Scotland is truly the city of brotherly love. Britain is truly the city of no one knowing what side of the sidewalk to use. Scotland is in Britain, so it’s two, two, two cities in one. They want you up and out early in this bed and breakfast, which is why they start serving the breakfast part before eight. Because we got almost enough sleep, it’s almost possible to forget that’s only three o’clock in the real world, but shortly thereafter, fortified with runny scrambled eggs and playing sidewalk dodge-em, the awareness creeps in around the edges.
Rob wants to go into a high-end department store to look at their spoons. I then guide him across the gorgeous park that separates New Town from Old Town, where we climb the hill to Edinburgh Castle. The history of Edinburgh Castle is that it was made of stones personally quarried by Mary, Queen of Scots, and she built the thing, too, from the ground up. Mary, Queen of Scots, was born in the castle, was imprisoned there for being a witch, and died there in nineteen eighteen. They used to let Mary, Queen of Scots, in for free since it was hers, but it costs us nine pounds eighty to get in, which is almost twenty dollars. The views from the ramparts are breathtaking, and you can see all the way across the Fifth of Fourth, which is some water. There are a bunch of mannequins of Mary, Queen of Scots, hanging about. We have shortbread and watch an army guy fire the one o’clock gun, which is an extremely loud howitzer they fire at 1:02 every afternoon.
(OK, I am very tired now. I will take a nap before telling you the rest. I hope you appreciate this, folks . . . they don’t tell you this stuff in the guidebooks!
Snooze.
And we’re back!)
After the castle and a breeze through the nearby kilt-making factory, we meet a cleverly disguised Hare Krishna, who attempts to sell us CDs of his Hare Krishna rock band. He is very cute and has an official-looking clipboard that stating he is twenty-four years old. Somewhere, I need to get a hold of an official-looking clipboard stating I am twenty-four years old. If I have to become a Hare Krishna, so be it.
We walk around some more, through Greyfriars cemetery and a bit of the Museum of Scotland. Although the day has shaped up to be quite lovely, and its view of the city is breathtaking, Greyfriars is a creepy corner of Old Town. Right away, I get the distinctive prickling in my palms and forearms that tells me there’s a ghostie afoot. Later, after the most expensive bowl of spaghetti ever to emerge from a boiling pot of water, we return there with the City of the Dead ghost tour.
Night has fallen, and the beautiful day has turned once again to rain. I swear, the Scots are impervious to rain. They actually repel it. Within moments, I’m drenched, but no one we pass looks uncomfortable or even wet. We have already bought our tour tickets, so we’re going through with it, rain or no. The guide is animated, brilliant, and funny. He explains some of the city’s history, uses Rob as a dummy to illustrate a particularly gruesome torture technique, and leads us to Greyfriars for the coop de gracie, the Mackenzie Poltergeist, a menacing creature that has made headlines the world over for actually attacking tour groups. The tour’s propaganda notes that the Covenanters’ Prison corner of the graveyard (where the poltergeist works its magic) has been named the World’s Scariest Place by whomever goes around bestowing such titles, so I have high hopes. Just inside the cemetery, Rob and I befriend a young Canadian woman who is traveling alone and wants the protection of our company (such as it is). We walk around the graveyard, slogging through sticky black mud, and finally end up in the famously haunted area. The Canadian woman locks arms with me. We crowd nervously into an open tomb, where the guide recounts tales of the Poltergeist. Suddenly, he plunges us into darkness, and . . .
Out pops Mary, Queen of Scots!!!
No, seriously . . . nothing. Nothing happens. I don’t even feel the tingling from before. We might as well be in a particularly dank elevator.
I would be disappointed, except, well, I’m not. Here I am with my husband holding one hand, a strange Canadian woman clamped to the other, on a pitch-black night, in the chilly rain, standing in an ancient tomb, with one of Europe’s most beautiful cities bustling around me.
It’s a moment I’ll never forget.
