Off to Skara Brae..the reason for coming to Orkney. Could've got in free as we entered the building at the same time as a coach party from a cruise ship! Looked at the interpretation display then walked back in time to 5000BC. A Snipe was visible tucked down on its nest in the rushes and a pair of Great Skua patrolled the sky above.
The remains of the Neolithic houses are impressive having been uncovered by a storm in 1867(?). There is a replica house to walk through. It's large and roomy being 5 metres in diameter with built-in beds and a dresser. ..all made of stone and a high roof with whale bone trusses. Something I learned today... Neolithic people are Stone Age folk who settled down to farm. Their tools were stone and bone but they had a good diet and comfortable houses.
Spent half an hour at an RSPB Hide The Loons. Greylag geese supervising a crèche of 13 goslings, shoveler, one wigeon, singing Sedge Warbler and a bird of prey (probably Hen Harrier) being harried by gulls. There are breeding lapwings and oystercatchers everywhere on this island.
From here we drove to Brough of Birsay, an island accessible by low tide over a causeway. The first ruins encountered here are Viking longhouses and a church. We walked clockwise around the island, past a lighthouse and were closely examined by a hunting Great Skua. Close views of a nesting razorbill.
A quick visit to Stromness was made even quicker by mistakenly driving down a narrow paved street which we couldn't avoid. So we drove the whole length of Stromness and then left! Visited some standing stone sites and then a chambered cairn which rivals Newgrange in Ireland. (Newgrange is better).
Back to our campsite at Evie for supper in the rain.
On Friday 5th we drove a short distance to the Brough of Gurness - an Iron Age defended settlement with a huge ditch and satellite dwellings surrounding a fortified tower with 5 foot thick walls. The Picts were the people who lived here.
Next stop Kirkwall to view the Bishop's Palace and the Earl's Palace.
The Earl was Robert Stewart, a greedy and unpopular man descended illegitimately from James V (his grandfather). Eventually he was beheaded in Edinburgh.
Rain was driving in from the East on a strong wind so we decided to head for the ferry at St Margaret's, relax and wait. ..and of course the sun came out!
Tonight we are staying on the north Caithness coast at Scarfskerry. Tomorrow the plan is to visit the Castle of Mey and then meet up with Ann and her cycling entourage somewhere near Inverness. They are on their way from Land's End to John of Groats (LEJOG).
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