Cake Goes Underground!

Calm before the cakey storm!

We've hosted some unusual events at The Real Mary King's Close before, but we never thought that cake would be a major feature for us to theme an event! 

How wrong were we?!  Last night we welcomed the fantastic Edinburgh Cake Ladies to The Close for a belated Halloween celebration of cake and savoury goodness! The talent was endless with some of the most elaborate cakes we have ever seen.

Entertainment was provided by Elliot Bibby, a local young magician who entertained with his feats of magic and mystery.

Between munching cakes and drinking tea, the Cake Ladies (and the younger guests) explored The Close, hearing tales of young Annie and Andrew Chesney's famous thunderbox.

Local charity, and nominated charity of the Edinburgh Cake Ladies, Its Good to Give raised £250 from the nights precedings which made us all feel that we were worthy of enjoying the delicious baking!

As one of our tour guides said after the event: "When I heard the Cake Ladies were visiting, I expected a group of ladies from the WI, complete with their old-school doilies.  This was so much more - AMAZING!!"  Hear, hear and thank you to them all for visiting....and being such wonderful bakers!

Thank you also to Alex Hewitt for taking the photos in the challenging, sorry, atmospheric light of the Close!!!

 

Our tour guides view the delicious spread!

One particularly talented Cake Lady Lou recreated the Close in cakey form! It tasted as good as it looked!

Happy Halloween from the Close

Its that time of the year again!  The Close is buzzing with visitors looking for the opportunity to come face to face with some of the sites 'residents'.

Mary King's Close is infamous for paranormal sightings and stories.  The tour itself is factual and historical, but that doesn't stop the more curious visiting in the hope of 'spying a spook'.

One of Europe's oldest recorded ghost stories was written on Mary King's Close in 1685 - 'Satan's Invisible World', where a couple are visited by apparitions and suffer the subsequent curse. 

No doubt one of the most famous myths of the Close is that its haunted reputation is the result of unfortunate victims being abandoned, with Mary King's Close being bricked up and its inhabitants left to die a gruesome death.  Whilst a dramatic and fascinating theory, its completely untrue.  History shows that plague victims were quarantined in their homes, a white flag hung outside the residence and neighbours would leave food and ale to support the stricken family.

Toys in Annie's Room

However, one of our famous residents alledgedly did fall foul of the plague - little Annie, a girl abandoned by her family, only making herself know centuries later to Aiko Gibo, a Japanese psychic who visited the Close in the 1990's with a film crew.  She felt Annie pulling at her trousers and sobbing that she had lost her doll.  One of her production assistants ran to a Royal Mile shop and bought a tartan 'Barbie' style doll.  Annie was happy and the doll remains in the room to this day to keep the little girl at peace.....along with gifts bought for her from visitors from around the world who have heard her story and sought to help.  Those who don't have a toy often leave spare change which in turn is donated to the Sick Kids Hospital Friends Foundation here in Edinburgh, helping today's sick children in the city.  We think Annie would be happy that other children are being helped in her name.

The Real Mary King's Close

Some visitors and staff experience things on the Close every day.  Many do not.  Those that do feel the presence of some of the Close's more mysterious residents have reported smelling strong tobacco smoke, spying a cat running between the vaulted rooms, seeing a tall figure in the corner of the 17th century house and seeing a figure in a feathered hat at the beginning of the tour (not a tour guides!).  Whatever you've felt, we are always happy to hear your story from your visit.   It contributes to the rich history and real stories of The Real Mary King's Close.

Happy Halloween from all at the Close!

A plea for votes!

Staff take to the Close 'X Factor' style to secure your vote

If you've been on our Twitter feed or Facebook page it won't have escaped your attention that we are thrilled to have been nominated for the British Travel Award for Best UK Heritage Attraction 2012.    There's under two weeks left to vote, so our staff took to the Close to campaign for your vote! 

Craig Miller our General Manager had this to say: “It is hugely prestigious to even receive a nomination in this category, as the UK has so many wonderful heritage attractions, but we made it down to the top four, and we’re just hoping that we get enough support to make it all the way to the top spot,” comments general manager, Craig Miller.  “We don’t quite have the profile of some of the other shortlisted candidates –which includes St Paul’s Cathedral in London – but we make up for that with a visitor experience that is second to none, combining an unseen tour of Edinburgh’s buried streets and some of the best tour guides in the country!”

