was reasonably priced and provided the tour and accommodations for three nights. I couldn’t really argue with that because there was absolutely no way in hell I was going to drive. I’m a terrible driver- truly awful. I can’t last long distances, I can’t drive standard, and I panic when I don’t know where I am. I had already decided if she wasn’t comfortable driving, who was I to force her? So I agreed. Without thinking too much about it we went ahead and booked our “reasonably priced bus tour.”
The beginning of my trip went pretty smoothly and I made it all the way to Scotland without a hitch and I went to the wedding with my Mom as my plus one. I also wondered in horror if bringing your Mom to a wedding as a plus one is the adult equivalent of bringing your cousin to prom in a 90’s teen movie? Probably.
After the wedding was over (which was great) and we felt like we had sufficiently experienced eating haggis, hearing the bag pipes, and enough men in kilts, I was ready for our big Highlands bus tour. I was pretty excited and I figured it was going to be a leisurely tour with a bunch of older people and me. I figured we’d have nice dinners with oversized glasses of red wine and I’d learn so much about the Highlands because these tour groupies would be genuinely interested in it! I felt I had spent enough time slumming it on friend’s couches or crappy hostels while travelling that I was looking forward to getting to travel in a slightly more “adult” way.
But, damn, was I wrong.
Dragging our suitcases behind us, my Mom and I strolled into the meeting location for our tour. The employee with hipster glasses and an ambiguous forearm tattoo looked at us and tentatively asked what we were there for. My Mom didn’t miss a beat and informed him we were there for the tour leaving that morning. They asked again, “Today? From here? You’re sure?” My Mom started scrambling around looking for her ticket. At this point I had wandered to the other side of the room and started looking at the promotional brochures and found the brochure with the tour we were scheduled to go on and ever so slowly started to…. PANIC!
I opened up the pamphlet: “FOUR AWESOME party days! THREE nights at different wild bars! Hostel accommodations all three nights! Party like a true Scot!” I felt my pulse quicken as I looked over at my 60 year old mother, Bernice. She had on Mom running shoes, a big floppy Tilley hat, a fanny pack, a money belt safely tucked beneath her clothes, and was pulling her sturdy and practical wheely suitcase behind her. She was picture perfect for a middle aged bus tour, but I was quickly realizing, this was not that kind of tour.
I saw some of the other tour “participants” starting to roll in (not the 30 minutes early like we were!). They were all younger than me, wearing oversized backpacks with leftover make-up from parties from the night before smeared on their faces and suddenly I realized… we had been booked on a four day party bus with a bunch of backpackers.
Me. And. My. Mom.
This was the type of tour I had opted out of in my early twenties when some of my friends had wanted to go because it “wasn’t my scene.” It was something comparable to a Scottish version of a Contiki tour I’d assume? When I was younger I had avoided those tours because I was nervous about the thought of having to party with a bunch of strangers and feeling the pressure of rushing through a bunch of countries with people I’d exchange numbers with and never talk to again. I know lots of people who have had amazing times on these kinds of tours, but it had just never appealed to me. So it goes without saying, the thought of experiencing that with my Mom appealed to me even less.
I pulled my Mom aside, “Mom, LOOK at this pamphlet! Did you even read about this tour before you booked it?”
She looked at me perplexed, “Of course I did, what’s the issue?”
I gestured to the people already taking morning shots of tequila to start the day.
“Well, I guess they all do seem a bit young,” she admitted.
“I should have read it first too! What was I thinking? The tour is all about hitting bars and you didn’t mention staying in hostels?”
Sleeping in hostels wasn’t an issue for me, I had been staying in hostels myself for a couple days prior to meeting my Mom, but the real issue was my Mom staying in hostels and the fact she snored louder than anyone I knew! I don’t think the bus of partiers knew what they were in for.
Before I had time to protest that we shouldn’t go and that we should try and get our money back and find a different age-appropriate tour, or try and rent a car, somehow we were getting ushered onto the bus. Before I knew it, my bags were stored underneath us and I was trapped on this bus for four whole days. I insisted we sit right near the front so I could stare right ahead in a rage and not make eye contact with anyone. Our tour guide got on the bus microphone to introduced himself and exclaim the first activity of the tour: SPEED DATING!
We were told that everyone was supposed to switch seats and answer the next couple of questions with your new friends. My Mom looked at me, eagerly undoing her seat belt ready to start to participate. I continued to look straight ahead and made it quite clear that I was not moving anywhere. To be fair, I would hate a speed dating ice breaker in the best of times, but certainly not in this situation. My Mom rolled her eyes at me and told me I was overreacting. She wasn’t wrong, but I was in denial that I was on a party bus tour with my Mom in my late 20s. I wasn’t sure anything summed up my life so well.
Finally, the bus tour carried on and the guide started talking about the Scottish history over the microphone, but everyone on the bus was still talking, bonding, and making new friends so I couldn’t hear anything. The thing was, I genuinely was trying to learn more about Scottish history! I’ll never know exactly what I missed about the intro to the Scottish Highlands that I’ll never get back. So please don’t ever test my knowledge on Scottish history because it remains influenced purely by pop culture.
Ultimately, I did survive the four days and it turns out the tour ended up being pretty fun. My Mom snored HORRIBLY loud in a way that was mortifying and also caused me severe sleep deprivation. Earplugs did nothing, but we did get to do some hiking, see some really beautiful scenery, and learn some interesting stuff.
My Mom also lived the true party bus experience while I watched her on the sidelines. She was like the cool kid and I was her nerdy friend. Everyone thought it was cute she was on this trip. She made a bunch of new friends, listened to people explain their travels, learned to eat new and unfamiliar foods, discovered facts about new countries, and enjoyed everything she saw.
In the end it wasn’t exactly the way I thought my first party bus would be, and I don’t think I’ll be on another anytime soon… or at least not until I’m 60 at the very least.
Even though I didn’t make nearly as many friends as my Mom and wasn’t a fraction as popular as her, I have to say I did still love the trip and her. When the tour came to an end I pulled our bags and started walking away from the bus ready to go on the next leg of our trip to Glasgow, but my Mom stopped me and insisted we had to say a full goodbye to everyone. I stood awkwardly on the side as my Mom hugged all her new Australian, American, and British party bus friends goodbye as they exclaimed “BYE BERNICE WE’LL MISS YOU SOOOO MUCH!”
lisa prose 