EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND
22nd April 2002 to 23rd April 2002
A wee ghost trip in Scotland...
Nelson's Tower, Edinburgh
well howdy doody all :)
I have finally managed to get myself out from under the covers, and stop shivering after our ghost trip last night, long enough to write this email... but I rush ahead of myself.
You'd probably want to know how the hell did we get on a ghost trip? well.... it started something like this:
We left London on Monday morning 7am, made our way to Kings Cross station where we got accosted by a "mavro" (black person) whilst asking for directions. Rob, the sweetheart, feeling sorry for him, offered him a few quid, but the gentleman preferred to help himself to everything in Robs hand:) hehehe.. what can you do:)?
finally made it to the station and sat there trying to figure out which train was going to carry us away to the highlands and lochs of Scotland. We almost missed it by the way, because the train we actually wanted was the one to Glasgow via Edinburgh... ever try running with a 20kg backpack on your back?... not much fun.. I can assure you:)
Our first near miss! wow... lucky!
Sitting there on the train allows you time to ponder the places you've been to, the things you have seen and the people you have met. It gives you the chance to compare and see how you feel about everything...and you're right... I'm going to tell you exactly what I think! :)there's no getting out of it...
Each country so far has been very different from the next, even the UK itself is very diverse.... London gave off an air of "High society", everything seemed very proper, you kinda wanted to walk around with your nose in the air, pinkie pointing up and talk with a hot potato in your mouth. The buildings, gardens, even the stations gave off this feeling too.
Out of the train window the very soft, green rolling hills of England, soon gave way to the slightly bigger, emerald, tufty hills of Scotland. Immediately the atmosphere changed and everything became a little bit more relaxed, a little bit more jovial, not as haughty. You kinda expected to run into wenches, banquets and all kinds of innocent debauchery (if there is such a thing:)) around.
Comparing this once again to where we had just come from, Greece, you take the comparison a little bit further. Greece is harsh, craggy, clear whilst the UK is soft, rolling and fuzzy around the corners.....
Can't wait to see what everything else is like.
Our trip through the country side revealed lots of power stations, frolicking lambs (even the sheep look different) and rows upon rows of housing complexes. Now these housing complexes are exactly the same. The houses are exactly two stories high, the same colour, have the same roof, same windows, doors and chimneys in the same place. Exactly same height, width etc etc, it's the dandiest thing, they look exactly like rows of monopoly houses.
Where London was flat and had majestic, Tudor-style architecture with very few tall buildings, Edinburgh greeted us with steep inclines, steeples, old, medieval looking buildings and narrow closes.
In medieval times, Edinburgh consisted of a main road ( The Royal Mile), Edinburgh castle at one end, Holyrood Palace at the other, a Loch (lake) at the bottom and a wall that surrounded the city. Everybody lived within the city walls because it was very dangerous to live outside.. there were bandits and rogues and all kinds of wicked people waiting to rob and kill you.
The city itself was very small, so people built their houses, apartment-style. It started at the Royal mile and went up the hill on the one side and then down the hill on the other side in neat little rows. These buildings were built very close together, with a narrow, cobble lane separating the one from the other. This lane was maybe 0.5m wide and then the next building started. Apartments were built on top of each other because of the lack of space, and just carried on going higher and higher as the population grew. As you can imagine, these lanes were dark and damp and very very scary. There where even apartments underground!!! there would have been no sunshine, no light, nothing. Just the glow form candles or kerosene lamps (with fish oil).
The interesting thing is that everybody lived in these apartments, there was no rich area or poor area. They both lived together, but their position in the building told of their status in society. The people who lived underground and had no steps leading up to their door, where very very poor. The people who lived right at the top, where also very poor. The people who lived in the middle and on street level, or who lived underground and had steps leading up to their houses were middle class to wealthy.
