We said goodbye to our parents and excitedly set off to Edinburgh. The train ride was very long, but so much fun! As we were arriving, there were the most beautiful views of the sea, bright yellow fields and a large number of sheep. On the first night before dinner, we went outside in the sunshine to rehearse for the concert the next day. The following day, we woke up early and immediately set off to Edinburgh Castle. When we got to the castle the teachers sent us off in our groups with our tickets to explore.

In the castle, we saw the crown jewels (which were extremely shiny!) and the prisons which smelt very bad. We went outside and down some stairs, finding a diorama of the castle and the one o’clock gun which is fired at one o’clock each day. After visiting the castle, we walked to St Cuthbert’s Church where we sang in a concert. It was an amazing experience to sing in the church with one of the beautiful tiffany windows that where painted in 1903 and where Agatha Christie got married just before leaving to write Death on the Nile. That night we had the most fun because we took a coach to a bowling alley and spent the night having lots of fun and scoring strikes, even though I wasn’t that good!

On the third day, we woke up early again to go to a morning church service which we found out was a baptism, which we sang in before doing our concert. The church we sang at was where Mary, Queen of Scots was baptised. While I was singing it felt like I was singing at Mary, Queen of Scots’ Baptism and it was great to get a standing ovation. After the concert, we had lunch and quickly got on the coach again which would bring us to the harbour at Loch Lomond, which also happened to be the title of one of the songs we sang in the concert. Loch Lomond is the biggest Loch in Scotland and we found out that the song we were singing is not a love story, but a story about two soldiers who went to war – one died taking the high road to heaven and one stayed on earth taking the low road.

On the last day, everyone was sad because we were leaving this incredible trip, however we were also excited to sing in a very big concert in the centre of Edinburgh. Later after the amazing concert and congratulating everyone we hurried to the train station, hoping not to miss our train. Luckily we arrived on time, even early, and embarked on the very long journey back to London.

This trip was an amazing experience – I had a lot of fun and we will all treasure the memories forever. I made so many new friends, became closer to my existing friends and I hope to go on another one soon to make other friendships closer too. I really loved all the fun activities we took part in, all of the laughs we had and that we had the freedom to explore this wonderful city.

Thank you so much to the music department for arranging this brilliant trip.

Giuditta De Simone Niquesa, Year 8