Last night on Orkney

 So my friends, tomorrow I head off for Shetland and leave beautiful Orkney behind, just as the suns come out!!!

The last few days have been amazing, I have viewed some spectacular sights and met more friendly helpful people. The hotel is lovely and the staff are really professional, helpful and super friendly, they make your stay really comfortable.  The hotel has a whisky nook, a divine parlour and a cute snug for guests to gather in and enjoy a drink before dinner.  I'm currently sipping a local gin and tonic.

My suite is very nice!!!  The bathroom's bigger than my bedroom back home.

In my last blog I told you about St Magnus Cathedral in Kirkwall, here are some photos.

After leaving St Magnus I headed to the Highland Park distillery for my tour and tasting under the expert guidance of local lad Rabbie.  One interesting fact, not related to whisky production, every year South African Swallows arrive and nest at the distillery for the summer. Its said that summer starts when they arrive, this year it was April 11th, and ends when they leave. The distillery workers make sure their nests are not disturbed during their visit and they care for them when the Swallows leave. The birds nest in the same one each year, its quite amazing.

 

So I'm now sitting at Kirkwall airport waiting for my flight to Shetland, I'm early because I decided I just needed to sit and regroup for  while, and basically apart from the staff, I'm the only one here.

Day 2 of Orkney is cold and windy, I'm rugged up in a down vest, scarf and coat and wending my way down to the stones of stenness, a small stone circle that's about 4000 years old, just my luck there's a tour group here as well. And I just have to say, I'm sick of American tourists, they are loud, rude, and self centred, rules and regulations are for everyone else except them!!! So that's my rant for the day, back to the stones.

The stones themselves are sandstone and if you look at the photo you can see the striations that allowed then to be cut vertically.  Too many people to really get any feelings from  the stones so I headed off to the Ring of Brodger to get there before the tour group.

When I  arrived at the Ring of Brodgar I was alone yee haa, the  circle sits on a causeway and is now only 36 stones,originally archaeologists think there were 65 stones in total.  Apparently in 1913 when the government body which is now Historic Scotland, took over the care of the circle they needed to restand 13 of the stones.

The car park is about a quarter of a mile away from the circle and from the car park you get a really good  view of the stones standing on the hill between the 2 bodies of water.

Walking around the  circle you get a real sense of history, I think the weather, being dark and gloomy adds to the mystery of the stones, and then the odd  hints of sunlight hitting Stromness Bay adds to the ambience, you can almost imagine the stones singing on the longest day.

After the Ring of Brodger I headed to Yesnaby to do some of the cliff walk, it was amazing, high above the waves, the Arctic terns swooping and screeching, a wild, lovely place.  I met an artist who was capturing the headland in oils, it was beautiful and I asked her if I could take a photo, she very kindly said yes.

Words don't cover the beautiful wildness of the place, so I'll just show you some photos.

From Yesnaby I headed to the neolithic village of Skara Brae which is classed as the best preserved settlement of its age in Europe.  Before you go through to the village there's an information exhibition which is excellent, and then you walk through a replica house showing how the buildings would have looked about 2000BC.

After looking through I headed along the path across the headland to Skara Brae itself.  At the gate there is a sign  that reads, this walk will take you back 5000 years, and as you walk along  there are stone plaques taking you back in time, from man on the moon in 1969 to the pyramids of Giza, Solomon's Temple etc. tracing recorded history back to the time Skara Brae was built.

It was quite eye opening walking along reading the plaques, I started at AD 1969 with man on the moon, then 1961 first man in space, telephone invented 1876, American Declaration of Independence 1776, and so on back to the stone for the birth of Christ, then back BC with the Great Wall of China 220BC, building of the Parthenon in 480 BC, and of course for all Wazzy's masonic brethren, the building of King Solomon's Temple, the home of freemasonry in 962BC, then back beyond Stonehenge and the Great Pyramids of Giza, and then finally the building of Skara Brae.

You can't actually walk through the village, the path has been built up so you can look down into the buildings.  It's quite amazing to think of people living and building their lives and families here so long ago.

 

From Skara Brae I walked to Skaill House where  William Watt, the chap who is credited with discovering Skara Brae lived. He was the 7th Laird of Breckness and Skaill House has been owned by his family for generations, it was built in the 1600's and has been updated and lived in as a family home right up until recently.

The house is now tended by Historic Scotland and is really worth the visit. I spent about a hour there.

I will upload photos and continue day 2 later.

 

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