A Castle Run & The Radical Road

Okay, so I got a bit busy and didn’t post anything. You see, that’s the problem with blogs. They’re like dogs in that they end in the same three letters. Oh wait, no … my point was that they require daily attention and if you ignore them for too long, they’ll die. Well, blogs and dogs are different in many ways like the last three letters might be the same but they don’t rhyme and no one cares when a blog dies.

So, what if you can’t think of something witty to post? Like I mentioned in the immigration briefing, I’ll post about running. I love running. My job is such that if I wanted to, I could work while running. (Well, my current research job … for the teaching portion of my job, this would require my students to be running, and I think some would object to this method of teaching.)

Edinburgh is a great place to run. Here is a cons and pros list (switched up to keep our brains fresh):

Cons:

• There is an intersection every twenty feet.
  
• You never know where the cars are coming from because they’re on the wrong side of the street.
  
• The city is very pedestrian active, cluttering the sidewalks with non-runners.
  
• It’s probably raining.
  
• It smells like fish.

Pros:

• It’s a town in Europe.
  
• They managed the park system nicely. (See above bullet.)
  
• It’s hilly.
  
• There are castles within a reasonable distance.
  
• From the right hills, you can see the sea.
  
• If you ever get tired of running, there’s certain to be a pub close by.

I can run for two miles in a loop without having to cross a major road but that’s boring. Here are two interesting runs I’ve taken.

The first, I ran to the Edinburgh Castle in the center of the city.




Here’s me with the castle (to show that I didn’t simply take this off the internet?).


Here are some views of Edinburgh from the Castle, well, right in front of the castle.


In this one, the amazing building in the middle is a high school. That's got to be the coolest looking high school anywhere.







In this one, at the horizon, you can see the North Sea (as in many of the following.)



I didn’t run in the Castle this time. I’ll post the story of the time I ran into the castle.


One morning last week, I decided to run over to Holyrod park. Then I decided to go over the very tall “mountain” in the middle, Arthur’s Seat, along a trail called The Radical Road. This was unplanned, a last second decision when I saw it. The run immediately turned into a hike, for the radical road is one of the steepest inclines I have ever been on. In great shape, I could not have run up the beginning hill. Since I have returned to regular running only after my arrival here 15 days ago, I’m not in great shape. Anyway, the hike was enjoyable and led to me getting the displayed views of the city.

In this last picture, if you look sort of dead center and squint, you should be able to see the back of the Heatherlea.


I plan a run to the sea in about two weeks when I think I can make it. It’s not so far in one direction, but then I’d have to run home.

-Tomorrow, Fettercairn 1824 12yr, Highland.

-Saturday, the castle story.

-The layout of the pictures with text looked much better when I previewed it. I simply don't have the time or energy to make it pretty again. I also realize that the text along the side in this post is not awesome and I'll go with simple centered photos in the future. Mea culpa.