My Own Jarl for UpHelly Aa Tonight

This is the last Tuesday in January and the day of the Lerwick Up Helly Aa fire festival in Shetland. 
His Lordship and I were there to watch the event in 2012 and I have to say  I found it the spectacle of a lifetime, street theatre at its most dramatic. 
It still brings out goose bumps when I think back to that dark, ferociously cold, windy night and the sound of the maroon fired over the pitch black streets heralding the sudden lighting of hundreds of torches; I can still remember the smell of burning paraffin and watching the weaving column of torch carrying guizers marching round the town. 
I wrote about the whole experience in my blog in Blipfoto on 31st January 2012 . Tonight I can watch the live  video on the website UpHellyAa.com, and be back there as an onlooker in spirit.

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