The Blair Street Vault Vigil

The Blair Street Vault Vigil
Edinburgh, Scotland
March 13, 2009 12:00AM- March 14, 2009 6:00AM
Hosted by Mercat Tours w/ special guest North West Spirit Seekers

Ray, Jim and I were able to secure places to a very special event at the South Bridge Vaults in Edinburgh. A Vault Vigil was being held on Friday, March 13 and “professional” ghost hunters and an equipment technician brought some equipment he had invented. Despite the long weekend we had ahead of us, which started only 1.5 hours after the Vigil ended, we left out flat at 10:56PM to meet up with everyone on the Royal Mile. We sat on the bench by the Mercat Cross where we always meet everyone. We just chatted and braved the wind. A huge crowd was gathering to the left of us in a back alley. Then an ambulance drove by. We didn’t really know what was going on. More of our group for the evening arrived and sat on the bench next to us. When the crowd left, Jim asked the one of the passersby what happened (since Ray wouldn’t and I didn’t want to leave the warmth of my bench). The guy said that the girl was feeling really ill. I can only assume she drank too much, because the ambulance was in no hurry to get her to the hospital, even stopping in front of us for a long time.

While sitting there, a woman came up to us and introduced herself as Anna. She was also going on the Vigil. I was a bit nervous at first about talking, as I was freezing cold. She told us that she was staying in Glasgow, but she was from Smithfield, North Carolina, which is right near Knightdale. How crazy is that? She hung around us a bit as we waited for the person from Mercat to show up to take us into the vaults. There was a Irish street band playing across the street and all the drunk people were having a ball walking by and singing. We weren’t too bored with that kind of entertainment.

Finally the girl showed up for the tour and it’s the girl who knows me. She’s been the guide for three of my four vigils now. She recognized me right away and was like “oh no!” It was a joke, because whenever I’m there something crazy happens. Her worst experience was during my first vigil and one of her co-workers had a horrible experience when I was my second vigil. And this time would shape up to be no different. Roll was called and we had to wait a little bit while the ghost hunting team did a sweep of the vaults prior to our arrival. Finally the girl couldn’t wait any longer and took us down. As we walked, Anna and I talked quite a bit and I found out she was going to be starting to do some work with a Glasgow based ghost investigation team, which was awesome to me.

So we get back into the vaults. We’re in the waiting room and I tell the girl to come sit by us and we’ll try to be in a group together. But first they want to take us all down and give us a quick run through. There were three people who had never been to the vaults before (Jim included), but sadly the initial intro wasn’t as cool as it had been in the past. Back up to the waiting room, the tech guy wanted to explain his equipment. Man that took FOREVER!!! We were all so anxious to get into the vaults, but you know how when someone is really passionate about their stuff… you just can’t get them to briefly talk about something. So after it was done, there was a bathroom break and Ray asked to use some of the equipment. Then we were split up into two groups. We wanted to be with Anna (TEAM NORTH CAROLINA), but instead of being practical about splitting people up, they just split people down the room. We didn’t need to be split. It could have been us four and then her and the couple from Australia. And then put the last group together. Its as even as you’re going to get 13 people. But no… so I was really disappointed not to be hanging out with her.

The main reason I was so excited to hang out with her was because, it turns out she went to New Orleans, too. She was there in May 2005 and I was there in June 2005 and we both went on the same ghost investigation house! So not only do we have all these weird connections (location, hobbies) but we also have this one special experience in common!

Let me stop digressing and get you into the vaults. As I said, we were split into two teams. The first team got the first half of the vaults, which included the Double-High room, the Tavern Room, and the far back hallway. The second team got the Cobblers Room, the Wine Cellar and hallway, the Captain’s Room and the White Room. We were Team 2. So we started out in the wine cellar, but we were accompanied by some of the North West team and they had divining rods (which I’ve used before in New Orleans). The only thing was, these rods had little white things around the place where you hold them. It took me a little while to get comfortable using them, because my stomach dropped when I realized how easily they moved compared to the other set I used. But almost right away in the Wine Cellar Hallway, I started to get a few interesting swings. Nothing too much. After a little while in the hallway, we moved into the White Room to play with all our gadgets (the voice box thing, our meter and the rods).

I arranged my divining rods and positioned myself to keep stable. I cheated alittle bit and used my thumb to help stabilize the rods. These rods were not as stable as the rods I had in New Orleans. So we started asking questions and this prickly energy starts running through my arm, up my leg and side and into my arm. It was at those points that I felt the movement. It wasn’t “oh gee, the things are moving!” I felt something touching me. It’s a very intense feeling and I’ve experienced it before. When you learn to tune yourself into how things affect you, you can really feel the differences. I know what normal goosebumps from cold or other things feels like. I know when I’m feeling cold spots and when I’m feeling the dank coldness of the Vaults. All of these things are very different. The energy was incredible. You could feel when whatever it was wanted to answer. And as we asked questions, whatever it was started reacting to the voice box and the EMF detector. It seemed to rotate between the items. We asked who it was. I asked if it was the lady (the one I saw my first visit) and it said no. We said “are you Jack?” and I felt the energy and the rods moved. Jack is the little boy in the vaults.

As things kept going, Ray decided to ask about the dog that was in the vaults. He said “is there a dog down here with you? Do you know the dog?” And after a second, on the voice box, we got this very defined “woof woof woof” like a little kid was making barking noises. Until that point we had just gotten spikes in sound that Ray referred to as “squelches”. This was absolutely impressive to us. We all started laughing, to relieve the tension of what we were experiencing! We stopped at that point and moved back into the Wine Cellar. We continued to get interaction from Jack, who seemed to really enjoy playing with the items. Then I was time to go upstairs for a brief break and then the groups would switch. I was having a ball and hated having to leave. It was incredible.

