Such a nice university! I walked around the small campus and got to see some of the areas where…read morestudents like to lay on the grass and relax. There's such a fun tradition here where once they have finished writing their last exam ever, their friends will throw water balloons at them! Some filled with glitter sometimes.

The University of St Andrews is the oldest University in Scotland and one of the oldest in the UK…read more Recently awarded the third best University in the UK according to league tables, St Andrews is becoming ever more prominent for its results and student body. Subjects are quite standard, ranging from a variety of Histories, Sciences and Arts, but it has a limited Medical degree (only stay for three years) and no Law programme. The University lies within the town - so it feels like a student town (the students in fact make up one third of the population). This University prides itself on its research and teaching and what else could you want more than a University set in a historically beautiful location, amongst world leaders teaching your course?

As the first place I stayed after leaving home this will always hold a place in my heart and…read morerightly so. It's a great place to stay if you are based in Kings and is one of the nicer University Houses I've seen. It's best asset is the space on offer, it has large kitchens and common room whilst the rooms aren't too small either. I had reservations about coming here due to the number of people per kitchen, but it does actually work out really well. The only downside is the walk to town (30 min) so you would have to think about cycling or busing if you don't want to walk that far.

I lived in Kitchener House for my first year at Edinburgh University while studying biological…read moresciences at the Kings Building Campus. This accommodation is University owned and was a great in so many ways! The building has approximately 60 rooms including doubles which span the older house and a newer extension onto the side. The rooms are of a good size which include a bed, cupboard, desk, chair, bookshelf and in most cases a sink each. There are 4 kitchens, many toilets and showers and a large spacious common room. There is also a large garden with grass and a picnic table outside. There is also a central bike storage area with metal bars to attach bikes and a large and sturdy gate which can only be accessed with a key that is given to residents of the accommodation. In each person's allocated kitchen they have their own dedicated storage cupboards, fridge and freezer compartments. Everyone was very social in my first year which was made very easy as it is one of the smallest university accommodation buildings which made it feel like a home rather than a large student block full of unfamiliar faces. The common room was a great area to socialise in the first few weeks when events like coffee and film nights were put on by the resident assistants (The common room has a TV). The kitchens have large tables in the centre which are also great points to socialise when everyone is cooking and eating. Many a night was spend playing beer pong and having pres in the common room and kitchens! One of the downsides of this accommodation is the distance from the centre of Edinburgh. It takes 30 - 60 minutes to walk from Kitchener into the town where the shops, restaurants and pubs are. This is very manageable if you have a bike though (which a lot of us had) and the buses have regular departures into the town. If you are studying any non science/engineering subjects, for example business, politics, religion, art etc, I would not recommend Kitchener as it is one of the furthest university accommodations from the George square campus in town. There is a shuttle bus service that runs from kings buildings to George square, free of charge to Edinburgh University students, but it can be unreliable and overcrowded with no guarantee of getting on the bus and getting to lectures on time. I knew people that stayed at kitchener house to go to the George square campus but most were unaware that their classes, or at least the majority were in central Edinburgh. I have made many friends in Kitchener and have formed some of the strongest friendships I have ever had with people from here in this very accommodation, even more so than high school friends that I have known for years. I have made friends here that I will know for my entire life. I cannot explain just how great kitchener was for me socially and academically. I hope this will help any students who are contemplating moving into kitchener house and studying at Edinburgh University. If you are lucky enough to get into kitchener, have a great time and take advantage of every opportunity, meet new people, join clubs, study hard and party hard. The lease only lasts for less than a year and time will fly by. I know as it did for me. I have so many cherished memories from kitchener house. Good luck! Callum

Ah, Pollock. The memories. Most people who've stayed here did so as freshers although the uni does…read morerent out the nicer blocks to tourists or people attending conferences at the on-site conference centre, St. Leonard's Hall. The tourists only ever get put in Chancellor's Court or John Burnett House, as the others are pretty skanky breezeblock cells housed in ugly 1960s wannabe tower blocks, and also because these two are the most expensive. When the rahs go home for summer and aren't cluttering up the quad with their stupid huge hairdos and jack wills tracksuit bottoms, this place is pretty good. There are a few grassy areas for lounging on during the rare suny days, there's an on-site pub and there's also a little corner shop which is fairly well-stocked. Just don't eat in the JMCC canteen. They like to dress it up and call it a restaurant, but it will always be a canteen. And not a very good one at that.

