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Daily Record
Daily Record
National
Nicholas Keyden & Hilary Mitchell

Bank holiday sunseekers swarm Portobello beach despite Nicola Sturgeon's lockdown warning

An Edinburgh beach promenade was swamped with Bank Holiday revellers despite Nicola Sturgeon's warning that lockdown has not been eased.

A clip circulating Twitter today shows Portobello esplanade packed with sun-seekers despite coronavirus restrictions being imposed for another three weeks in Scotland yesterday.

Cyclists line the promenade while people queue for coffee and sit on the beach wall.

They were slammed by angry locals, with one claiming people were 'hanging about drinking', as reported by Edinburgh Live.

They tweeted directly to Police Scotland, saying: "What is happening here! Portobello is full of people.

"Groups of men hanging and drinking. Gym being used and too many bicycles. You are not doing your job properly!"

While a cyclist added: "Portobello-busy-lots of coffee shops open."

The video - tweeted by Gavin Bell and embedded above - shows long lines of people queueing for takeaway coffee, mirroring long queues at Costa Coffee at Cameron Toll when it reopened on Monday.

Pictures taken by an  Edinburgh Live  staff member showed dozens of drivers blocking other shoppers desperate to get a quick fix during  lockdown.

They were even forced to lay on a coffee warden in a hi-vis jacket  to try to control the droves of people joining the queue.

We told last week how hundreds of Scots coffee lovers queued for hours outside Costa's Glasgow drive-thru near Braehead.

Traffic chaos ensued as drivers flocked to get their fix, with cars stretching back towards the M8.

It comes after Nicola Sturgeon used her briefing this afternoon to warn people not to be tempted to go outside during the long bank holiday, with the UK Government echoing her statement during their daily Downing Street press conference.

The coffee shops are the first to re-open after Costa shut down all 27,000 UK stores on March 23 in the wake of the covid-19 outbreak.

Five Guys and B&Q have also seen large queues of people forming since reopening.

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