Portobello Beach Edinburgh Day 245

Beltane and Braces - aka May Morning Madness on Arthurs's Seat. Beltane is the Gaelic Festival to mark the beginning of summer after the endless winter. In all my years living in Edinburgh I have always wondered what happened at dawn on this day on Arthur's Seat. Well, today I went to find out, taking advantage of my body clock still running on Central European Summer Time! I saw rabbits and then a human rabbit. I saw young men being filmed by this rabbit trying to wash their faces in the non-existent dew. (The ground was amazingly dry.) Legend has it that if you do this and allow the sun's rays at dawn on May Day to dry the dew from your face you will have achieved eternal beauty. I saw the sun rise and was surprised at how few people were there, apart from the human rabbit and his friends. However, as I was coming back down what looked like a Jacobite army in retreat from Culloden was crawling its way up from the direction of The Palace of Holyrood House. They had come from the Beltane Celebrations last night on Calton Hill ( apparently featured on the BBC One Show yesterday evening) via the Caves night club and were now preparing to chill out at dawn, to the melodic sounds of Beltane drumming and the shimmer of Beltane red painted skinned bodies - the hairy man in a blood red thong would have failed the Blip sensors for sure - but my montage tries to captures a little of this May Day celebration. I beg your indulgence on Beltane Day for the use of four and not one image on the grounds that I am not planning to get up this early again to capture this event and if you cannot manifest Blip fecundity on May Morning when can you? It is however an event worthy of attending, if you happen to be in Edinburgh, on May Morning. (PS Portobello Beach can be seen in the top left hand inset).