Sunday in the Orkneys

This morning we drove out to see the Italian Chapel -- a quonset hut decorated by Italian POWs interned here during World War II. It is very pretty -- painted inside to resemble stone and brick work.

Then we went to mass at Our Lady and St. Joseph's in Kirkwall. This was the only weekend mass held in the entire group of Orkney Islands. There were about 30 of us at mass, and the priest was 90 years old and used a walker (zimmer frame!) to come up the aisle. Mentally very spry and an excellent preacher, though. But he is tired, so we are praying especially hard for vocations to the priesthood in the diocese of Aberdeen (of which the Orkneys is part). STill too much kneeling for my taste, but we survived. We had coffee afterwards and chatted with the parishioners and Fr. Walls.

We decided to see some Scottish History sites in the afternoon, starting at the top of Mainland (the largest Orkney island) and working our way down. Birsay has the remains of an 11th century village, only reachable at low tide by causeway (and hopping over big rocks). Looked like about an hour on the map - took us 15 minutes -- seriously, it is very disconcerting doing any navigation around here!

Anyway, we passed a church that bore a sign saying "est. 1068" and stopped at a tea house for "tatties" -- a warm baked potato smothered in butter with cold ham and cheese on top and an heirloom tomato salad. YUM! Fortified, we discovered that the tide was low and so we hiked over the causeway and up to the site of the village -- it was a church, a monastery and a few houses, including a forge and a sauna. I can't really describe how moved Brian and I were -- it was really breathtaking. The sea, the blue sky, the cold high winds (not a bad air temp, the wind is dangerous), the bright green grass and the stone outlines of these buildings. Tide pools and sea shells. Excellent stuff.

Then we drove south to Skara Brae, the 3500 BC settlement. This too was impressive -- the houses remain with their stone furniture-- dressers, beds, pens for fish or bait. Major archaeological jewel. It is on Skaill bay and was first discovered by the local laird, a fellow who lived in Skaill house. He was a local big wig ("Elizabeth R" signed in his guest book) and his house is part of the Skara Brae site and the tour is billed as the most beautiful house in Scotland. People hold their weddings there. It's a huge house. We got to see 6 rooms in one wing. Including a pink bathroom -- it was mostly kind of pokey and sad -- not as grand as my own house, in some rooms. Very odd. I will have to read the guide book (I always buy the guide book) and see if I missed some important something or others.

After this we drove south and east until the Brodgar stone circle. That was fun. A couple of miles down the road was the Stenness Stone Circle and henge (it's a henge if there is a ditch and wall surrounding the circle, I think). It is much smaller and was surrounded by sheep (and sheep shit, of course). For all these sites, you see the water - the North Sea, the Atlantic, the many lochs, and bright green grass. The heather is mostly dark and finished for the season, but the odd sprig of bright purple remained -- letting us identify it!

Then home and dinner and rest.

This really is a cool place. It's clean, people are helpful adn polite and friendly, tourism is bringing even more prosperity to an already prosperous place. There are no old cars anywhere.

More photos for Brian to post -- maybe tomorrow.