7th September – The shore at Warebeth is littered with evidence of the effects of wind, waves and time. Patterned rock displaying an ancient sea bed that has dried out, cracked and then been frozen in time.
Adjacent is an example of the artistic hand of wind and waves, with a nicely grouped collection of sea-rounded pebbles. I couldn’t have done a more artistic job myself.
Time and tide shows no mercy to man-made objects. These rusty old pieces have a sculptural quality. They are the remains of a Norwegian vessel, Norholmen, that ran aground in November 1966.
13th September – After the recent stormy weather that we’ve been having, Hoy Sound was like a mill pond this morning. Ideal for a bit of kayaking and a great way of getting close to the seabirds.
14th June – Further to our little post in June 2018, it’s been announced that the Microsoft server experiment has completed and the submerged cylinder has been retrieved from the test site at Billia Croo, which is about 3km outside Stromness.
15th September – OIC Marine Services took delivery this morning of two new tugs. Odin of Scapa and Thor of Scapa were built in Turkey at a cost of £6.1 million each. Shame they couldn’t have been built more locally.
After 17 days at sea their 3,500 mile journey from Istanbul ended in Stromness. They received a traditional Orkney welcome – rain!
20th September – Orkney.com have produced this nice little video highlighting Summer 2020 in Orkney.
7th August – We’ve been pleased with our spuds this year, this was todays harvest, some nice tatties.
We’ve had a lot of nice lettuce and spinach but the beetroot and turnips are still small. The carrots are slow but coming along nicely.
8th August – It’s hard to tell here but there are two boats tied together. I assume one has had some engine problems and is piggybacking a lift home. A lovely evening for it though.
9th August – I couldn’t resist posting this. Scotland’s dodgiest Greggs is in South Street, Perth!
14th August – Stromness Museum reopened yesterday after lockdown closure in April. It was my first day on duty today, lots of new practices to be implemented. Custodians now sitting in a perspex box for protection.
The shop shelves have been moved behind the screen to prevent handling
Visitors have to book online for a 45 minute slot per hour, with a maximum of ten people per slot. We’re using a system called ArtTicket which records track and trace information. Custodians then have 15 minutes to run round wiping down door handles, handrails, etc. before the next contingent arrive. The shape of things to come?
17th August – H captured the amazing colours on one of the piers today. Amazing the effect lichens, etc. can have on stone slabs that are constantly exposed to a salty environment.
24th August – Last night, our old pals, Rob and Petrina, stepped off the ferry from Scrabster to begin their first visit to Orkney.
After a good overnight rest following their long journey, we set off to see as much as possible in the semi-locked down islands.
On Day 1 we concentrated on the neolithic sites of West Mainland and, after visiting the Stones of Stenness and the Ring of Brodgar, no trip is complete without seeing Skara Brae. Although officially closed we managed to sneak in for quick look around.
After circumnavigating West Mainland, we rounded the evening off with a nice meal in the Ferry Inn in Stromness.
25th August – Day 2 saw us visit Kirkwall, the town is fairly quiet at the moment so we had a leisurely stroll around taking in the Earl’s and Bishop’s Palaces and some “quiet contemplation” in the Cathedral. Our walk took in the harbour to admire the boats.
Rounding off todays exertions we dined in the Merkister Hotel in Harray, a lovely setting on the loch’s edge.
26th August – For Day 3 it was the turn of the South Isles, we headed straight down to Burwick and had lunch at the Skerries Bistro, which specialises in seafood.
With appetites sated we set off back north to see the sights en route. It’s always important, when in Orkney, to say hello to the seals. So we stopped at Windwick to say hi to this socially distanced trio.
There’s some nice scenery at Windwick, with rock stacks, tall cliffs and shorter ones too (geddit?)
Popped into the Italian Chapel, it was very quiet and we had it to ourselves for most of the time.
Early evening saw us having a quick tour of the world famous Stromness Museum with Rob enjoying more quiet contemplation on the Museum pier.