If you could take 5 minutes to vote for us, we would really appreciate it, you could also be in the running to win a fantastic prize from the British Travel Awards. Click here to make your vote count! There are plenty of reasons why we deserve your vote!

If you could spare a vote for our sister attraction Spinnaker Tower in Portsmouth that would be marvellous - they've been nominated in the Best UK Leisure Attraction category.

THANK YOU - we very much appreciate your support!

 

The September Sigh of Relief!

So we're into September, the Royal Mile is back to normal and there is more than an Autumnal feel in the air.

RMKC Team celebrate record numbers in the style of Olympic champion Usain Bolt

For most tourism businesses and restaurants in Edinburgh, a collective sigh of relief is taken in the first week of September as the many festivals of August have finished and the tourists and performers have long gone home.  For us here at the Close, we're back to normal opening hours - 10am to 9pm (last tour) rather than 9am to 11pm (last tour) and we're reflecting on the August whirlwind! 

We welcomed a record number of people, exceeding our previous records for amount of tickets sold in a day and the amount of visitors on the tour in a day.  We've had some great feedback with 95% of our visitors saying they would recommend a visit to their friends or family, which is a testament to our fantastic team of tour guides, retail staff and managers.

One of our tour guides, Marc McKinnon who plays Walter King, the Foul Clenger, put it well -

"So the Fringe Festival has been and gone, and what a busy time it has been. Luckily for us Foul Clengers, we are used to treading through thousands of bodies each day, so it was just another day at work!

Although a completely hectic time of year, both for tourists and attractions alike, it has been so much fun to see all the staff come together and work long hours and deliver some brilliant results on tour - to the masses - daily.

Extending our opening hours as usual allowed more people to come on tours and allows more people to experience our amazing attraction. So, when all is said and done, it has definitely been a win/win, for our tourists and for our attraction, and I feel privileged to be part of our guiding team at the Close"

The 'Hoff' and the team!

One of the highlights of August at the Close was welcoming a special guest to the Close.  Of course all of our visitors are extremely special but we welcomed the legendary David Hasselhoff and his team to the Close for a tour.  The Hoff was a treat, spent time having his photo taken with staff and was a welcome morale boost at a frantic time of year!  

Sport way back when!

With the London 2012 Olympics in full swing and sporting fever truly sweeping the country, if not the world, we thought this would be a great opportunity to reflect on sporting history in Edinburgh.  Whilst there are no records of Mary King being a particularly great gymnast or Stephen Boyd being a dab hand with a racquet, there are some fascinating tales to behold.

The earliest reference to sport in Edinburgh our historian could find could be found at the 'barras' or the barriers, at the west end of the Grassmarket, where the Royal Tournament yards could be found dating back to the early fourteenth century.  Royal Tournaments were also held near St Cuthberts in the West End, on the north side of the Castle, until the infamous Nor' Loch was created.

In the late 15th century and early 16th, King James IV loved tournaments.  He had married Margaret Tudor whose brother was Arthur, and therefore as a result was fascinated by the Arthurian legend, ordering a Round Table to made for one tournament. His tournaments took place at the 'barras' or outside Holyrood Palace and were celebrated throughout Europe.

In 1456, James's grandfather, James II formally designated the little vallley of Greenside to the west of Calton Hill as the official playing fields of Edinburgh. This became the place for plays, 'mystery plays' and organised games of Holy Fest days.  Strangely there is no commemoration of this at the location, but fittingly the Edinburgh Playhouse continues this tradition at the site today.

The usual place for sports before the declaration of the official playing fields were at the Mercat Cross, the Salt Tron (by the Tron Kirk), and the Butter Tron (by what is now the Hub).  'Real tennis' courts could also be found at nobleman's houses, with a Royal tennis court obviously at Holyrood.  Today's sports fans would have been outraged that football and golf were banned on the orders of James I but continued in some form regardless!

It would be remiss of us to do a sporting blog post and not to congratulate Team GB on their accomplishments to date in particular Mary King, the legendary Olympic equestrian star who yesterday won silver with her team mates.  An epic achievement in her sixth Olympics and following an awful accident in 2001.

