Best View of Edinburgh: Carlton Hill

Went up Carlton Hill yesterday for the first time. The hill lies East of Princes Street and is an extremely easy climb - perhaps climb isn't the best word actually. It's an easy walk up. Carlton Hill is very user-friendly and accessible. There are stairs which easily aid your ascent up the hill. Once you're up, you'll get what I feel is the best (free) view of Edinburgh. The 'viewing' space is also definitely better than Arthur's seat as its flat ground - no fears of being blown off a precipice. And there are plenty of interesting structures on the Hill itself to keep you occupied once you've had your fill of the Edinburgh cityscape.

But apart from the view, Carlton Hill also makes an interesting entry-point to the subject of the Scottish Enlightenment. Briefly, the Scottish Enlightenment was a movement in the 18th-century, which saw Scotland produce a staggering number of intellectuals from various fields including the sciences, philosophy, economics and literature.

But back to the present. Today, Carlton Hill is the site of a couple of interesting monuments attesting to the Scottish Enlightenment. At the foot of the hill for instance, you can pay homage to one of the stalwarts of the period:

David Hume's statue lies somewhere along the Royal Mile, but I had no idea he was buried within the city centre until yesterday. The tomb itself is quite pretty - its a simple round structure, and you can go in and pay your respects to this distinguished individual.

At the top of Carlton Hill itself, there are several kooky looking structures which appear to have been transplanted straight from Athens:


This thing on the right is a monument to Dugald Stewart whom I've learnt was another philosopher who worked during the Enlightenment era. The monument was actually modelled upon the Choragic Monument near the Acropolis, hence its rather classical appearance. This allows it to fit in perfectly with the other Greek-inspired structures including the rather imposing National Monument:

It has the mysterious appearance of being unfinished - was it based on the Parthenon in Athens? Who knows...In any case, it's quite magnificent, and you'll always see people happily scrambling up its monumental looking steps for photographs.

In all, Carlton Hill is a nice place to stretch your legs, and get a great view of Edinburgh. On the last point, I would say better than the one you get from Arthur's seat, because you can see more starkly the boundary between the Old Town and the New Town from the vantage point at Carlton Hill.

However perhaps because it is so easily accessible, the hill does seem to be in need of a clean up - closer examination of the ground reveals lots of cigarette butts and beer bottles. Evidence of the activities which go on at night I suppose.

But go in the day and I assure you the only rowdiness you'll find are from Italian and Japanese tourists all jostling to get the best shot of the cityscape.