Auld Reekie Tours: Haunted Vaults and Graveyard Tour

What Is Included

The Includes list names three things: the visit to Greyfriars Kirkyard, entry to the Edinburgh (South Bridge) Vaults, and the live guide. That vault entry is the real value here, since the vaults are visited on a guided tour. Free cancellation up to 24 hours before departure and reserve now, pay later come with the booking.

Everything else is on you. No drinks or food are listed, there is no hotel pickup, and no transport is provided, the tour moves on foot. Video and audio recording are not allowed inside, so leave the camera work to memory. Tips are not mentioned in the listing either way, so treat any gratuity as your own call rather than an obligation.

You can also visit Greyfriars Kirkyard on your own, so the guide and the storytelling are what you pay for above ground. The Covenanter's Prison, the locked section of the kirkyard, is not entered on this tour.

What You Might Pay on the Day

The listing names no mandatory extras, so the $34 is the whole ticket. Any drink afterwards is your own, and the Banshee Labyrinth on Niddry Street, a pub built partly into the South Bridge vaults, is an option if you want to extend the underground theme over a pint.

Meeting Point: 300 Lawnmarket

You wait on the pavement in front of 300 Lawnmarket, next to the tourist information booth, police box and telephone box. That is the Lawnmarket side of the corner with George IV Bridge, opposite Deacon Brodies Tavern. The name Auld Reekie means Old Smoky, the old nickname for Edinburgh's coal and peat smoke, and Walter Scott wrote in 1820 that the smoke hovered over the city from twenty miles away.

The comedy horror ghost bus departs from 7-9 George IV Bridge, outside the Central Library.

First Stop: Greyfriars Kirkyard

The walk goes to the kirkyard, established in 1561-1562 on the ground of a Franciscan friary dissolved in 1560. The guide tells the Greyfriars Bobby legend here, the dog, usually given as a Skye Terrier, said to have guarded his owner John Gray's grave for 14 years after the nightwatchman died of tuberculosis in 1858. Historian Jan Bondeson has questioned the story and suggested Bobby was a stray fed by visitors, so hear it as a legend. The bronze statue by William Brodie went up in 1873, paid for by Baroness Burdett-Coutts.

You also see the Gothic mausoleums and hear about notable burials. The kirkyard holds hundreds, including geologist James Hutton, mathematician Colin MacLaurin, chemist Joseph Black, poet Allan Ramsay and James Craig, designer of the New Town. Two iron mortsafes stand in the kirkyard, cages built against body snatchers, which ties into the Burke and Hare stories the listing promises. If you want the dog's story in depth, the Greyfriars Bobby guide covers the record.

Second Stop: the Edinburgh Vaults

The second half goes into the vaults in the South Bridge arches. South Bridge opened to foot traffic in 1786 and was completed in 1788, with 19 arches and about 120 rooms beneath, built for taverns, cobblers' workshops and merchants' storage. That lasted about 30 years before businesses left, and by the 1800s the chambers were slum housing lit by fish oil lamps, with no running water or sunlight. Illegal gambling taverns and an unlicensed whisky distillery worked down there too. The rooms were abandoned between about 1835 and 1875 and rediscovered in the 1980s, with excavation finding oyster shells, toys and medicine bottles.

Here the guide tells of the destitute, witches and a hellfire club, and of regular paranormal occurrences and how some characters have never really left. Most written records from the slum period are almost non-existent, so most of these stories are folklore rather than documented history. The Edinburgh Vaults guide separates the history from the legend. Auld Reekie says it has exclusive use of its own vaults, and rain can drip in from the bridge above, so floors may be wet and slippy. The listing gives no finish point or return time.

Age and Access Limits

The tour is suggested for ages 12 and over and children under 2 are not permitted. So under 12s are a parental judgement call, and the content warning matters: some historical material covers torture, hangings and death and may be distressing. For younger children, look at the afternoon Old Town and underground tour, which takes children from 5 and runs in the afternoon at $21.53.

Wheelchair users and people with mobility impairments are named as unsuitable, and for a concrete reason. The vaults entrance has a 2-foot step, a single-floor spiral staircase at the entrance and exit, and further small sections of stairs inside. The walking pace and terrain may not suit anyone who has difficulty walking. There is no step-free alternative on this route.

Language, Conduct and Tone

The tour runs in English only, with no audio guides or translations, so non-English speakers should consider the Old Town ghost walking tour, which runs in English, French and German for $26. Anyone under the influence of alcohol or drugs will be turned away, and alcohol and drugs are not allowed on the tour. Pets are not allowed, though assistance dogs are.

What It Is Not

This is a guided walk suggested for ages 12 and over, and the content covers torture, hangings and death. If you want the hard version, the same operator runs the late-night terror tour, strictly 18 and over at $34, with a torture exhibition and the stone circle vault. If you want the locked Covenanter's Prison and the Mackenzie Poltergeist story, that is the City of the Dead tour, not this one.

The graveyards comparison shows who gets you inside which graveyard.

What Is Free

Greyfriars Kirkyard at 26A Candlemaker Row can be visited on your own, though no fixed gate hours are printed, so check locally. You can find the Greyfriars Bobby headstone, the mortsafes, the Martyrs' Monument and the mausoleums yourself, and self-guided information boards are offered in several languages. Entry to Greyfriars Kirk is free too, with donations encouraged. The Covenanters' Prison is the exception, it is kept locked and opened only for guided groups, by arrangement with the kirk or on City of the Dead tours, with the Friends of Greyfriars Kirkyard running free open days.

The Royal Mile itself, almost exactly one mile from castle to Holyrood, costs nothing, and the closes and wynds can be walked freely. The haunted places in Edinburgh guide maps the free sites. The Greyfriars Kirkyard guide covers the history if you would rather walk it alone.

What Needs a Ticket

The vaults are the hard limit. The South Bridge Vaults are visited on a guided tour, which is the core of what this $34 ticket buys. Several paid attractions cover similar ground alone: Surgeons' Hall Museums on Nicolson Street charge £10 adult and £6.50 concession, open 7 days a week from 10am to 5pm with last entry at 4:30pm, and hold Burke's death mask and pocketbook.

The Real Mary King's Close at 2 Warriston's Close sells its own guided tours, so check the official page for tickets and times. For the Burke and Hare background, the Burke and Hare guide tells the whole case.

What the Guide Adds

A guide gets you into the vaults, carries the stories the information boards do not tell, and fills in the Burke and Hare, witch and hellfire material in the places it happened. If you are happy reading boards in the kirkyard and skipping the underground, walking alone is genuinely enough. If you want below ground, book a tour, and the choice is between this one, the Mercat daytime vaults tour with groups capped at 18, and the budget evening walk at $25.