Why you might ask? well, the people who lived on top had a really good chance that their house would be blown to bits. Scotland has extremely strong winds that blow almost constantly and can even blow you off your feet. The products and tools used to build these top apartments, where not very strong or of good quality, so bits of building used to fall off quite often.
now before I explain about the rest of the people, I have to explain about the sewage and sanitary conditions. People back then did not have toilets (only the really really wealthy). They had a bucket that was used all day by everyone in the house or office and emptied out at night. This bucket was called "The bucket of nastiness" and you can all imagine why...ewwwwwwwwww.!!!! There was also no privacy when using this bucket and no lid.. so again, you can imagine the stench by the end of the day.
There were disposal areas where people where supposed to go and empty their buckets, but this was right at the end of the city and people where too tired from the long hours they used to work to carry a full, stinking bucket all the way to the end of the city to empty it. sooooo... they used to just throw it out the window or door and into the street. Everybody did this ... and the lanes were constantly coated with sludge and muck. This leads me back to the poor people who had no steps to their houses... they would get all this gunk oozing through their front door and into their house.
The wealthier people, who had steps, didn't have this problem and the really wealthy that lived in the middle of the building didn't have the problem that their apartment would crumble away beneath them:)
Now that you have a slight idea about what the old Edinburgh used to be like, lets carry on.
Rob and I arrived at around 1pm and where lucky enough to find a great little hostel not far from the train station.... yip... you heard right,,, Rob and I stayed at our first hostel... and it was great. We didn't share a room though, we had a private double. This hostel funny enough, was run by Ozzies and Rob had a great time catching up with a nubile young blonde behind the reception:) This is where we stayed: St Christopher's Inn
Rob, being navigator and general map plotter, plotted our first day. Where in Greece he took us to all these high mountains, it seems that Europe is going to be one of stairs... thousands of flights of stairs...EVERYWHERE!!! Haven't these people ever heard of friggin lifts?
Our first stop was Edinburgh Castle which is situated at the end of the "old Town" ( there is a new town too)... we had to walk up this really steep hill to get there, but the view from the top was great, and the castle itself majestic. We had a guided tour and one has to giggle at the Scottish humour.... we were told that the reason they fire the cannon at 1pm exactly everyday is because that way they get to save on gunpowder....imagine doing it at 12pm... would cost a fortune:)
The castle is still very much in use today and a big part of Edinburgh
Even though it was a very windy day, we continued walking the streets till we got to Calton Hill. Getting to Calton Hill consisted of walking up this almost vertical hill. Thank God for the hand rail that one groped for support. The hill is almost in the centre of the town and on top you find all kinds of interesting monuments and buildings...one of the strangest has to be this quarter building/ruin consisting of Grecian columns... I though I was in Athens all over again. When one consults the travel books.. it tells you that " this is an unfinished Greek building" duh... and that's it... very confusing indeed... why would they want Greek buildings in Scotland????
Further along the hill one finds the observatory and Nelsons'Tower. There are 145 steps leading to the top, from where you have panoramic views of Edinburgh. we got there 10 minutes before closing time and of course just HAD to climb to the top. Up and down within 5 minutes... the keeper was aghast at how quickly we had done it... we pretended that it was nothing, walked out non-chalantly, then fell in a gasping, wheezing heap outside in the garden... :)
The interesting thing about Nelson's Tower and the Edinburgh Castle is that everyday at 1pm they set off something simultaneously. The castle fires the cannon and the Nelson's Tower has this enormous ball at the top which it drops. Both of these are to tell the town folk and the ships at harbour the time... pretty cool huh...There was a video demonstration that showed this, but me being really brainy thought that they fired the cannon onto the ball and this made it drop... Rob just looked at me as if I was stupid...well? wouldn't it be cool if this is what happened? I mean really now.. how unimaginative! pah!
Carried on walking around getting a feel for the place, and I can definitely tell you that although Edinburgh is very safe, you can't help but feel uneasy, especially as it gets darker and the sun sets. I think this is because of the buildings and all the movies about Jack the ripper and vampires. Places like Edinburgh almost make you believe that these things can happen to you.
Got home around 10pm and went to bed. Only to be woken up by some very drunk college boys from France who where there on vacation. Their idea of fun was to bang the doors in unison one after the other and set off the fire alarm. I think in their drunken stupor they were producing some beautiful music, but to the rest of us.....yea right.
They finally got kicked out 4.30am, about 20 minutes later and we got back to sleep again.
