I went to Shetland in 2018 but didn’t consider my “mission” complete without a trip to Orkney. So here we are , while staying as near to the children’s summer holidays as possible I arranged a flight and my accommodation in Kirkwall, Orkney on the 1st September – or partly on 31st August perhaps . I have done well , my first assignment, taking Juno and Issy to school is to be 8 hours after my return. The trains were on strike at the time so not only did I have to make the journey to Scotland by air, I even had to get to Heathrow Airport by taxi and the driver wanted £97 in cash!
I got to the airport with time to spare but not as much as I had imagined; The BA flight was to take off at 22 hours and I had read that as 11 pm! I booked my tickets online and printed off the details for presentation. Isn’t modern life easy? I had a window seat on the plane and the seat on my right was empty. We got to Glasgow airport one hour late because my plane had to take the overflow from a cancelled flight.
Anyway it was an uneventful flight. We got to Glasgow airport one hour late, a bit after midnight. I spent most of the next ten hours at the only open cafe/restaurant at the airport, Greggs. Thank God for its existence. After a coffee and a bun I began reading Jeremy, Shashi and family’s present to me, a book “Around India in 80 trains, by Monisha Rajesh. Having struggled to get started for weeks I really got into it and enjoyed the 86 pages I covered. I felt guilty about using Greggs as a comfortable place to sit but there were other people doing the same thing.
The flight to Kirkwall was again uneventful. Once again I had a seat to myself in Row 3. Kirkwall airport has no cash machines and taxis have to be summoned by phone. I took a public bus which dropped me off at Balfour hospital. Balfour is a popular name up here. My landlord at Scapa house guesthouse is also Balfour.. I understand that William Balfour Baikee, a local fellow took Christianity to Niger, Chad and other West African countries.
Thanks to the satnav facility on my mobile phone I was able to walk from the hospital to my accommodation at Scapa House. Soon after my arrival my landlady, Ida obliged with a lift to the travel centre in Kirkwall. She was going to see her grandson in a football match.
After advice from the travel-centre I visited St Magnus Cathedral, Bishop’s and Earl’s palaces, the museums and then stopped to applaud a noisy and happy wedding party consisting of a bride, an effigy and the bride’s friends on an open-top road transporter. Then I wandered round Kirkwall settling on Restaurant 21 for my evening meal. The only available seat was at a bar along the front window. But it was fun watching the goings on outside. I had food , red wine, white wine and partly to kill time a brandy allowing plenty of time for the last No 2 bus to get me to Scapa House. In fact due to confusion the last bus left without me and I got home by taxi. One benefit was that after talking to the taxi driver I decided that my best option to get round the island was to accept a coach place with mother and daughter, Lorna and Carrie Brown on Tuesday 5th September.
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As I finish writing for the moment I note the good view through the window I have been seated at for the last hour or so, a sheep field, a very active wind turbine and, in the distance the cathedral I mentioned earlier. I shall shortly depart for Kirkwall Centre. I hope to see a neolithic settlement in town. Oh! Kirkwall has a street called Watergate but I don’t think this is the one the late President Richard Nixon didn’t like!
Sunday 3/9/23
Not a very productive day. By the time I had had breakfast, done my ablutions, written my diary for yesterday AND had a sleep it was 3 pm. I couldn’t find my bus time-table and the buses are infrequent anyway, especially on Sunday. I started walking towards Balfour Hospital knowing there was a bus stop there. Near the hospital I realised I was only 0.8 of a mile from Kirkwall town centre and walked all the way there using my mobile phone satnav.
At Judith Glue’s shop at 4 pm they said it was too late to be given the keys to Kirkwall’s neolithic site, a key to get into the barred area of the site and another one to the door leading to the site which was underground. The buses would not have been able to get me to Stromness and back in reasonable time so I revisited Tankerness Garden with its large red rabbit, entered the cathedral again and wandered along the sea front., this time walking up to the end of the pier. I decided to have my evening meal not much after 5 pm. All the sea front restaurants were either fully booked or booked till very late. So I reluctantly went into a very noisy bar/restaurant where a band was playing music and “vegan” Dev had to accept fish and chips but with prosecco and red wine it wasn’t bad and the band didn’t really bother me. The satnav said I was only 1.7 miles from Scapa House, so I walked home.
I went to pay Ida the daily rent. She and Balfour were entertaining friends, a father and daughter (Linda). The father is 91 but quite sprightly. I congratulated him and said “aim for 100”. Ida offered me a glass of wine. I chose red wine and also ate her lemon meringue pie which made up for the lack of a dessert with my meal in town.
Back in my room I tried to sleep off the effects of the alcohol and watched TV lying on the carpet before retiring.
