23 September

Today is our last day on Orkney, can't say we are glad! But we only have to reach St Margaret's Hope by nightfall, to catch the second ferry the next day. So decide to go to Stromness, the second largest town on Orkney Mainland after Kirkwall. Then on to Kirkwall.

We say goodbye to David at Old Quoyscottie, see for the last time the cattle and geese on the road to Dounby, and revel in the fact that it's lovely weather! The farmers are out after the rain with their tractors.

And Stromness at last! This is the alternative ferry port to the Scottish mainland. We park our car when we see a parking spot and walk along Alfred Road to the museum, that we believe is a not-to-miss experience. And indeed! What a delight!!

This little street is so enchanting, with all sorts of interesting details. Above, we see the evidence of Norse architecture: the stepped gable and corner treatment, and John Rae we will get to know intimately in the museum. He was the Orcadian explorer who discovered the fate of the Franklin Expedition in the Canadian Arctic. At the end of this street we find the museum.

The phone booth has been put to good use!

A life saving defibrillator and heart restarter

Here is the Stromness Museum.

There was a very friendly lady at the desk who explained everything about Buddo, John Rae, and the rest of the museum.

Meet Buddo. He is one of only a handful of human figurines from British neolithic time, as it is extremely rare to find representations of humans from this time. It dates from 2900-2400 BC and was found at Skara Brae. Buddo is the Orcadian affectionate term for 'friend'.

Next is a necklace made of human teeth. Apparently it was a rite of passage ritual to smear a black paste on a youngster's teeth daily until they were stained adequately to render a black smile!

Dr John Rae, a native Orcadian, was a surgeon and explorer who made several expeditions to the Arctic regions of Canada, and among his tasks in the Hudson's Bay Company at Stromness was to finish mapping the Arctic coast, and on a subsequent expedition to search for the lost Franklin Expedition. Rae met Inuit who claimed that a party of 40 white men had died on King William Island, resorting to cannibalism in a final attempt to stay alive. After finding several pieces of evidence he returned to London with the sad news in two reports, one without mention of the cannibalism for newspapers, and the other an unedited report for government files only. The two were switched and a storm of controversy broke out about his head. The grieving widow of Franklin was enraged by the suggestion that her husband could have resorted to cannibalism, and she destroyed Rae's reputation publicly. John Rae, being a gentle-hearted man, just let them be, and went on to live a quiet life in Canada hereafter. He should have been knighted - in fact our lady in the museum called him Sir John Rae - but Lady Franklin saw to it that history recorded her man as the hero and John Rae as the villain. Today Orkney recognises its son John Rae as the hero he certainly is.

Here a life-size model of dr John Rae, crossing the Richardson River, 5 Sept 1848

The natural history part of the museum contains a fantastic collection of birds, shells, animals, etc.

North Ronaldsay Sheep (ram, ewe and lamb). This ancient native breed of sheep lives mainly on seaweed, confined to the shoreline by a dry-stone dyke which encircles the island. A primitive species, DNA tests show they are very similar to sheep's remains found at Skara Brae.

The puffin we didn't see

Squat lobster

Hermit crabs

Edible crab

Golden eagle

Grey-lag goose

Great Auk, extinct since 1844

Magnus Spence, whose gravestone we saw at the St Magnus Church of Birsay

The museum contains so much more of real interest that cannot be included here, for it will take forever! Suffice to say it was a real highlight, the Stromness Museum!

Last laugh:

Now we are proper hungry, and nowhere can we find on this Tuesday a place to sit down and eat a light lunch!

Dr John Rae memorial

After we've scoured the town, we decide to revert to eating a car-boot-lunch - so we stop at a church-turned-into-a-house and decide the Co-op's brie is unsurpassable, and we couldn't have done better!

Now we are heading for Kirkwall via Stenness and Finstown.

We've had the refuse lorry in front of us the whole way, so we decide to take a breather for the sake of my photos. We stop in Finstown, a charming village. Here a public bench to sit and regard the sea...

This stone is a marker on St Magnus's Way. Now on to Kirkwall.

Once reached, we struggle to find a parking spot, but we do succeed right next to the Bishop's and Earl's Palace. These are ruins, but the adjacent St Magnus Cathedral is the real drawcard.

Now for the cathedral and its churchyard.

Dr John Rae was buried here in this grand way by his wife, a fitting memorial for an intrepid man. The smile on his face is quite telling.

Prayer to St Magnus: O Magnus of Fame, on the Barque of the Heros, on the crest of the waves, on the sea, on the land, aid and preserve us, Amen.

We found this man named David Lowtits

At the bottom of every gravestone of the 18th C there is written 'Memento Mori', Remember Death.

Now we hit the road to St Margaret's Hope via the Italian Chapel and a whole lot of causeways.

Never heard of such a name for 'street'.

These 4 causeways were built in 1940 and called the Churchill Barrier. When we came, I didn't know their connection with the wars, and now coming back, I see them in an entirely different light. In 1939, the Royal Navy ensconced itself in the bay at Scapa Flow, and a German U-boot came through in-between these islands and torpedoed a big British battleship, killing 700 men. So Churchill ordered the barriers to be built. That kept the navy safe in both World Wars.

And there we are at our inn for tonight, the Anchorage in St Margaret's Hope. We are shown to our room, which is scantily appointed, but we realise it is a 'hostel', so there is a communal kitchen with everything one might need. There is, however, a hairdryer!