Introduction

Our Lives in Orkney

This blog is intended to keep our friends and families up to date with our lives here in Orkney.

Why on earth move to a remote, northern archipelago, inhabited by axe toting, wild men? Well, they’re not all axe toting nor wild, in fact, they are quite nice and friendly and we’ve been made to feel very welcome. Orkney frequently comes high in the lists of best places to live in the UK and we would agree.

We moved here in July 2015 and bought a nice, peedie house in Stromness, overlooking the southern end of the harbour. By the way, “peedie” is Orcadian for small. The yellow arrow in the picture below shows the location of Gray’s Noust. The red building to the right is the former lifeboat station and slipway, it’s now used as a dive centre. Stromness is a very compact, little town and we were in easy walking distance of all the facilities. Gray’s Noust has great views across Scapa Flow to South Ronaldsay, hence the “scapaviews” blog name.

In June 2018 we bought the house at Well Park, situated at the southern edge of the town, it also has great views across the Flow. We moved at the end of August 2018 and love the new setting. For the location of Well Park, see the map on the “Around Stromness” page.

Orkney oozes with history and the Neolithic remains in Skara Brae, Brodgar and Stenness have been declared a World Heritage Site. The six hundred year period under Viking rule is still strongly felt and most place names are of Norse origin, including Stromness.

Orkney is a great place for music and there are several festivals through the summer covering a range of genres, including Folk, Jazz, Blues and Classical and we get to some of the concerts when possible.

We were keeping ourselves busy with odd jobs, H was volunteering in the local Red Cross shop and I was a Custodian at Stromness Museum but the recent change in our circumstances means we are both fully retired now.

We enjoy getting out for walks – weather permitting. Since the move, we now have a little garden and that’s nice for pottering in.

The intention is that all the photos used in this blog will be taken by myself or H. “Borrowed” photos will be credited.

You can follow our exploits by clicking on Contents, then the appropriate year / month. Feel free to use the Contact section to send us a message.

Hopefully, if I can get the hang of this blogging malarkey, we can keep in touch with everyone.

Note: Posted views are our own. Unless otherwise noted all photographs are by N and H.