Monday 4th September
I was careful not to spend too long at Scapa House and left in reasonable time to get to Judith Glue’s shop for the keys to the neolithic site Grain Earth House. It didn’t seem to be far away. I decided to walk with the aid of my satnav. But following its instructions I was getting further and further away from my destination. I gave up, walked back into town and asked Orkney cabs to pick me up.
I got to the site and opened up with some help from the taxi driver. I have attached a photo of the external gate and the internal door. I went in a few feet from the entrance and decided not to go through a tunnel into the underground site on my own. I took a picture of the diagram of the site to attach to this narrative.
Walking back into town I returned the keys to Judith Glue’s shop, bought something there as a “thank you” and got on a bus to Stromness. Stromness was interesting and different. Many of the houses went right up to the water’s edge. The crocosmia by the waterfront was amazing. I must plant more in my garden in Havant.
Back from Stromness I had my evening meal with two glasses of wine – on a Monday, that broke one of my principles! It was a nice vegan meal. I then walked home and paid Ida for the day. Tomorrow I shall be on a guided tour.
Tuesday 5th September
I got picked up at 9.35 am or so by Lorna Brown of “See Orkney” and we drove straight to the ferry port at Stromness where I had been yesterday.
We picked up six people off the ferry from the mainland, Scabster I think, four Canadians and two Australians. The Canadians were related to one another and were a separate unit from the Australians I think.
The first place we headed for was Skara Brae, a neolithic settlement about 5000 years old. There were the remains of a number of houses with sleeping, cooking and other facilities in each house. The houses are numbered for modern convenience. There is a sandy beach nearby, nice to use in good weather. We did not enter Skaill House nearby, owned by the family who had a key role in the uncovering of the Skara Brae settlement.
We then proceeded to the ring of Broadgar, a set of stones arranged in a circle. I believe this is older than Stonehenge. There seems to be less certainty about the origin and the purpose of the stones.
We carried on to the Standing Stones of Stenness. The stones here are even taller but there are fewer of them. Lorna suggested various ways in which the stones may have been transported here such as rolling on logs.
From the Stones of Stenness I think we went to Kirkwall, had a refreshment break for half an hour and entered the cathedral. Lorna told us various stories related to the cathedral. It was once much nearer the sea. The distance was increased by diligent filling in of rocks and rubble. She also told us about Magnus and a relative and the intriguing way in which Magnus met his death.
We then moved on to the place where Italian POWs were used in the second world war to build barrages to block the passage of German warships like the submarine which sank the Royal Oak. A large number of German ships were scuttled in the area for some reason.
An Italian chapel was built by and for the Italian POWs. It is used today for weddings especially by Catholics but by followers of other faiths too.
On the way back to Stromness we stopped again to allow some of us to fuss over two hairy pigs. We dropped the party of six off at the ferry terminal in Stromness. After that Lorna took me back to Kirkwall. I had a meal at the restaurant at which I ate yesterday. Again it was fully booked but they let me eat at the bar. Then as before I walked back to Scapa House.
Wednesday 6th September.
The taxi arrived to take me to Kirkwall airport in good time. I said goodbye to Ida and Balfour. At the airport I did my bag drop. But this time I made sure I had emptied all my water bottles, my failure to do that at Heathrow on the way out had caused delays and inconvenience.
I texted Ginia (Virginia, my sister-in-law and sister of my Dear wife Celia) to say I would be in Glasgow just after midday and that it would be nice for us to meet. Ginia said she was planning to play boules with some friends and I replied saying that I was quite happy to join the game or games of boules.
In my usual manner I was only just beginning to realise that I had booked BA Club class tickets. That would explain why my seat was roomier than usual and that I was at the front end of the ‘plane on most flights. At Glasgow airport I put my suitcase into storage at a certain charge and got a return ticket on bus 500 to Glasgow. Ginia who had been on her way to the boules game decided to abandon boules and meet me at or near Glasgow Central station.
We met and I took Ginia to a restaurant for a coffee and cake. After that we strolled and Ginia took me to a spot near the building where her new flat was being constructed.
We strolled back to Glasgow’s main bus station for me to catch the 500 bus back to the airport. We did have a loud debate about the best place to go to for me to catch the 500 bus. Ginia turned out to be right and we had a very friendly parting.
At the airport I retrieved my suitcase, did a bag drop and proceeded to buy some food. Only soon after that did it come to me that I had been travelling Club class. I was advised to go to the club lounge where there was a variety of drink and good food to consume for free. So I broke my own rules again and had wine etc on a Wednesday!
The flight back to Heathrow was uneventful – I cant remember whether the staff offered me more alcohol. But I arrived at Heathrow and from there by train and bus got to Havant.
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