With thanks to Chris Aliaga-Kelly for his input into this blog post

More Than Meets the Eye to our Tour Guides

Our tour guides quite rightly receive fantastic praise from our visitors, with 89% of our visitors in June 2012 rating them as 'very good' in our visitor research, but there's more than meets the eye to a lot of our brilliant team.

They come from all walks of life with some guides being students working with us on a part-time basis, a few are Mums returning to work after their little ones have started full-time education, quite a few are training to be actors and some have a background in history and archeology.  What they all have in common however is a passion for our unique attraction and a passion to tell the fascinating truth of Mary King's Close.

Don't be fooled into thinking they just follow a script.  Yes, they all start out with the same script of facts and stories but our guides put their own spin on the part of a full researched one-time resident of Mary King's Close.  

Agnes Chambers The Maid

Each tour guide character has its own distinct theme: Walter King is a Plague Cleaner, or Foul Clenger - a gritty soul who has one of the toughest jobs in Edinburgh's history.  Jonet Nimmo is the youngest daughter of Mary King and has had a comparatively easy upbringing on the Close (as easy as life could be in the 17th Century!).  Jonet is joined by Agnes Chambers, a maid in the Cant family home and witness to all the inside information on one of Edinburgh's most prestigious of families. Stephen Boyd is a wine merchant - who dresses in the finest cloth and will probably sell you some of his finest claret - and Robert Fergusson the Poet will give you the inside scoop on his greatest admirer, Rabbie Burns.

Research is always ongoing - if you have a question about the Close or 17th century Edinburgh you can just ask.  If we can't answer your question straight away, we'll find out the answer and let you know.

Jonet Nimmo, Mary King's Daughter

Anyway back to our tour guiding team, with August and the Festival Fringe in the offing, our team are heading into our busiest time of year (pre-booking strongly recommended at this time of year!).  But if that wasn't enough, some of them are starring in productions as part of the worlds biggest arts festival.  These productions are in no way connected to The Real Mary King's Close but if you're in town in August and looking for something a little bit different why not give these productions a try - 

Marc McKinnon (a Foul Clenger) in Smile-In Production's 'I Got It - An Actors Tale' at Stockbridge Parish Church from August 9th to August 11th 2012 at 7.30pm

Paul Vickers (another Foul Clenger!) in his own absurdist comedy show 'Twonkey's Kingdom' at the Alternative Fringe at the Hive from August 2nd to August 26th 2012 at 3pm (disclaimer: not for the easily offended!)

Connor Jones (Stephen Boyd) stars in Two Squared Production's  'Wind in the Willows' at Paradise in Augustines on George IV Bridge from August 14th to 19th 2012 at 18.50

For more information on the Edinburgh Festival Fringe click here (other productions are available!)
 

Only Street in Edinburgh Where It Never Rains....

Our first blog post comes on the same day that our brand new 'street promotion team' hit the Royal Mile and the streets of Edinburgh.  It also comes on one of the wettest days of the month so far...and that's really saying something given the dreadful weather July has given our fair city! The new team truly have their work cut out today!

The Real Mary King's Close - dry and rain-free!

Although we may moan and groan about the wet and wild weather that has been battering the city in recent weeks, the residents of Mary King's Close back in the days when it was open to the skies may have been grateful for the extra water in order to flush the 'nastiness' from the twice daily 'gardez-l'eau' sessions on the Close into the dank and reeking Nor' Loch in what is now Princes Street Gardens. 

However, for our visitors today, keeping dry is a real challenge!  A visit to the Close is providing an entertaining one hour respite from the elements and our doors remain open until 9pm this evening!

Walter King models the RMKC Poncho outside St Giles Cathedral

You can even sport one of our attractive ponchos to keep dry, adorned with the Plague Doctor (as modelled here by Walter King, one of our resident Foul Clengers! 

If you are passing by the attraction today, keep an eye out for Roberta, Mass and Douglas who will be out on the streets every day ready to welcome visitors to the city! Flash them your best smile as they work out in the challenging conditions on the Royal Mile!

Today the Real Mary King's Close is very much the only street in Edinburgh where it never rains!  

(If you're planning on sheltering from the rain in the next few days with us, you're best to prebook to avoid disappointment)