How I became a Scottish Tour Guide

“What followed next were four years of traveling the country visiting all sorts of castles, palaces, ruins, distilleries, lochs, glens and a large number of hairy coos.”

Tour guiding was never something I’d intended on doing. In fact, I would go as far as to say that nobody leaves school thinking “I’m off to begin a career as a tour guide”. It’s not one of your typical career day jobs. You could work for the police, become a teacher, or perhaps have a diminishingly fulfilling career within the NHS. These were never really options for me though. In fact, when I left school way back in 2009, I had absolutely no idea what I wanted to do with my life. Others seemed to have very clear career paths and so went to study relevant degrees at university. I thought to myself “I quite like history; guess I’ll go do a history degree”, so that’s exactly what I did. With a love for all things Roman and Greek, I left Edinburgh for, well…Edinburgh University, and studied Ancient History with a sprinkling of archaeology for four years. Now, you might be thinking that this is where my future job prospects came into play. University must open a lot of doors after all. Not for me. Well, not directly anyway! The degree itself didn’t provide me with a clear path to employment, but being at university - and the experiences I had whilst there - did.

Jump to 2012 and, like many students, money was drying up and the pennies were few and far between. I had to find some form of work that was going to bring home both the literal and metaphorical bacon! Taking myself into the library, I opened up my laptop and started looking through the University’s dedicated job page. Perhaps I had unrealistic expectations for what kind of job I was going to get, but I wasn’t having much luck going through the lists of what was available. I didn’t see myself as being cut out for rickshaw cycling, bar work, private tutoring or peddling through the streets of Edinburgh’s Old Town for Deliveroo. In fact, I don’t think they even existed then! However, one job did catch my eye…the position of a “Jumper-Ooter”:

“If you would like to spend some of your evenings lurking up closes, terrifying (and entertaining) unsuspecting visitors and locals alike, and bewildering passers-by, then maybe - just maybe - your place is here, in my basement.” How could anyone say no to a description like this? Honestly, running round the streets of Edinburgh as a resident ghost sounded a lot more fun to me than being sat behind a till scanning somebody’s weekly shop. I very quickly compiled a skin and bones C.V., handed it in (as was the way back in the day) to the Cadies and Witchery Tours office on Victoria Street, and patiently waited. Soon enough, a call followed, and I was brought in for the strangest interview experience I’ve ever had. There were the usual questions about experience, previous jobs, skills and such, but never had I ever been asked to scream my head off as part of the process.

“Can you scream?” I was asked. Of course, I responded with yes. What sort of ghost can’t scream after all? Then the follow up question, “Would you mind screaming for us just now?” At this point, I had two options. 1. Chicken out and not get the job. 2. Go all out and scream till my face popped. Thankfully without much hesitation, I went with option two and let loose the best ghostly shriek I possibly could, right in the face of my interviewer. This was promptly followed by a well-timed police siren from out on the street. They seemed impressed!

Two months later, I had officially joined the elite ranks of Edinburgh’s Jumper Ooters, and now spent my evenings running around dressed as mad monks, skeletons, witches and more! My cardio had never been so good! This marked the beginning of what is now a twelve-year career (do I call it that?) as a Scottish Tour Guide. From 2012 to 2015 I haunted the closes of Old Edinburgh, terrifying anyone that would cross my path, and soon enough advanced from Jumper Ooter to Senior Guide, leading the tours as Edinburgh’s very own Adam Lyal (Deceased). This was probably one of the most fun jobs I’d ever had. Unfortunately, as life progressed, evening work became more difficult and often I’d find myself working while all my friends were off, and off while all my friends were working. So, I was back on the job hunt again. But I must emphasise this, it was not for lack of job satisfaction! The Witchery Tours and everyone who I worked with there are like a second family to me.

