Day 8: Out and about in Kirkwall!

After arriving in Orkney in the dead of night, and setting up camp, I went out to explore its capital – Kirkwall, which means church wall. My plan was to explore the environs and then bike clear across the island to its second greatest city, Stromness, where I could get a ferry to the mainland.

In Kirkwall is a great sandstone cathedral, St. Magnus’s Cathedral. Saint Magnus is the patron saint of Orkney, and his name does tend to come up around the island.

Near to the church were more ruins – this time, of a bishop’s palace and of one of those dang Stewart’s palaces. They were both from around 1700.

There was the interesting Orkney Museum. The most fascinating part was a section on a sport called the Ba’. The whole town shows up, divided into two halves according to where people live. A ball is produced. Each side of town tries to get the ball over to the other end, in a no-holds barred free for all. This sport is still practiced twice a year, on Christmas and on New Year. It sounds like total madness.

I then biked a bit south of the city to see Scapa Distillery. It was a real highlight. The Scapa whiskys one can buy in America (or most anywhere, really) are nothing I’d care much about. But guess what – Scapa, along with many other distilleries, have special small batch distillations which you can only get there!

I came for a tasting and that’s what I got. The whiskys were full-bodied, full of flavor from their bourbon or sherry barrels, cask strength and brimming with flavor. They were unpeated (though one had been aged in a barrel which previously held peated whisky), unusual for island whiskys. I think this was probably my favorite distillery of the whole tour. Unfortunately, it would have been too difficult for me to bike around for the next 2 weeks with some extra bottles strapped to my bike, so I may never taste these particular, and great, whiskys again!

I also got some good advice on sights to see in Orkney, including an old style grain mill and a couple breweries.

Dinner was a fish and chips, and not for the last time. These serve much more than fish and chips. They serve every tasty treat and most non-tasty treats in Scotland, and all deep fried.

The evening found me in the Orkney Distillery, a gin distillery. It was fine.

Day 9: Orkney is mine

After staying another night in Kirkwall, I biked on to the other Orkney whisky distillery, Highland Park. This is a much larger and well-known distillery. Its whiskys are most definitely peated. The tasting was good – only good. Scapa was a far superior experience. I did admire the confidence at HP, though – time and again their promotional materials proclaimed that they made the greatest whisky in the world. (Guess they have to fight it out with all the other distilleries who make this claim.)

And then I started to bike across the isle, seeing ruins and sights along the way. Orkney was quite wonderfully flat, unlike hilly Shetland. It did still have very intense wind, sometimes behind me, sometimes raping my face and sometimes pushing me sideways into ditches and traffic.

First stop: A mysterious neolithic hole in the ground, possibly used as a burial chamber. I biked to the trail, had to climb a fence with a movable staircase and then walk on hands and knees to enter this pitch black, all but abandoned hollow.

Next I toured a series of ruins and standing stones all across the main island of Orkney. Some of these standing stones predate Stonehenge (in boring old England) by 500 years.

By the time I saw all this it was around 3:30. I had biked a lot. But I still wanted to see the Barony Mill. Google said it closed at 5, and it was 20 miles away. I booked it hardcore to get there at 4:30. And it was well worth it.

Barony Mill is a water-powered mill which makes flour from bere barley, an ancient strain of barley unchanged for thousands of years, which exists only in Orkney, plus a bit in some other Scottish isles.

And then I biked to a campsite to spend the night. Wind punished the tent brutally all night long. I was glad I had bought a tough one.

Day 10: Western Orkney

I had a few more things to see on the West Coast of Orkney – the Earl’s Palace, Orkney Brewery and Skara Brae.

The Earl’s Palace, ruins of a palace built by those dastardly Stewart’s, was a small ruin near my campsite.

Then stopped to see a little church nearby.

And back on the road.

Pit stop at Orkney Brewery, a little micro brew and restaurant.

Next it was time for one of the stars of the Orkney show, Skara Brae. This very well excavated site had ruins from neolithic times. I found it fascinating to think of how people lived thousands of years ago.

Near Skara Brae, and included in the ticket, was the Skaill House. It had been passed down or sold to one lord or another; the current lord opens it to tourism as a means to maintain the house.