I bought my lunch for the day at the supermarket and made my way onto the train. I hated my seat cause I couldn't see out the window, it was very frustrating.
When I got to Edinburgh I was shocked by the atmosphere there. It was nothing like I expected it to be. Pictures and words cannot describe the feeling that place gave to me. That first night I mostly wandered around looking at stuff. I decided to check out the "Edinburgh Dungeon".
This is kind of a chain of haunted houses, they scare you with live actors and give you a history of the city. They have these in most of the major cities in England. As I was going in, these girls were really freaked out and kept pushing me ahead of them and grabbing my backpack. I couldn't understand what they were saying (bloody tourists!) but it was pretty funny. Overall I would say this place had some really cool stuff, but then other things were really stupid.
The positives:
1. This really cool maze of mirrors. I would be walking and all of a sudden I would run into myself! Much better than my childhood favorite, the glass maze at Playland.
2. This rotating cylinder thing you walked through made it feel like the room was flipping upside down.
3. Good history lesson and I love those Scottish accents.
4. One of the actors said I had a nice hat (Robilyn had made it for me the day before!).
The negatives:
1. There was one place that had things written on the wall and we were supposed to read them before we moved along. No one really knew we should read them so they all just walked to the exit door waiting for the actor to lead us to the next spot. They just stood there for like 15 mins. I tried to read the stories of these grave robber guys, but the lighting was really bad in there and some of them I couldn't read.
2. This one section was all hyped up. The lady told us to watch out for vampires as we got into this Disneyland style boat. It went through this door into the dark and these things from the ceiling brushed against you and everyone screamed. Then it stopped and we sat there for like 10 mins as these moaning noises got louder and louder. Then lightening flashed and this dummy vampire thing dropped from the ceiling. Gave me a little bit of a jolt, but then the boat moved to the next room and let us off. I couldn't believe we got in that dumb boat, moved 20 feet, waited 10 mins in the dark, all for that fake thing to slide down.
3. That same actor that liked my hat kept flirting with me. Did I mention it was a dude! He kept coming at me with his lips puckered ready to kiss me. He would slowly move in, my goodness, he got so close! I wouldn't have minded, but his breath was horrible...
After that I had some McDonald's and went to Mary King's Close. In Edinburgh people live in these apartmentesque buildings that were separated by small alleyways called closes. One particular close was named after Mary King and over time a building was built over top of it. The close was eventually fixed up and reopened as a tourist attraction. It's quite dark and musty down there.
I went on the tour with a retarded actor. His lines were completely scripted and he would often forget where he was and just pause, then he would start again. It was just like this sentence that............I am typing to you now from...........my computer at work. So annoying! He was dressed like an idiot too.
The plague hit Edinburgh really badly so there are a lot of ghost stories, especially from Mary King's close. He took us into one room where they had it set up like a typical room occupied by mannequin people. In the beds were two people infected with the plague and hovering over them were these two plague doctors. They were so creepy looking! They wore these leather robe things and they had a big beak mask they wore over their face that was filled with herbs and such. Reminded me of those creatures from the Village.
So I'm standing next to one as the tour guide is talking and I think to myself, I should just nudge this doctor to make sure its not real. Just then it slams its staff on the ground and walks out of the room!!! Freaked us all right out.
So that was a fun experience. It was better than the dungeon, although I could have done with a better tour guide. After that I looked around a bit...here are some pics:
I went back to my hotel (I decided to splurge a bit) but unfortunately my jet lag kicked in again. I fell asleep at about 10pm but of course woke up at 2am. I walked around outside for a bit, but nothing was going on. I didn't get to sleep until 5am. I wanted to get up early to check more stuff out before my train left in the afternoon. Hopefully going to bed so late wouldn't screw me over...
2 comments:
those are some great pictures. I think i will be a plague doctor next halloween. Did the herbs do anything or did they get the plague too. Does getting the plague mean a person gets bloody armpits? I do do well around sick people... yuck.
ps. you were in a dream i had the other night. i don't remember what you were doing there, but you were there!
janie
i think i will be a plague doctor next year too! i absolutely love the outfit...i think they had herbs in that beak to block the smell and also to "purify" the air, but i don't know how good that worked. if you get the plague you would often get swelling in a lymph gland, most commonly the groin, but sometimes in the armpits and neck also. good times! i will try to visit you more in your dreams, i'll be the one wearing the plague doctor outfit!
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