27th August – The few days of the visit have gone far too quickly and R & P have caught the 11 o’clock ferry back to Scrabster.
H & I hope, that now they know where Orkney is, they will be able to find us again and come back for a longer stay.
30th August – When we were at the Skerries on Wednesday, we noticed a young woman and her dog in a rather cramped Fiat Punto.
Well, we met her in the Stromness campsite today. It turns out that she is a doing an MA in botany at Uni in Edinburgh. She was on a budget tour of the Highlands and Islands and had converted her little car as, perhaps, the smallest camper ever.
3rd July – Today is the fifth anniversary of our move to Orkney. No regrets at all, we have loved every minute of our time here. Normally we would go to the Hamnavoe for a celebratory meal but sadly it is staying closed this year due to Covid-19.
5th July – Harry the Snake is still growing at the Ness ( see 9th June post ). We particulary liked this this little sea stack complete with tiny climbers.
8th July – A lovely, warm day here. Kids playing on the beach. H & I admiring the view out of Hoy Sound.
As we basked in the sunshine, a drama was unfolding. Local fishing boat Noronya was returning to Stromness and battling through a strong tidal race in the Sound when the engine cut out.
The boat was turned around in the current and carried back towards the open sea. Eventually a marine energy service tug arrived and towed it back into the harbour. Panic over!
10th July – As face masks become compulsory in Scottish shops, we’re not all getting the hang of it…
15th July – We’ve had a little Wheatear fledgling in the garden for a few days now. Not sure where the nest was but it seems quite adept at looking after itself now. Dad is never far away, keeping watch and bringing food.
16th July – It’s Jeanne’s birthday today, so the gang assembled at Woodwick House for, socially distanced, cakes and cookies.
Woodwick House is an old Victorian mansion in Evie. It’s run as an artists retreat and is in a beautiful setting. It is one of the few places in Orkney with mature, deciduous woodland.
There are no vistors there at the moment, for obvious reasons, but Jeanne (of course) has access. So it was a nice peaceful afternoon.
23rd July – As Boris Johnson visits Stromness on a whistle stop tour, he is harrassed by a band of dangerous, masked insurgents.
“We want to build back better together with a green recovery.”
Prime Minister Boris Johnson sets out plans to introduce infrastructure to support green energy in Orkney.
24th July – A nicer day today, yesterday’s grey skies have cleared and the big cloud drifted off southwards. We went up the coast and were pleased to see there were still a lot of puffins around.
Met a nice couple from Bedale in North Yorks. They moved to Orkney two years ago, having lived for twelve years in France (too hot, apparently!). They’ve built a lovely bungalow overlooking the cliffs to the north, an ideal spot for auroras.
2nd June – Lockdown is finally getting to us! H has started seeing faces in seashore pebbles!
Seriously though, it’s just a flat stone with bit missing and presented an opportunity for a bit of fun.
3rd June – These three pics are from the Orkney Library. They show Porteus Brae in Stromness over the last century.
In the early 1900s
In 1952, painting by Stanley Cursiter
In 2020
Not much has changed over the years. Normally the street would be teeming with visitors but, as it says, this is 2020 and things are very different.
6th June – A dreich morning here, a solitary jogger putting us to shame as we sit and look out of the window.
H has been busy making face masks for friends and family and has set up a little production line in the front bedroom.
8th June – In the absence of a Folk Festival, we have to make our own entertainment.
The recycled plastic vegetable garden is coming on nicely. These flat boxes have lettuce. carrots and spring onions in them. The creel cloches have various seedlings and cuttings sheltered from the elements. See the post on the 17th April for the first concept with the orange box.
We used a large blue fish bucket to plant some potatoes and they have come up beautifully.
During the cold weather they were “earthed up” using seaweed and they seem to thrive on that. We’re looking forward to a nice crop later in the year.
9th June – Harry the Lockdown Snake was started about ten days ago down at Ness Point and he is still going! People walking past are invited to add a stone or pebble at the end. Most are plain but many painted ones are included. This is a little video posted by Orkney Library.