The break was a little longer than we wanted, but we finally got to go back down and were left in the Double-High room with the medium and the tech guy. This is when we started realizing how much of a joke the medium was. When I finally felt something and I spoke up, like he wanted us to do, he was like “you need to tell us right away if you feel something, because the spirits want to be acknowledged. So you should be following where you’re being pulled.” So I left the room and went into the back hall where I felt something was. There’s a tiny room off the hallway, which is new. I’ve never been in there before. So I went in with Ray and we were getting a little bit of activity on the EMF detector and I felt the electricity flowing through me once or twice. I acknowledged these things and tried asking questions, only to be scared by my own flashlight turning itself off. When it felt like the energy was gone from the room, we poked around in the hallway for a second and then moved back to the group, who were still claiming to feel cold and something was touching their shoulder (water dripping).

Finally, our group moved into the back hallway and they started using the voice box and were getting all sorts of “squelches”. There were three levels of “squelches”, but the medium was totally off his rocker with what was going on. He was trying to tell us that Mr. Boots was singing songs with Jack and a little girl. Mr. Boots is the most evil spirit in the vaults and was the one who attached my group during the first vault vigil and made it known that he wanted myself and our Greek group member to leave during our last vigil. He’s not going to stop and sing songs with Jack and a little girl. Jack rarely makes strong appearances when Mr. Boots is around. Medium are just performers and its so irritating.

I had gone to the bathroom during this part of the night and when I arrived back, there was no way to get into the hallway. As I stood in the doorway, I became incredibly uneasy. I really wanted to move. I wanted to move out of the doorway. I wanted to get to the other side of the hallway. I kept looking over my shoulder. I had to move. Finally, I forced my way through and made it to the other side, where my anxiety lessened. What I did find on the other side, though, was a guy who came alone and was in the other group. He was using the rods, but from where I was standing, he seemed to be moving the rods by himself. I can’t speak for his experience, but something felt amiss, especially since I seemed to be really in-tune with the spirits in the vault this evening and I was not feeling the intensity that would cause those to move as much as they were. My other question is, how is he responding to questions from this fellow, but also dancing and singing with the little girl and Mr. Boots? Essentially this second part of the night was a bit too charade to me.

Our night was about over as the groups convened one last time to break and decide which areas were the most active. We learned that the North West Spirit Seekers were told 5AM and not 6AM, so after our group investigation, they would be leaving and we would have to decide what to do. So we all went down into the White Room to investigate, even though we had originally decided the Wine Cellar. I wasn’t interested in the White Room, as the medium was leading things, so I went off to investigate with one of the ladies from the group. As we stood in the Wine Cellar talking, I looked up and saw a ball of whiteness dart from left to right in the Cobbler’s Room doorway. I was really taken aback by this and I lightly grabbed the arm of the women who was with me. Then Ray come into the room and we whispered about how icky the whole medium thing was. The group then migrated into our room and the show was about to begin.

It was anticipated that the medium would really go and become all “Most Haunted” like and it was really lame. He latched onto our guide and wanted her to start saying the first thing that came into her head. Like “what letter comes into your head?” “D” “did I hear someone say David?” Then he would ask what emotions she was feeling and that these emotions echoed that of the spirit. This would have been potentially interesting and viable IF what happened next hadn’t occurred.

He started to talk about the woman ghost and mentioned witchcraft and paganism and said its something nearby. Even our guide and one of the owners said there are no historical reports of any pagan or witch related incidents down here. The guy kept pressing it and was trying to fish for information from those in the group. It was really pathetic and I moved away from the group to look for Ray and Jim. I also then asked for the divining rods and when the group finally wrapped, Ray, Jim and I stayed back. I gave Jim the rods so he could try it and he found it very difficult and was very put off by the rods. Essentially they just helped build his skepticism about the validity of the results. They Ray took a stab at it and nothing happened. Then I tried and there really was just no energy in the air. The whole vault felt different, like whatever it was had left. Obviously insulted by the mediums circus-like behavior.

We went upstairs to rejoin the group and to find out what was happening next. It was determined that we would try glass movements on a table, because supposedly spirits had been reported in the room. So I made sure I was with the guide, as I trusted her and then there were two other people who I noticed were being very serious about the situation and were not heavily trying to push the glass. So we sat there waiting for the spirit to contact us. Our table was stable and soon we were getting circles. Circle in such a way that one of us couldn’t push that glass around. We also all took our fingers off in turn and it still just kept going. It was incredible. As our group and another group tried to get in touch with the spirits, you could hear lots of heavy banging upstairs. Nothing was up there. No one was there and the vaults are double-door-locked. So a small group went to investigate and apparently you could hear the walking in the basement. Mr. Boots was on the move. It would also explain the lull before we went upstairs. The other spirits disappear when he’s around.

The night was finally over. It was interesting and interactive. Probably the most personal fun I’ve had down there in a long time. I was disappointed that there were things that didn’t help break down Jim’s skepticism, but Ray really enjoyed playing with the gadgets. All of us agreed on the medium being nothing more than a circus side show. I am confident about what I experience. I have a very heightened connection to emotions, a very strong intuition. And I swear I’d never blow things out of proportion or make things up. If nothing happens, that’s just the way it is. I’ve been down there a couple times and activity has been pretty nil. But tonight… even during the walk-through, things felt really busy. It was in the air.

I gave Anna my e-mail address incase she found anything cool in her pictures or ever wanted to share ghost stuff, since we seem to have gone a similar path in our experiences. We all parted in front of the Starbucks on the Royal Mile where Ray, Jim and myself would spend the next hour and a half resting before heading a few doors up to the Wild in Scotland office to start our 3 days tour of the Highlands and Skye.