Visit to Edinburgh and Climbing Arthur's Seat

I have always wanted to visit Edinburgh, so I took the opportunity to do so when I was last up in Northumberland, just before Christmas. However, the idea of walking around the shops three days before Christmas was the last thing I wanted to do, so instead the day was spent exploring Holyrood Park and climbing Arthur's Seat, an ancient volcano.

Beautiful lake on the climb up. It took me 30 minutes to climb to this bit.

View of Edinburgh from Arthur's Seat (still a climb to the top)

The top of Arthur's Seat! 251 metres up in the air!

Doing this climb was quite a challenge for me, being rather unfit! Luckily, it was a dry and fair day, although it was pretty cold. Climbing up was hard in terms of breathing (I was huffing and puffing a lot), but climbing down was tricky because it looked a lot steeper in real life than it does in the photos! There was one bit which where it was hard to get a firm foot hold, so I just wriggled down on my bottom :)

This may not look steep, but it felt like it at the time!

I was really chuffed that I managed to complete this climb. It's something that I would have been too afraid to attempt in the past, given the history of my arthritis. It took me longer than most people, and there were people jogging near the top (!), but this was still a good achievement for me. Everytime I do something new which I have never done before, I feel great.

If you liked this post, you might like Self Coaching Tip - Do Something Difficult, which is on a similar subject. As ever, please leave me a comment below or click 'share' to post on Facebook or Twitter!