A couple of weeks ago the folk behind the Stromness Rocks Facebook page created Harry the Lockdown Snake along the shore at the Point of Ness, asking people to add pebbles when they're out a walk.
H has painted a few stones recently and placed them in the snake. She did a couple of nice Harry Potters but they’ve been pinched. I suppose that should be taken as a compliment.
Here are some of the others:
12th June – Noticed this Northern Marsh Orchid growing in the shadow of a rusty anchor. It’s in the old boatyard nearby, as it’s hardly ever used the yard has dozens of orchids in flower at the moment.
13th June – Ralph Robinson and his wife Patty Boonstra are artists living on South Ronaldsay. We got to know them through exhibitions in Stromness and we have some of their work. They have a wild otter which visits them and is confident enough to enter their house. Here are a couple of Ralph’s short video clips.
16th June – Flaming June at last. A beautiful day. Families paddling and kite flying, and Meadow Lark in full voice over Netherton Road.
18th June – Here’s a couple of Puffin pics. It’s late in the season for them now and they’ll be heading out to sea soon. Sorry, the photos are a bit blurry due to distance.
21st June – It was summer solstice yeterday, the longest day. This photo, taken at midnight, is looking to the north, over the harbour, there is still quite a bit of light to the northwest.
25th June – Local composer, Erland Cooper, has made this little video to accompany his latest album. It sees Erland running up Alfred Street, Stromness, towards the Museum. He cuts down an alley, with the Museum on his right.
5th May – We’ve enjoyed a spell of glorious weather here and it looks set to continue for a while longer. The sun has nicely caught these tulips in the front border.
It’s just a great shame that, due to lockdown, there is no-one here to enjoy it all.
We’ve been taking advantage of the nice weather to create a vegetable patch from recycled plastic boxes. Mostly old fish boxes. we’ve planted a selection including lettuce, carrots, beetroot, leeks, spinach, chard, turnip, onions and spring onions.
8th May – The glorious weather continues, ideal for seals to find a shallow spot and soak up some rays.
The forecast is that a cold front is moving south, so this might be the last chance to to do this for a while.
9th May – The weather has completely changed now. We are having our first rain for a couple of weeks and it’s brought the snails out en masse. Spent a damp morning bagging and binning them. Spent a damp afternoon earthing up the spuds and protecting the vegetable seedlings from the predicted cold snap tonight.
The wet weather is keeping us mainly indoors, so H has made some lemon curd.
It’s a messy business funnelling it into jars but well worth it…it’s delicious.
11th May – With the pandemic resulting in zero visitors to Orkney, the poet Edwin Muir caught the right note in this excerpt from “The Northern Islands”.
12th May – Well, after some three weeks of beautiful spring weather, we woke to this!
This is known as “lambing snow” and seems to arrive every year when the lambs are just born. It’s the heaviest snow we’ve had this winter. It won’t lie at low level as the ground is quite wet but the hills are white.
Driftwood with seaweed ……and snow!
20th May – Stromness featured in the BBC’s “Scotland’s Home of the Year” programme this evening. This week they covered Orkney and Shetland, with a tiny cottage in Stromness winning this heat. The programme used some nice drone footage of the Stromness area with Well Park clearly visible. I pinched this pic from the programme.
This shows the Graemsay ferry entering the harbour with Well Park arrowed. It’s only when you see these aerial shots that you realise how narrow the Stromness peninsula is.
21st May – This would have been the first day of the Orkney Folk Festival but, for obvious reasons, it has been cancelled. Here is a sampler from last year’s event. Staged at venues throughout the Islands, it really brings in the crowds. A real shame that all the various halls are silent this year.
29th May – It’s the first day of the relaxed lockdown and good to see the golfers are back out on the course.
The golf course is in great condition, There’s been no-one hacking divots out of it for over two months and the grounds staff have been maintaining it throughout.
3rd April – A bit of a chilly spell at the the moment. We had a few hail showers yesterday interspersed with sunny periods, punctuated by some snow.
