Highlands and Islands: Orkney

The last post in the series is about the previous day, when we drove from Ullapool to Thurso. This post is about Day 6, when we took a day trip to Orkney.

In the morning, we drove to John O’Groats, where the ferry goes to Orkney.

I think it took an hour or two to get to the island. When we arrived, we got on a bus that took us to Kirkwall, which was my favorite town on the island. The main area is so cute. We went inside the main church, St. Magnus Cathedral. It was founded by Vikings and was built in 1137, which makes it one of the older churches (and buildings) I’ve been to!

Lots of creepy skulls!

We got to walk around Kirkwall and the High Street a bit.

Then we headed to the western part of the island, where Skara Brae is. Skara Brae is a prehistoric village dating to around 3000 BCE! I never realized it’s basically right next to the beach.

They’ve set up some of the old houses to give you an idea of how they were used.

Skara Brae is on the land of Skaill House, which was owned by the people who discovered the site, I think when the earth on top of it was washed away in a storm.

As part of the entry fee, you get to see the house, which is just a really nice example of an old manor house.

Next we headed to the Ring of Brodgar, which is one of the most famous standing stone circles (other than Stonehenge). I remember the guide describing some of the mysteries about the circle. First, they don’t really know how it was physically made. Second, I think the stones come from all different parts of the island. Some of the stones were hauled for miles and miles to this site. They also don’t know why – it seems to correspond to the directions the stones are facing in the circle, perhaps it represents the different groups of people/parcels of land on the island at the time? Also, some people think it was the same civilization that made Stonehenge, except Stonehenge was done much later – like 1000 years later.

Also, you can see it better in these photos – the stone circle is on this elevated and almost completely level platform of dirt. Another mystery!

Then we went just down the road to the Standing Stones of Stenness. These I think are older than the Ring of Brodgar, but the ones that remain don’t form a circle. They might be the same size, but you can get so much closer

After the long day on the road hopping from one pre-historic site to another, we started to make our way back to the mainland. We took the ferry back and then drove back to our Airbnb. This was sadly the end of our time on the north coast of Scotland. The next post will be about our journey back down south!