Per Mare

Stromness burgh’s motto is Per Mare – By Sea, reflecting how much the town’s success has relied upon the sea. These photographs, taken around 1900, shows the harbour full of herring boats.

The “Double Cottages”, opposite Well Park, can be seen at upper right. ( Pics from the Orkney Archive)

The harbour today is still busy but the nature of the traffic has changed. The fishing boats are much fewer and mostly inshore crabbers. Taking their place now are the dive boats, excursion boats and cruise liners.

The scuttling of the German High Seas Fleet, in Scapa Flow, in June 1919 provided a great business opportunity for companies today offering scuba diving trips. A number are based in Stromness and, using old converted fishing boats, they take intrepid tourists out to dive on the wrecks. Out of seventy-four warships interned here and scuttled, seven battleships remain submerged and can be dived on. This picture shows three dive boats, Leviathan, Huskyan and Jean Elaine returning into harbour.

The rise of Orkney as the UK’s top cruise ship destination sees between 150 and 200 cruise liners visit the county each year. The majority, and all the large ships, dock in Kirkwall but a number of the smaller boats, 70 to 100 passengers, visit Stromness. This influx of tourists can bring some vital income to the shops in the town and much is done to make them welcome. These are some of the regular visitors, Corinthian, Clio and Silver Explorer.

From time to time, the more “well heeled” visitor arrives and there is a great deal of speculation as to who could own these very flashy yachts. Below are the Jamaica Bay and Archimedes in Stromness harbour.

We never heard who was on the Jamaica Bay but the BBC did an item on the Archimedes, which is owned by a hedge fund manager. Glad to see he’s making good use of my pension fund!

https://www.superyachtfan.com/superyacht/superyacht_archimedes.html

The Ferries

The Orkney archipelago consists of some seventy islands, twenty of which are inhabited. For the islanders, the ferries are the lifeblood of the county. Orkney Islands Council provide the service within Orkney and the services to mainland Scotland are run by Northlink Ferries and Pentland Ferries. Two services run out of Stromness, the Graemsay runs to the islands of Graemsay and Hoy, and the Hamnavoe covers the Stromness to Scrabster route.

Above: clockwise from top left, Hamnavoe, Graemsay, Thorsvoe and Hoy Head

It’s not always plain sailing (so to speak) for the ferries. In December 2017, the Hamnavoe was returning to Stromness on a particularly stormy morning and attempted to manoeuvre into the dock. The wind was so strong that they couldn’t turn the boat and had to abandon the attempt, the Captain took the ferry into Scapa Flow and spent the night following a circuit up and down the coastline. The hapless passengers spent almost twenty-four hours on what should have been a ninety minute crossing! This photo shows the OIC tug, Harald, trying to turn the Hamnavoe before eventually conceding victory to the elements. It all took place in front of Gray’s Noust – fascinating to watch.

Each year the boats go for their annual maintenance service and we get replacement ships providing cover. Previously we have had the massive Helliar and, on loan from CalMac, the Isle of Lewis. 

The Lifeboat

Providing a valuable life saving service in the seas around Orkney are the volunteers of the RNLI. Orkney has three lifeboats, Kirkwall, Longhope and Stromness. The first Stromness lifeboat was established in 1867 with funds provided by Sir Titus Salt, the Yorkshire philanthropist, and was named “Saltaire” in his honour.

The current Severn Class boat, Violet Dorothy and Kathleen, has been in service since 1998 and is the seventh lifeboat to be based in Stromness.

The Harbour & Marina

A nice video made for visiting boats.