Ghosts & Pubs
“Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.”
Victoria Street
On Wednesday (Dec 28) we were finally able to take Pam to see the beautiful Victoria Street.
Bertie’s Proper Fish and Chips (What?) is an iconic shop on Victoria Street. Of course we also wandered through The Great Wizard Shop but there was a queue at the Museum Context Harry Potter shop. Definitely best to visit this area during non-peak hours if possible.
Brollies down ladies for the famous view on West Bow looking up Victoria Street. Watch out for the curb Pam!
A foreign concept for people who essentially reside in a desert. Throughout Great Britain, umbrellas are frequently called brollies.
Women and their love of brawny, manly men! I feel so inadequate. 😔
At the bottom of West Bow/Victoria Street is Grassmarket Square. Home to Edinburgh’s oldest pubs, the Square has a quaint and charming appeal—an appeal that did not exist back in the 1500s.
Dad, since you mentioned The Last Drop in your comments, here is the sign near their front door.
White Hart Inn
I mentioned previously pubs claiming to be the oldest this-and-that. The White Hart Inn claims to be the oldest in Edinburgh, having seen the likes of Oliver Cromwell, William Wordsworth, and Robert Burns as patrons. Two of the city’s most notorious murders, William Burke and William Hare, were also known to knock back a tankard here.
The pub gets its name from a miraculous and holy event that took place in Edinburgh in 1128. The Scottish King David I, against the advice of his priest, set out hunting upon the Feast Day of the Holy Rood, which is Scots for the Holy Cross. He came upon a huge, white stag and gave chase but was suddenly thrown from his horse. The maddened stag immediately turned upon its pursuer and King David began frantically praying to God for his salvation. The story is told that a fiery cross appeared between the stag’s antlers before it vanished from sight. A grateful King David built a shrine upon the site of the miracle, founding Holyrood Abbey, the ruin of which may be seen today at the rear of the Palace of Holyroodhouse.
And there is also this about the White Hart Inn:
Robert Burns famously loved the lassies but he was particularly besotted by one—Agnes Maclehose. However, she was already married, unhappily married but married nevertheless. Her husband had long since left her and gone off to Jamaica. Robert & Agnes conducted a romance through letters and exchanges of poetry and to keep their correspondence confidential, adopting the pseudonyms “Clarinda” and “Sylvander.” Burns spent one week at the White Hart Inn in November 1791 visiting his lover one last time and during his stay was inspired to write one of his most beautiful and enduring love songs—Ae Fond Kiss. Some of his poetry may be seen painted upon the wooden rafters.
We’re getting a bit side-tracked here, but since we’re on the topic of Robert Burns (“Sylvander”) and Agnes Maclehose (“Clarinda”), there is a tea shop named Clarinda’s Tea House on Canongate along the Royal Mile.
Oh yes…and Clarinda’s headstone is in the Canongate Kirkyard, right next to Clarissa’s Tea House.
OK, OK, OK…so you can see the strong appeal and why we’ve tried to stop in The White Hart Inn several times. Unsurprisingly, the pub is exceptionally popular, as we found it again today when we tried to have lunch.
So, it was off to the neighboring and almost as popular, former-16th-century-coaching-house-turned-contemporary-drinking-and-eating establishment: The Beehive Inn. On the second floor is the original door from the “Death Cell” of the infamous Calton Jail. Fortunately, the only “death” we experienced was by near starvation. We waited for 30 minutes and never saw a server! Strike 2 for the pubs!
So, we walked next door to an American pizza joint—Mamma’s.
You simply cannot open an establishment in Edinburgh without some backstory. Mamma’s story is far more modern than those of her ancient pub neighbors, but it’s still quite fun. It was founded by Angus MacInnes, the Canadian actor who played Gold Leader in Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.
The pizza was actually very good.
No UK beers on tap here, only Coors. Now that’s devotion to your brand! (See the blue mountain logo—proof they do serve cold beer in the UK!)
After lunch we finished out our tour of Grassmarket Square, including this photo under the amazing display of Christmas presents.
Pam in The Vennel.
And for all you cat lovers reading, just off Grassmarket you can stop in the Maison de Moggy cat café and pay £10 to play with their cats for an hour.
Such an odd form of therapy if you ask me, but as far as therapy goes, £10 is a bargin.
The owner of our current rental is Slawomir (a Polish name if you’re wondering), and he said if we love coffee we just had to go to The Source Coffee Roaster for the “best coffee in Edinburgh.” I’m a coffee drinking poser who only like mochas, so what do I know really? I’m just going to say that my experience did not live up to the hype. The ladies had hot chocolates that were “good, but nothing to write home about.” I say don’t waste your time here—go to Bastard Barista!
Wednesday’s adventures were a bit of a roller coaster between the rain ☔️, understaffed restaurants🧑🏼🍳, and “different” coffee ☕️. As has been our experience, however, it’s hard to have a bad day in Edinburgh! Let’s just hope that Edinburgh’s many ghosts don’t mess up this pattern tomorrow night.
Pam and Amanda spent most of Thursday morning (Dec 29) exploring thrift stores on Morningside Road, but the big activity for the evening was with the paranormal.
We signed up for the Ghost Bus Tour and while we waited to board we did receive a sign from the other side:
Amanda was walking through Deacon Brodies pub when she spotted a dime on the floor. As a bus driver, we think Keith particularly enjoyed this evening’s choice of entertainment.
We sat upstairs on the vintage double-decker bus.
Partway through the tour the bus died, so we had to kill some time amongst the dearly departed in Edinburgh’s oldest kirkyard at The Parish Church of St Cuthbert.
While in the kirkyard, our bus conductor told us tales of hauntings and grave robbers. He showed us St Cuthbert’s watch tower and told us, if you spent the night there alert for body snatchers, you were said to work the “graveyard” shift.
Due to the poor medical knowledge of the times, people were sometimes only “mostly dead” when they were buried. They took to tying bells to the hands of the dead and graveyard workers would listen for bells so they could unearth someone who woke up buried. In that case you were “saved by the bell” and you were considered a “dead ringer.”
Not surprisingly the tour was campy, but what else would you expect? Our conductor made lots of puns, so that kept Amanda happy. Overall we gave it a B and it was a fun way to tour the city at night.
Spoiler Alert—If you take time to research graveyard shift, saved by the bell, and dead ringer, you’ll find they make for a seemingly cohesive narrative, but they have nothing to do with old burials and the terms are not connected in any way. 😔
After being frightened nearly to death, we were ready for a drink and some live music.
Deacon Brodies pub is near where the ghost bus tour ends and, as it turned out, they had live music going on in about 30 minutes.
Even if they have fun things to look at in the pub, what happens when the guy starts singing mellow top 40 hits from the 1990s and early 2000s?
You leave and look for another pub of course! We didn’t go all the way to Edinburgh to sit in an old pub and hear some guy sing Layla (a horrible song to be subjected to at any time or place).
We walked up to the Ensign Ewart pub at the foot of the castle and found the authentic atmosphere and experience we were looking for!
I mean, just look around this place!
AND…they had live folk music about to begin! Now that’s how you end the night in Edinburgh!
Put yourself in the middle of the music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QckX_CHg_g
