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Day 109 - Orkney

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Helen dropped us off at the Ness of Brodgar - a live archaeological dig of a large site that was discovered only a few years ago. Because of the risk of weather erosion to the dig and the availability of student archaeologists to help with the back-breaking excavation, the site is only open for 7 weeks before it gets covered again until next Summer. There are valuable finds being made almost every day. You could sense the enthusiasm and excitement in the air at the gradual and careful unearthing of crucial finds. We walked via the Stones of Steness  to catch the bus to Kirkwall. The ferry port has connections to some of the other Northern Orcadian islands - Eday, Westray and Sanday from which there are further ferries to others. St.Magnus' cathedral dates from the 1100s.  In the evening we visited the Ring of Brodgar - 5000 years old. The stones on Orkney provoke all sorts
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Day 108 - Stromness

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A restful day in Stromness. ....making friends with Luna - Helen and Mike's Golden Retriever. The weather was perfect. The harbour is lively and interesting. The Pier Arts Centre is wonderful - the way it sits-in with the rest of the buildings on the harbour and the intimacy of the spaces inside. We saw an exhibition of drawings and paintings by Wilhelmina Barns-Brown who spent time  on Orkney. At the other end of town, the museum has rooms devoted to an exhibition of stuffed birds, images of the 74 German warships scuttled in Scapa Flow at the end of WW1,  the adventures of the Hudson Bay company and the explorations of John Rae, an Orcadian explorer from Stromness who lived amongst the Inuit in Northern Canada. Then back to Helen and Mike's for a lovely evening. There's only so much loving
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Day 107 - John o'Groats to Stromness

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After breakfast at the Seaview Hotel, we caught the early bus to Thurso. It was pouring with rain and blustery. The bus got busier with damp passengers who'd all been waiting in the rain which all contributed to the strong smell of damp wool. Thurso has a charm about it and compared with Wick, the high street seems to have a lot more vitality. The planting boxes along the high street are used as community gardens to grow vegetables. Those ready for picking are marked with a flag. Caithness is very proud of its flag which you see everywhere. The geology provides large slabs of rectangular stone ideal for large stone paving slabs. and stone slab walls. We walked the mile or so along Thurso Bay  to the harbour at Scrabster and met Joan at the RNLI shop. Joan has been on the local RNLI committee for 20 years and has run the shop for more than 10 years. It's only small in area but with the queue
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Day 106 - Keiss to John o'Groats - 14.5 miles

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The last 14 miles. The last day of the walk. The weather forecast wasn't the most promising. While the rest of the country was still experiencing 'Summer' weather, it looked as though the North of Scotland was going to be wet. Whatever the weather forecast, we set off. Keiss Harbour - you'd need a nifty hand-brake turn to get in to the inner harbour. The trail rises slowly towards the precariously perched Keiss Castle There were seals, cormorants  and the calls of oystercatchers all the way along. The strata are visible as large flat slabs sloping into the sea   which in places look as though they've been shattered into massive cubes of stone. They look like ready-made building blocks. In places, these blocks have been left stacked high into eroded columns of stone and the cliffs look almost like science fiction tower blocks At Nybster Broch  we stopped f
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