POLLOCK! I think…read morePollock Halls hold a special place in the hearts of all Edinburgh University students. It certainly does for me. The entire area is huge, fantastically huge and it is easy to get lost. There are several different houses - Chancellors, Baird, Lee, Turner, Grant, Holland (Blocks A, B, C, D and Annexe), Masson and Fraser court. I'm sure there's more I've forgotten about...! Here's the scoop - when I was here in 2007 there was a distinct seperation between each house. Chancellors Court was generally reserved for the yah's at Edinburgh Uni - I'm sure you know what I'm talking about, but the rooms are lovely, modern and clean. All en-suite, naturally. Chancellors Court and Holland are the only two houses with en-suite facilities. I stayed in Holland B block (following my brothers recommendation) and loved it. Yeah, the rooms weren't huge and the toilets were tiny, and the walls were really thin, and it got cold (wow, I'm really selling it) but it was fantastic. Because Holland was one of the older houses it had a real sense of tradition about it. I've made some brilliant memories in Holland Block! The JMC food-court left a lot to be desired, I'm afraid to say. Their breakfasts were good, always a great selection of fruit, cereals and cooked breakfast,but their dinners went steadily downhill as the term progressed. Don't get me wrong, it was all edible (but i once got a bad bug from the beef goulash) and if there was nothing you fancied there was always salad and cold meats, but it wasn't amazing. Overall, however, I thoroughly recommend Pollock Halls. I recently went for a drive and saw that the whole place has been updated with a whole new house being built, so I'm sure it has just got better!

I spend a year living here, I felt it was only fair to review for the benefit of those looking to…read moreapply for first year accommodation. Hermit's croft wasn't my first choice. It wasn't even my second. I was gutted when I found out I was going to be living in my third choice accommodation for the whole of my first year of uni. But fear not! It's really not that bad. It's actually in a great spot - you can join in the Pollock crowds on the walk to uni (if you like yahs) and it's only 10 minutes to George Square. It's also really close to all the local amenities you could want. My only problem, and it was a big one, is the lack of washing facilities. There are 18 flats in Hermits Croft, each with an average of 5 people in. That's about 90 people. There are 2 washing machines and 2 dryers (honestly). But who does washing in first year anyway?

I stayed here for four nights during my trip to Scotland. I picked it because everything else in…read morethe area was so expensive, so I figured I had nothing to lose. I was pleasantly surprised. To start off, their customer service before my visit was very solid. I emailed them several times before my visit with some detaily stuff and they always got back to me within a few hours. My train got me into town about noon and the check in is 3pm. The young lady at the front desk greeted me warmly, let me check my bag and gave me a map and directions. I asked the front desk people for help at least once a day (directions, recommendations, help with the on-sight laundry, renting a towel, etc,) and they were all terrific. The room is not super big but it is certainly big enough. The bed is more than big enough for one person. There is a desk and a lot of storage space. The bathroom is big enough for a guy like me (shower, shave, brush teeth, etc.) and the shower works better than some of the more expensive hotels I stayed in. The location is handy (about a 15-20 minute walks to the Royal Mile and to the train station.) They partner with a tour company. The tours looked solid but did not fit my schedule. The only reason I gave four stars instead of five, is that you can only open the window a crack. You can borrow a fan for a £20 deposit but I did not. I would call the place "cute and functional" and the service was outstanding. I would definitely stay again!

Paterson's Land is a very recent discovery for me and I'm still not totally sure what it is. This…read moreis what I know so far: it's the same building as the Bongo Club. It's owned by the University of Edinburgh. It's kinda cool looking, with a big inner courtyard. And it seems to be overrun by tourists during the festival. Paterson's Land is also home to the office for the Edinburgh student newspaper, The Journal, and the magazine that covers the Edinburgh Festival, Fest Mag.