Our routine is now getting very repetitive, same basic walk every day. We do bump into (not literally, of course) friends doing the same walk, so it’s good to have a 2 metre catch-up.
It’d be nice to get some planting done in the garden but it’s still too chilly for that. The dry spell meant I could get the grass cut for the first time this year.
We’re up to two cases of Covid-19 in Orkney now. People seem to be taking all the appropriate precautions but ferries are running half empty and Stromness is like a ghost town.
Feeling a wee bit hard done by this morning. Had the car MoT’d last week and the Government have just announced a six month amnesty – typical!
6th April – A lovely day here. Ideal if you’re in the fishing business for getting out and feeding the nation. This is a local boat, Viking Senior, heading out into the spring sunshine.
9th April – We’re giving a thought today to all of you that are working from home in these difficult times.
It’ll soon be the Bank Holiday weekend and we can all put our feet up and have a few days relaxation. Stay safe.
10th April – It’s Good Friday. Stromness would normally be wall to wall tourists. This is Victoria Street this afternoon. It just needs some tumbleweed to complete the picture. It really is a shame as the weather is lovely. There’s just the occasional local out for some exercise.
Victoria Street Easter 2020
This young gull learning how to deal with a spiny sea urchin. Having seen urchin innards, I’m not sure if it’s worth the effort.
16th April – Here’s a little curiosity for you. An old Orkney rhyme. Kirsty Kringlit is a long-legged spider that children would hold in their hands whilst reciting the rhyme. If the spider left a droplet of water on the palm before being released, the child would have a good supper.
17th April – Over the past few weeks we’ve been beachcombing and collected bits and pieces of rubbish off the shore. I’ve put together an old plastic fish box and the metal frame from a crab pot and made this little cloche arrangement.
With the possibility of veg being in short supply we’re going to have a go at growing our own. I’ve got another two bigger trays so we should get some decent results.
19th April – A glorious day, we’ve had our walk, then pottered about in the garden. Followed by a bowl of H’s Chicken & Roast Butternut Squash soup, lovely. Ready to put the feet up now and enjoy the view across the bay to the parish of Orphir. What’s not to like!
21st April – The good weather is continuing. We’ve filled another couple of old fish boxes and made a propagator out of two stationery boxes. H has made a couple of polythene covers to protect the bigger boxes.
We’ve got beetroot, carrots, lettuce, chard and spinach in and onions, leeks and turnips to follow. Tom and Barbara have got nothing on us!
Spotted a pair of Red-throated Divers passing by the house this morning. Nice to see them in the harbour area. Picture is a bit fuzzy, camera phone not too good!
I just looked back at April last year and we had posted a picture of a pair on the 28th. Wonder if it’s the same pair?
27th April – Graemsay ploughing past Hoy Low lighthouse. The old gun battery control tower can be seen to the right.
30th April – All togged up to go shopping in Tesco. You can’t be too careful. Multi-filter face mask by H of Stromness, suppliers to the crowned heads of Europe. After Tesco I’m off to rob a bank.
10th March – The tenth already and this is our first post of the month. The weather at the start of the month was poor so we didn’t go out much. Thankfully the last few days have been more springlike.
Down at the Pierhead, our little local ferry has just returned from it’s annual service and is back in it’s rightful position, hogging the middle of the harbour.
Graemsay (centre)
The Graemsay covers the short route from Stromness to north Hoy via Graemsay. A pleasant little excursion if it’s a nice day.
15th March – It looks like it will be a quiet season in Orkney due to you know what. Cruise operator, CMV, have announced that they are suspending operations for six weeks. Their ship, Magellan, was en route to Kirkwall from Shetland on Friday but was diverted back to its home port.
As yet, we’re not sure how other tour operators are going to respond. Time will tell.
17th March – Covid-19 starting to impact Orkney now. The 2020 Folk Festival has now been cancelled and the St Magnus Festival is also under review.
These festivals bring thousands of visitors to the islands and their loss will seriously impact the tourism and hospitality sectors. As I write this Radio Orkney is listing all the social, craft and children’s groups that are suspended.
