A day in Edinburgh with visitors from New Zealand. Among other places, the Royal Yacht Britannia. My visitors are of a generation and inclination to whom the Queen really means something, but I didn’t need to share that to find the tour more fascinating than I expected, and superbly presented. What I enjoyed most was hearing of the military precision and care that went into daily life on the yacht – for example the layout of spoons and forks for formal dinners being measured – with a tape measure, and the fact that the seamen could have up to eleven changes of uniform in a day for different duties. I have a repressed anal nature that would love to be part of such an exacting regime (if I wasn’t such a slob).
An article sent me by my friend the G: