To enjoy wandering around cemeteries and graveyards?

[Rhine]

Just that really.

People think I'm odd, but I find cemeteries and graveyards fascinating places. I love wandering around and reading the headstones, especially the really old ones. In my town we have a massive old cemetary, its pretty much full up now but some of the graves date from the 1870's onwards, they have those huge ornate headstones with the big statues on them. You can tell the people buried there must have been from well to do families, it's facsinating.

It's so peaceful and tranquil in there, and there's lots of lovely wildlife to be seen as well.

The general opinion of others seems to be that cemteries are creepy, and that I'm odd for finding them interesting places.

Nope, I find them fascinating too.

I love old churches too. I went to Lindisfarne recently, absolutely brilliant and beautiful - monastic ruins, church, graveyard and a brilliant off licence. Perfect.

YANBU.

I can't say I'd go to a cemetery specifically to enjoy the peace and tranquility, but my gran is buried at a very big and lovely, well kept cemetery, and I do like going for a walk round when I leave flowers for her.

Oh really? People actually say you are odd?

I don't think it's unusual at all, I know people who like this kind of thing. My daughter always goes into graveyards, she's obsessed with looking for wartime graves. Or anything from the war tbh.

The Pere lachaise ( sp?) was always full of tourists whenever Ive been

I'm the same too. I love a good wander around a cemetery. I like reading the headstones and thinking about who that person was; the thought that that person was so important to somebody that they were commemorated for hundreds of years.

yes, we have some lovely old tiny churches around and about here

I keep meaning to go back and photograph some of the headstones, I have a lovely fb chum who does this
Also had the best time in the Glasgow Necropolis when we had a free morning after a works thing, it's a really super place.

Also I like to look out for "bingo" graves , that's my own shameful terminology
...someone who died on their birthday, I always feel there's a satisfaction to that.
...someone who shares a birthday/death day with me
...someone who died on 1st Jan or Christmas Day

There can be so much information on some headstones, it is hugely fascinating.

Not odd into book. There is a particular cemetery in Northumberland that I will visit whenever I am up there. There are som amazing headstones with interesting decoration and inscription. It also has beautiful trees and the whole setting is lovely.

My dad died on his birthday! I never heard the term Bingo ... But it appeals to my sense of humour

I do find it odd but wouldn't be rude enough to say so.

You need to go to Highgate Cemetry, it's absolutely wonderful

I love looking round cemeteries as well and looking for the oldest headstones (have done since i was child but I love social history). I feel a pang when I see a stone with lots of childrens names on and wonder what their lives were like, where they lived and what they looked like etc

I don't find it ghoulish or morbid in the slightest; when we visited a cemetery in Worthing four years ago where my paternal Grandparents , aunts, uncles etc are buried I 'introduced' my children to them before laying flowers.
"Yoohoo, Great Granda Sandy- I'm your great grandson"

it's just my own irreverent humour at work!

there's a lovely and very old churchyard in Gigha which has some very interesting graves. I meant to go around the newer church there when we went recently, but we got rained off.....I am not that dedicated, the hotel bar was dryer and a bit more convivial :o

Yes, Highgate Cemetary is somewhere I've wanted to go to for years. I believe they do tours of it now.

I love graveyards too, especially if they have some family connection. I love finding poignant messages. In our village churchyard there are only a very few surnames, as I think the villagers all ended up marrying each other. The same families are still around today and remarkably none of them have 2 heads despite all that intermarrying!

I live very close to a cemetery, with a very old part and a part still in use. It's very well-kept with sunny wide paths and flower beds. There are rabbits and squirrels.
I really love walking around it, or taking 5yo DD on her bike.

I love a good bimble around a graveyard. I used to pass through one twice a day when taking the children to and from school and would often detour on the way home for a nosy.

I like it too. It's a peaceful escape, and I like to do my bit by picking up bits of litter or pulling the ocassional weed. I also find reading graves pretty fascinating. The random feature on findagrave.com keeps me occupied for hours!

My dream day is one spent wandering around churches, graveyards, cemetaries - the more spectacular the better! I don't care who thinks I'm odd - I think it's bloody odd NOT to be fascinated with such a fantastic display of history, romance, architecture, religion and family ties.
My personal favourite is the San Michele near Venice - absolutely huge and with so many different interesting sections - the ex-pat quarter is really fascinating.

Just as long as you're not wandering around new gravestones packed with grieving relatives shouting, 'Bingo!' I've just buried my dad so seeing someone galumphing around his grave might not go down too well.

I love a good graveyard. On a trip to Paris once we stayed in an Ibis hotel near Place de Clichy with a view of the Monmartre cemetery. It was amazing.

There's lovely old cemetery near the Inlaws which is no longer used as such. It's been renamed as a pocket park. It's a beautiful walk, trees line the outer and spring up unimpeded through very old graves. It's almost a nature park. I only visited it for the first time a few weeks ago. But there's benches for sitting. A quiet little area where you can take a break and just drink the surroundings in.

I and my youngest adult DD will often look up the nearest grave yard wherever we are.

They are interesting, just don't go round one when you're hormonal.

A local small one, was filled during an outbreak of Scarlett Fever, the mutiple childrens/family graves really make you grateful for the time we are born into.

Likewise one we found, seem to have a high number of Mum and baby graves, the Mums would die in childbirth and the baby, within days. One older lady was eventually laid to rest with her Sons that had been killed at war (one was a tribute to him, he was buried in France) and her other children, all who died before the age of five.

There often wasn't a class divide when it came to death.

My DD and I just did the tour at Highgate West Cemetery last week and it is well worth the price. You can also get into the East cemetery afterwards on the same ticket and have a walk around. For the tour (the only way to visit the West Cemetery) you need to book for Monday to Friday and Bank Holidays but can just turn up on Saturdays and Sundays.

I love strolling around old cemeteries!

I love walking around cemeteries. There's a beautiful one in Cincinnati, Spring Grove Cemetery, that's on the National Registry of Historic Places. There are some "celebrities" buried there - Charles Fleischmann (the yeast guy), William Procter and James Gamble, etc.

I live equidistant between Cincinnati and Dayton, and there's a nice cemetery in Dayton where the Wright Brothers are buried. The first time I visited there, I had to wait in line to see their grave! There were tons of people there.

Our cemeteries are not as old as the ones you have there, of course, but they're interesting none the less.

Yes I find myself wondering about the stories behind the graves as well. Some have whole families in them, grandparents, parents and children. There are also lots of war graves of service people who've been repatriated.

When I was younger I had access to some of the church magazines going back years and years, all bound into wonderful leather books. It had all the birth, marriage, deaths logged in. I spent a lot of time in the church due to various family members being active within and I'd write down names to see if I could find their gravestone. I found it fascinating to correlate between a name, a date and an actual gravestone. My Grandma used to say 'every day above ground is a good day' so it really resonated with me that there were so many families (in the same plot) who had spent time, love and money in putting their lived ones together after passing away. I find graveyards to be a peaceful place, don't get me wrong, they can be spooky as balls in the middle of the night, but as a burial/burial of ashes is one of the last practical things you can do for a person, I love it, its history.