Breakfast consisted of a yummy warm yoghurt, milkless coffee, an orange, yummy chocolate muffin and orange juice and then of to do some more touring.
We walked down the cobbled streets and did a bit more window shopping. Ended up in the Edinburgh museum, which was quite cool and then walked of to Holyrood Palace ( where the queen stays when she's here) and on to The Dynamic Earth.
This was a huge building that took you underground and showed you how the life, the planets etc all came about. The tour was great, it's a wonderful educational tool especially for children.
Hungry by the time we finished that, so we stopped at "The world's end pub" and had a lovely meal. Rob was tempted to have a wee bit o Haggis but changes his mind.... for those of you who don't know what haggis is... it's offal all ground to mince and mixed together with meal and herbs and spices and then put into a sheep's stomach and cooked. It is then served with 'neeps and tatties (turnips and potatoes) for you uneducated plebs out there:)
After a hearty meal off to so a Whiskey Heritage tour. This tour was excellent, they had this fantastic hologram showing us the art of blending scotch and after that a cart took us around the showing us historical stuff.
Did you know that whiskey is known as "the water of Life".. no wonder I like it soo much:)
Now no one can come to Edinburgh and not do a ghost tour.. I mean the place is renowned for it's banshees and ghosts. so we booked a tour called "Mary Kings Close". There where other tours too that took you through cemeteries and ghost hunts, but Rob was too scared and needed something a bit more historical.... so we went with that one....
Just a warning to those of you who are feint hearted or think you will have nightmares tonight.... get parental guidance first! or don't read the following few paragraphs.!! until you see the "all clear **********"
The tour started at around 8.45 and took us underground to Mary Kings Close and told us the story of how people used to live ( like I explained earlier on) The interesting thing about this particular close was that this is where the Black Plague first started and spread to a further 3 closes next to it (caused by fleas on rats due to sewage conditions). To stop this plaque from spreading the council quarantined the closes by brick walling all entrances and exits. This meant that nobody who lived there could come in or out, they also could not get any food or water, and the sewage could not run off, so they all ended up dying. There was probably over 1000 people who succumbed to this fate.
The story is horrible as these particular closes where smack centre of the town and everyone could hear the people groaning and screaming inside. Once everything went quiet a few weeks later, they decided that they had to do something about all these dead people as the stench was overpowering.
People were too afraid to go into the close though because 1. they were afraid of getting ill themselves and 2. they believed that it was the work of devils and witches and were terribly afraid. Autumn came and went, and still nobody would undertake the excavation and disposal of the dead. The council started offering huge sums of money, no luck... winter came, so did spring.. and when everything started thawing, the sums of money became extravagant. Something had to be done. Two butcher brothers decided they where up to the task and went about to clean the closes up. The problem though was that they couldn't get all the bodies out fast enough, so the only solution was to chop them up into little bits.... just a we bit gruesome don't you think?
ALL CLEAR NOW **********************************************************
Hope we didn't cause you any discomfort with our story.. but it's all true!
St. Giles Cathedral is quite beautiful and the memorial to Sir Walter Scott is amazing.
Scott Monument (Sir Walter Scott the writer)
It is probably the world's largest memorial to a writer. The monument is 200ft high, with a huge Gothic spire, crockets, niches and finials. It forms an arch over a marble statue of Sir Walter Scott, sitting with a book in his hand and deerhound Maida at his side. It was paid for by public subscription, most of which was raised in Edinburgh where Scott was born and lived most of his life. A spiral staircase leads to the top - and marvelous views of the city and close-ups of the monument's many statues.
That was it for Edinburgh, we definitely will be coming back again, there's so much more to see, and next time.. I'm dragging Rob off to hunt for the Loch ness Monster ('nessie).
We left for Amsterdam on Wednesday the 24 April at around 3pm. and like all good stories, this one will be a blast.
Sex, drugs and rock and roll.. woooooooo hooooooo
Arrived at the airport, jumped onto the train to get us to Amsterdam city ... only for disaster to strike......
But for the rest of the story, I leave you with baited breath..!
Till we get online again
toodles
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