This time round, I was a little more refined in my search for new employment. Instead of simply casting a wide net blindly into a random patch of water, I specifically looked for tourism related jobs, from daytime walking tours to positions with both Historic Scotland and the National Trust (unsuccessfully so to their detriment), and museum work. Disappointment followed with each failed attempt, though with hindsight this was the best thing that could have happened! Eventually I found a company called Rabbie’s who were hiring Driver Guides. Traveling around Scotland, visiting castles, distilleries, and beauty spots, whilst entertaining passengers with stories? Sounded like the perfect job to me! So, I applied and also told my friend Ewan at the Witchery Tours about it, as he was looking for a change as well. Soon enough we both had interviews and were invited back for second interviews, requiring us to tell a story or two. Then not long after that, Ewan let me know he had been successful and was now off to start his driver training with Rabbie’s. “Not long now for me!” I somewhat naively assumed…and soon enough, an email arrived telling me I had been unsuccessful. Great, it was time for me to start my new job as a driver…wait. Go back and read that again. “Unsuccessful”?! But that’s not right. I DID get a job with Rabbie’s! Sadly, it just wasn’t meant to be in 2015, and another year of service was dedicated to the Witchery Tours. I never did find out why I was unsuccessful, but the pessimist inside me assumed it was down to having Diabetes. Anyway, I pushed onwards for another year, not intending to apply for Rabbie’s again, looking at new career paths with other possibilities. I’m not actually sure what it was, or why, but around October 2016 I applied yet again for a position with Rabbie’s and was even asked why I decided to apply again. If I’m honest, I don’t actually remember why, or the moment I did apply, but it’s a good thing I did! This time I received an email saying I was in fact successful and by the 7th of November I officially had my first day working for Rabbie’s.

Guests on a tour stop at Invegarry Castle in Scotland

Invergarry Castle in the Scottish Highlands was the seat of the Chiefs of the Clan MacDonell of Glengarry, a powerful branch of the Clan Donald.

What followed next were four years of traveling the country visiting all sorts of castles, palaces, ruins, distilleries, lochs, glens and a large number of hairy coos. I could have done with far fewer visits to Loch Ness though. I never thought I would luck out twice and find a job that didn’t really feel like work, but here I was doing exactly what I loved doing. Then jump forward to 2017 and something interesting happened which was all over the papers. A casting call had been put out for a film about Robert the Bruce (Scotland’s greatest warrior king) and they required men with long hair and beards. Believe it or not, my beard and hair weren’t anywhere near as long back then and I thought to myself “I can grow them out”, so I did! I was lucky enough to join the ranks of the supporting artists on set filming for Outlaw King and had a blast doing it. What’s better, is that passengers on my bus seemed to like the new look and when leaving reviews would often refer to me as Eric the Red, Eric the Viking and…well, this one had a good ring to it…”The Tartan Viking”.

Tartan Viking was born! I very quickly adopted the name and began using it on my social media platforms as I travelled around the country. And with that, my following slowly began to grow. At that point in time, there was no intention for the name to become a business in and of itself, it was just a catchy name. I did eventually want to be my own boss and do tours privately, but that was going to take a little bit more experience. Three years of experience to be precise, and by 2020 I had decided that now was the time! I’d already taken a handful of bookings for the summer and my pal Henry (yes, that Henry) had helped me to buy my first bus! So, there I was, March 2020, bus at the ready and raring to go and…lockdown. The dreaded virus that shall not be named arrived and life as we all knew it came to a halt. The world closed down, and I went from travelling around the country to being a stay-at-home dad to my one-and-a-half-year-old son, and that is something I would never have changed! I did take this opportunity to explore more locally and even record a few Scottish stories which I sold via “Buy Me a Coffee” to keep me busy. But my plans of running my own private tour company were still there. In fact, they took another step in the right direction when I asked Henry to join as a 50/50 partner in Tartan Viking Tours. Henry had also joined Rabbie’s as a Driver Guide, but he had a mind for business that I didn’t quite have, and I knew if we put our heads together, we could form a pretty successful business. So new plans were in motion in the hopes that we could hit the ground running when the world eventually opened up again. We both had a little stint doing Amazon deliveries before tourism kicked off again, then returned to Rabbie’s for a few months until October 2021 when I handed in my notice. Over the winter I worked with Bethany Christian Trust, a charity seeking to end homelessness in Scotland. I worked in their emergency homeless accommodation, the Welcome Centre, until the end of April. Then on May the 4 th we ran our first official Tartan Viking Tour, a ten-day trip around the Highlands and Islands of Scotland. And the rest is history!

Eric & Henry on a recent trip to The Isle of Mull

The Isle of Mull, also known simply as Mull, stands as the second-largest island within the Inner Hebrides, situated off the western coast of Scotland. Spanning 875.35 square kilometers, Mull ranks as the fourth-largest island across both Scotland and Great Britain.