150th SF Caledonian Scottish Games @ Pleasanton, CA

[California Highlander]

Pretty amazing two days for my first time at the SF Caledonian Games in Pleasanton. It's the 150th, so I figured I needed to go after trying for the last few years and always having a labor day weekend conflict.

I did not make it to any XMarks get together, but did see a few of the rabble including Jamie and Starr, OC Richard. Also saw Hafthor Bjornsson (the Mountain from Game of Thrones on RV), many pipe bands, all manner of kilts (only one worn backward!) some fun music, whisky!, a bit of the heavy weights and caber, and the usual vendors and outrageous food lines.

I saw more tartan kilts that utility style both days. Everything from wool tanks to acrylic and "PVs" or PAs (Poly acetate) with the PV/PAs leading the way and too long on most guys. It was 91ish degrees on Sunday and I saw at least 3 men in full 8 yard wool kilts, tweed jackets, and ties. They looked pretty melted and these were guys in their 30s/40s, so not an old guy like me. More men in boots or sandals with kilts. I went with regular hose and brogues day 1, brogue boots day two and a 4 yd 16oz wool casual kilt. Both days started with a collared shirt be got down to a tee shirt by 10:30am.

Winnepeg Police pipe band wore doublets with feather bonnets out in 91 degree heat...and sounded so cool....



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Albannach had great crowds of enthusiastic fans. I didn't get many shots of their kilts. The tartan was created with Rocky of USA Kilts.



Albannach by len gilbert, on Flickr

More traditional music.

Alasdair Fraser San Francisco Scottish Fiddlers

A familiar face in the 600 pipers at the massed bands on day one!


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XMarks sponsor Celtic Croft


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Hafthor Bjornsson

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Wildcat Tartan at Clan Mackintosh tent. I was at the Mackintosh tent in the Clan Chattan area quite a bit. We had several people who were interested in the wildcat tartan, so we sent them home with flyers and a link to the FB page for additional info and ordering. I also had brought back some wildcat postcards from Scotland and we had them at the Mackintosh, Clan Chattan USA, and Macpherson tents to hand out.


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Full photo album on Flickr includes more shots of the pipe bands to see all the uniforms and kilts. More shots of the live music events, clan tents, etc.


@the-celtic-croft @OCRichard @Panache @AlanH @McMurdo

[Thekiltedmohawk]

Hafthor Bjornsson

He also acts as Gregor "Mountain" Clegane in the popular HBO tv show, "Game of Thrones."



That shows you how big he is!

OP, great pics, and glad you had great time at the game.

[California Highlander]

Yes, the Mountain! Sorry, that must have dropped off my post in trying to get some of the more "Xmarksy" pics in there. Thanks for adding in the reference for those who wouldn't know who he is.

Not sure how many people came to the games because of him, but attendance seemed strong and the massed pipe bands playing together was majorly impressive.

I'm sure Alan, Jamie, Richard, and crew will have different perspectives on it all. So much to see and do that it's going to be different for everyone.

[OC Richard]

Nice pics! I'm looking rather grumpy there at Massed Bands. Actually I'm feeling the effects of several Black & Blues.

I'm a huge Game Of Thrones fan and it was awesome seeing The Mountain. That guy is huge! And he posed for a load of pics and signed autographs and so forth, very nice.

Our band had a good run on Saturday, got 1st place, here we are

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6JbvuiHbnA

Not as good a view here, for one thing it's a wiggly camera, for another my backside is front-and-centre

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3FeEwJtWZo

[sailortats]

@ OC Richard
I tried a couple of times to catch up with you but you were never at the band site. Best weather in years on Saturday, not too hot and a nice little breeze.

[OC Richard]

sorry about that, Tats!

[grizzbass]

wish I could have been there. especially hafthor. I shot world's strongest man in 2014 and he was great for the camera

[Alan H]

I was stubborn and did not get a picture with Hafthor.

However, I DID get to meet the absolute legend of Highland Athletics, Bill Anderson. If I had to pick heroes, I'd pick Bill over Hafthor, any day. But I'm weird, like that.

[OC Richard]

Here are a few pics I took.

I arrived at the host hotel San Ramon Marriott on Friday afternoon (after having great Indian food at Haveli in Dublin) to find none other than Greater Glasgow Police doing some run-throughs of their competition sets in the car park



Due to the recent vast increase in the size of Grade One bands (top bands having 25-30 pipers, a dozen snares, and a half-dozen tenors, around fifty members in all) and the current strength of the US dollar it became impossible for the Games to pay sufficient travel money to overseas bands. So the Games came up with a nice solution: limit the size of the Grade One bands to 15 players.

The participating bands were Greater Glasgow Police, Triumph Street (from British Columbia) and our local Los Angeles Scottish. BTW the former band was known for decades as The City Of Glasgow Police until a reorganisation of Scottish police caused their name to change to Strathclyde Police. A recent reorganisation has led to the latest name change, Police Scotland Greater Glasgow. In Grade One there is also a band called Police Scotland Fife.

Friday afternoon at the Marriott is always the Professional solo piping competition, held in a ballroom with great acoustics. Anyone who likes piping, or would like to expose themselves to great piping in a great setting, owes it to themselves to attend.

Saturday morning, the rest of the solos begin. What's a Highland Games without a huge plastic cow?



In the late morning and early afternoon the bands were getting out their instruments, pipe sections getting some air in the pipes, drum corps running through their sets. Here's Winnipeg Police pipers doing an initial tune-up



Here's the drum corps of Queen City Pipe Band (Denver CO) practicing. Their kit was very nice, not the usual modern pipe band thing, with weathered/reproduction kilts, Lovat tweed waistcoats, and Lovat hose. Oddly their Lovat tweed waistcoats had brilliant Royal Blue satin backs (much brighter than appears in this photo).



Perennial favourites at these Games are San Francisco's finest, the Prince Charles Pipe Band, in their Black Stewart kilts. A very fine band, they won Grade Two both days. Not affected by the Grade One size limit, they played 14 pipers, which has long sounded "right" to pipe band people, being the size of military pipe bands for many years.



The final bands of the day were the Grade Ones. Here is Greater Glasgow Police, which opted to play three snares and three tenors rather than four snares and two tenors. Modern Grade One pipe bands, with six or more tenors tuned to various notes, have sophisticated drum orchestrations which just aren't possible to do with two or three tenors. Likewise the lush three and four part harmonies of the vast 25-30 member pipe corps aren't going to sound the same with eight pipers.



Winnipeg Police marching out of the circle after competing. Their competition day is done; time for refreshments!



Apropos of nothing, doing quick math I estimate that the god Thor was 13 1/2 feet tall and weighed just shy of 800 pounds.

[The Celtic Croft]

Thanks for sharing! That's a great photo of our booth!