WOWZERS I have…read morepassed this place a hundred times, shame on me, shame on me. This is another really cool unique venue in Edinburgh, home of numerous indy arts groups etc. We were there to see the National Theatre of Scotland's performance 'Menage a Trois', which was a pretty special experience. The theatre was small, and they encouraged the audience to sit as far up as possible as there was a sort of TV screen between them and the stage. The show itself was spellbinding, I can't describe it myself, but NTS said it is 'A hauntingly beautiful study of love, obsession, loneliness and manipulation. A visually stunning piece of dance theatre from award-winning performer Claire Cunningham.' Anyway, if you like your arts in all shapes and sizes then keep an eye on this venue

Many moons ago in my last year at school I decided to go to Herriot Watt's Open Day, I guess this…read morewas for two reasons; 1) The first being that they have a really good language department that offers a degree in translation and interpreting and they pride themselves in being the only University in the UK to offer this degree. 2) Perhaps the most important reason... I probably just wanted a day off school. To get to the Edinburgh Campus you need to take a bus from the centre of Edinburgh which takes 30-45 minutes. The campus is in the middle of nowhere and to get a taxi after a night out it takes around 20 minutes and costs about £20. As there's no rail link the choice is pretty limited so a night out would never be cheap or straightforward but I guess if you're sharing the taxi fare with a few other people it's not so bad. When I went to the Open Day I went with a couple of friends from my school who both eventually decided to go to Herriot Watt while I decided to go to Glasgow Uni. Funnily enough, they have both since left Herriot and reapplied for different Uni's both having a negative experience with their courses and the social side of life in a Uni that's pretty isolated. Had I gone to Herriot Watt I would have had a completely different experience of Uni life, I would have moved out and experienced the whole University package of living in halls, writing my initials on eggs, marking the milk with a marker pen so I could tell if someone else had drank out of it and of course fighting over who's block of mouldy cheese was stinking out the fridge. Okay... so maybe I don't miss that aspect of university life but I do regret not getting more involved with the social side of uni having not lived in halls and as a result am probably the least "studenty" student ever.

I didn't actually attend Heriot Watt, but visited my pals who went there on many an occasion. This…read morereview is thus not about the teaching or courses (which I'm sure are good enough), but about the fairly unique atmosphere it has. It's location out in the sticks just outside Edinburgh means it's often overlooked by those more concerned with clubbing than studying, but the self-contaned campus feel that results from this is actually probably my favourite thing about it. I attended both the pretentious Glasgow Uni, and the businesslike, socially lacking Strathclyde, so seeing a campus with a community feel where everyone knew everyone else, was a breath of freash air on my visits. There's some cracking 70s architecture as well, and if you say it fast it sounds like "hairy twat".

Whoop Whoop a handy dry cleaners! If you ever need anything properly and professionally dry…read morecleaned, Euroclean Dry Cleaning is the place to go. Situated in the Newington area of Edinburgh, Euroclean Dry Cleaning is very central and a convenient place to reach. It is just a short walk from the first year halls of residence, Pollock Halls, and so it is a terribly handy place for students to go to get nasty stains out of their clothes. I have been to this store several times over the years to dry clean my jackets and some skirts which can't be put through the wash, and I have received excellent service with every visit. The prices are incredibly reasonable and pretty competitive, with it costing £16 to dry clean 2 suits - what a bargain! Euroclean Dry Cleaning also offer a FREE pick up and delivery service which is handy and you don't have to actually go to the store to get your clothes cleaned. As well as suits and clothes, they also do carpet and curtain cleaning. A great place to go to get your clothes perfectly clean.

After being on the road for nearly two weeks, we were ready to get our clothes cleaned! Our luck…read morethat we were here during Fringe Festival with a Bank Holiday looming on Monday. The wonderful woman running the shop took pity on us and got it all done perfectly in one day. Absolutely wonderful and kind! Thank you so much for your hospitality and great wash on top of it all. Highly recommend for quality service