Advertisement
Published: October 23rd 2006
Edit Blog Post
New Town
You can see Old Town off to the distance Pronounced Ed-in-burra, with the “burra” part very cut off; don’t drag out “burr”. This is just a lesson for the folks back home. The Scottish roommate had to correct both the chilly guy and my pronunciations all last week. How to describe the city? If you took away the cars, signs and the few modern buildings, you could have no problem thinking you actually went back in time. The city seems to be separated into Old Town and New Town. New Town, built in the early 19th century, does look very “new” compared to Old Town. It also seems the city has made some conscious effort to keep new development in New Town.
The bus cost 6£ return and takes about 1hr each way. We arrived in Edinburgh at 7pm Friday. I woke up just in time to see our entry into the city. I didn’t take any pictures of Edinburgh at night but it was amazing. That night we went out to a dance club after having a few too many glasses of wine at Jeanette’s sister’s flat. Afterwards, the sister’s decided to walk home along the scenic route, going around the base of the Castle. At night teems
of rabbits can be seen grazing on the castle grassy hill. After a fruitless search for a chippy we headed home for some much needed rest.
The next morning we woke up to a bright blue sky. I’d been blessed with perfect sight seeing weather. We set out at a slow pace towards Old Town. Everything is in walking distance. Not being in the height of tourist season kept the streets comfortably clear. I had one of those “I can’t believe in I’m in Scotland” moments as the Castle came into view. I stood staring in awe across the small grassy valley at Old Town. I asked Jeanette if people actually live in Old Town; it looked like a set from a movie! I can’t even venture at a guess as to how much it would cost to live at the base of the castle.
After taking me to the “best chippy ever”, Jeanette left me to my own devices with a few tips as to where to walk and what to keep my eye out for. She went to meet with some old friends and get a hair cut. I decided to go on one of the
All Dolled up!
I did Jeanette's hair and makeup. She should really hire me as her personal stylist. many underground ghost tours offered in the city. The Old Town you see today was actually built on top of an even older town. There is an intricate underground city that has only recently begun to be explored. They’ve unearthed only a tiny portion of what they believe to be under there. On the particular tour I went on the woman took us into 3 different cave-like areas, each increasingly with more “paranormal” activity. We didn’t see any this time but she did have many interesting stories to tell us. She freaked us out in the last one by turning her flashlight completely off and telling us the story about the man who used to come down to the caves and kill people. She said he particularly didn’t like women and in the past when the tour group used to just pile in, many would leave with scratches and bruises. Now she had us stand men on one side and women on the other. Luckily, there was a large group of us and we were standing almost back to back. I probably would have freaked out otherwise.
She said the Archaeologists believe there may be 6 layers deep underground
of these cave like places, all built on top one another. They were originally built to store barrels of alcohol and other goods, but the merchants soon realized it wasn’t an ideal place for such storage since the earth of Edinburgh is actually made of volcanic rock and so is very porous. Worse than rain dripping in were the excrements of people and animals seeping through the cave roofs. Eventually the whole underground system was evacuated of merchandise. In about the late 18th early 19th centuries the poor people decided as a last resort to move into these underground caves. At the time it was illegal to be homeless. Imagine 40 people crammed into a space the size of your average living room. People would just stand in their space and go to the bathroom where they stood. She said it would be unusual for anyone to stay alive for over 2 months after moving there. If they weren’t physically being assaulted or killed by others they would die from disease. Unfortunately it was an even worser fate for those who didn’t move in and decided to be illegally homeless. Our guide ended our tour at a small museum of
torture devices where we were given a shot of whiskey and short bread.
Edinburgh is rich with stories about the paranormal; a haven for people who really want to seek this kind of stuff out. Jeanette told me she avoided going on any of the tours when she lived there. I would too! I spent the next few hours walking down the rest of Royal Mile and then going on a short hike up Arthur's Seat where you can see the whole city.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.07s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 6; qc: 45; dbt: 0.043s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Kristina
non-member comment
yikes! scary
Sounds worse than the haunted house at the PNE ;)