Edinburgh: Day 3- Arthur's Seat

We tried (again) to tour Holyrood Palace, but it's still closed to the public, so the plan is to head into Holyrood Park and make the climb to Arthur's Seat. We started out on the Radical Road trail, which I feel is aptly named except for he "road" part - it's steep and rocky and unfortunately did not take us to Arthur's Seat. Really unfortunate since it was definitely not an easy little hike so far. So we descended to the upper road that circles the hill and walked just past Duddingston Loch and took a trail up the hill. This is fairly steep and grassy at first, then becomes steep and rocky nearer the top. I hate to admit it, but this little jaunt was not easy for me, especially after first climbing the Radical Road section. There were some guys running up there(!), ironmen obviously. We scrambled up the last few feet and were rewarded with the knowledge that we had finally made it to the top and a 360 degree view that was pretty amazing. The pictures I took just can't convey the distance and height that we covered. Unfortunately it was a little hazy as the clouds and marine layer were still burning off, but the sun had come out and felt really good to us. There were a lot of people all over the park and up on the hills, this area is very popular it seems. We descended by a different trail, then were walking around the base of the hill on the regular road, looking for a place I'd heard had Highland cattle on the grounds, when we noticed a rescue operation going on just below Salisbury Crags. We had walked that area just a couple of hours earlier but, since then, someone apparently had a heart attack and fell from the Crags. Unfortunately the person did not survive and the mission became one of recovery rather than rescue. The rescue workers had to rappel down to the person and bring the body back up the hill to a trail where a rescue ATV was waiting. We struck up a conversation with an older couple who live nearby, and they said it's not an uncommon occurrence for someone to die there once or twice a month (sometimes suicide). That's a sobering thought. We watched until they had recovered the body, then headed back to our hotel.