Actual Education Interactive Guided Tours

'Image recycling' - What is this?

We want to be open and honest and transparent in our dealings. One thing we want to be clear about is that in some of our tours we use the same images. What does this mean? Well, we've got more than one tour out about the history of Edinburgh so at times we will use the same image in more than one tour. This may seem unfair especially if you have purchased the other tours but we want to explain why we don't feel this is disadvantage for you. Let us use Edinburgh as our example because we do have many interactive guided tours coming out and a few will recycle images. Why don't we just retake these photos? Let's explain...

Firstly, we did actually go out and retake some of the images but then we got home and realised that all we had done was retake a photo in the same place. We didn't really feel that this was necessarily a 'new' image - same scene and same place - just taken at a different time...

Secondly, Edinburgh’s historic Royal Mile was once described by historian Marie Stuart as the street where 'one third of Scotland's history happened' (we paraphrased a little there). Over one thousand years of history happened here so whilst one image might show only one scene it certainly does not offer only one story. We will give you an example of one scene and a taster of the different stories about it...

Scene - Cardinal Beaton's Palace in the Cowgate (that’s the 360 scene you see on this page).

Story 1 - The Cowgate in the Old Town, this story would look at how this was once a wealthy area. It was quite possibly green fields which came down from the houses developing around the King's Hie Street in the medieval period.

Story 2 - The Cowgate lost its 'posh' reputation and by the nineteenth century it was one of the poorest areas in Edinburgh. Two of the very poorest streets were St Mary's Wynd and Blackfriars Wynd. We can see Blackfriars Street going up towards the High Street here. It became a Street when the buildings on the right hand side were demolished and the whole Wynd was pushed across to the right in a bid to increase light coming into the houses. Dr George Bell, one of the town's foremost medical practitioners studied both Wynds and his reports make grim reading. Some houses were well looked after...others were real dens of iniquity.

Story 3 - On the corner of the Wynd, now demolished as part of the Improvement Act of 1871, sat the 'Palace' of Cardinal David Beaton. At one point there was a huge fight, known as 'Cleanse the Causeway' which took place here'.

Story 4 - Blackfriars Wynd and High School Wynd, where we are now, was on the direct route from Holyrood Abbey to Kirk O'Fields where King Henry (usually referred to as Henry, Lord Darnley), consort to Mary, Queen of Scots was convalescing following an illness. He was murdered here and evidence points to this route being used by his murderers.

Story 5 - This Wynd would have been used by the bodysnatchers Burke and Hare to bring the corpses of their newly murdered victims to Dr Robert Knox at Surgeon's Square.

You now see we have shown you five very different stories which all took place at, or within eyeshot of, the same panoramic scene. We do hope this convinces you that each tour may share some images with other tours but that the stories are all absorbing and in-depth!

And remember - if you still don't like the tour you are entitled to a full 30 days, ‘no quibble’ refund.