Historic Environment Scotland has closed all it’s manned sites, i.e. Skara Brae and Maeshowe. No decision has been made regarding Stromness Museum but a lack of visitors and/or closure will be disastrous for our finances.
I’m told that, in Germany, people are stockpiling sausages and cheese. It’s the Wurst Käse scenario!
Boom Boom!
20th March – The Board of Trustees met last night and it has been decided that Stromness Museum will close until further notice. A great shame as we were about to launch our summer exhibition, which the team had put in a lot of work to put together.
And we had only unveiled the new Buddo display case on Monday.
As everybody is now self-isolating and social distancing we decided to do our bit and socially distance ourselves out to Warebeth to do some bruck bagging. Spending an hour or so picking up plastic waste and getting it out of the environment. Very satisfying.
Not a bad spot to do some litter picking.
26th March – In lockdown now. Just the occasional visit to the Co-op for essentials like ice cream and crisps. Orcadians are on message with self isolation:
30th March – It’s official. Orkney now has a case of Covid-19. We don’t know where exactly but rumours are that it’s on Stronsay.
H and I have been pretty good in self isolating and only going out for basic grocery shopping at the local Co-op and a daily walk around the shore. There’s not many people about but they seem to be keeping their distance when passing.
Luckily the weather has become more springlike and it’s a pleasure to get out for a walk in a bit of warm sunshine.
1st February – It’s that time of year when the farmers need to cull the migrant greylag geese. Every winter thousands arrive and eat the shoots of the new crops. The farmers are allowed to shoot some to keep the numbers down.
The benefits are nice tasty burgers, the drawback is that the steel shot plays havoc with the dentures.
2nd February – A lovely day for a stroll down to the Pole Star pier where the fishing gear is stacked ready for the season. A bit of sunshine creating a colourful scene.
9th February – As Storm Ciara batters the rest of the country we have been spared the worst. A typical Orkney day here, a bit breezy but nice enough. Went for the usual shore walk and admired the resilience and determination of the local golfers to get a game in.
12th February – Wintry showers overnight have left a trace of snow on the high ground. Don’t think I’ll bother getting the skis out just yet.
13th February – What a difference a day makes. A very cold night has added a bit more snow on the Hoy hills.
1st January – Woke up this morning to a lovely sunrise in the east. Hope this heralds a lovely year to come!
2nd January – Err… no! Gale force winds today, ferries cancelled for two days, no newspapers! Completely cut off from the outside world!
13th January – There’s a bit of a breeze today, went for the usual walk around the Ness Point but the footpath is a bit damp underfoot.
Didn’t bother with the walk in the end, came home, battened down the hatches and put the kettle on.
14th January – Exceptionally high tide this morning. It is the first time we’ve seen it flowing over the seawall in front of the house. Luckily we are about 4 metres above the road. I think some of the older houses on the piers have been flooded.
Going down through the golf course, the 17th fairway is a lake. Spot the footbridge in the photo below.
17th Fairway Bridge
Looking back along the footpath from old lifeboat station, honestly, there is a footpath there! (see right hand pic yesterday) It is now completely impassable.
15th January – The best thing about the short, winter days is getting to see the sun come up at 9 am. January sunrises are not neccessarily better than June sunrises, it’s just that I’ve never been up early enough to see a June sunrise at 4 am!
Apologies for the repetitiveness of these pics but I never tire of this colourful display!
16th January – There was a nice article on the BBC News website this morning, on the Orkney Festival of the Horse. The festival celebrates farming traditions in South Ronaldsay, it was traditionally held in Spring but is now held in August for the tourists.
Children dress as horses with very elaborate outfits. Historically the costumes were worn by boys but more recently girls have taken part. The festival starts with a parade of the “horses” following which they proceed to a nearby beach for a Plooin’ (Ploughing) competition. Using miniature ploughs, the boys compete for the straightest furrow in the sand. The little ploughs have become family heirlooms and are passed down through the farming families.
Scapa Views 