Tartans and traditions celebrated at Highland Games

Bag pipe music filled a campground Saturday for one of North Americas longest-running Scottish events.

From kilted golfing to the caber toss, hundreds of people gathered in Eldon, P.E.I., for the 154th Highland Games and Scottish Festival.

Spectators moved around lawn chairs from one spot to another to take in pipe and drum bands, dancers and traditional competitions such as a the shot put, Braemar Stone, sheaf and rolling pin tosses.

The event runs Saturday and Sunday.

"I can remember coming here as a boy, so the men and women of those days, they instilled in us those traditions, so we are carrying it on," said Robert MacArther, president of the Caledonian Club of P.E.I.

He said the campground itself has special significance as it's the site of Lord Selkirk's 1803 landing, which brought Scottish settlers and their traditions to the area.

People of all ages took part in the festival, including of Cara Sweet of Antigonish, N.S., who started Highland Dancing two and a half years ago. Dancers preform on a stage, judged on their ability to preform complex routines.

"I do it because I like it and it is the only sport that I like," she said.

Saturday morning kids were invited to try out the different traditional Scottish sports before the athletic competitions later in the day.

Kim Gill won the Ladies' Athletics Competition for the previous two years. But she only entered because she was camping at the same time as the festival.

"A bunch of us came in it as a laugh because when else would you say you can throw a rolling pin and just kind of went from there," Gill said.

Others, like Bryan MacLean, are taking the competition more seriously. MacLean will be representing Canada at the Scottish Masters Athletics Heavy Events World Championships held in Stuttgart, Germany in September.

Though the competition originated in Scotland, he said some of the biggest games are now held in California.

"Here in Canada and even in the Maritimes, we have some of the top throwers in the world so we are very lucky," he said. "It's pretty amazing to see how the games have grown internationally."

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