The U3A here have an ambling group that I have been promising to join for the last few months but have always had something else to do on the days when they were going out. Today hover was a beautiful day and as John and Alex also fancied a wander round we decided to go.
There is an Orkney Ramblers group but they do walks of 20 miles or more and I thought that this may be a bit ambitious for my poor aged body so the amblers seemed a good idea as they only do a few miles.
Today they had a walk round Deerness but unfortunately it wa a bit of a disappointment. We met up at Newark bay, walked for about half a mile round the coast and then walked back. Hardly enough to blow away the cobwebs.
It was easily fixed though. After the others had gone, we had a stroll the other way. Nice and leisurely including a long period of lying on the grass at the new Deerness jetty.
After leaving Deerness we went up to Hoxa Head on South Ronaldsay. We had our butties in the shade of the scenic concrete second world war gun emplacements where lookouts kept watch for anything trying to enter Scapa Flow. We just watched for whales while we had our butties but once again No Whales.
In the evening we were booked on one of the tall ships, The Wylde Swan, for a cruise round the flow that had been organised by the Okney Folk Festival. This time it was nice and calm with a lovely flat sea and I felt that I cold take full advantage of the bar while listening to the music. It was a real good cruise and I am sure that John and Alex enjoyed it aswell.
On our return to Stromness the harbour looked magnificent with several of the tall ships moored there with all their masts and rigging standing out against the sky.
On our way back home after the cruise we were going to take a stroll round the ring of brodgar. It was about 11PM and going dusky. Brodgar always looks better in the dawn or dusk or when the sky is sullen and overcast. In the sunshine the Ring of Brodgar just looks like a load of stones stuck in the ground. With the right light though, it is very atmospheric and impressive.
On this occassion though we decided not to go out even if it looked good. On the road to the ring we ran into clouds of midges thicker than I have ever seen. Great clumps of them were smacking into the windscreen. We therefore decided that it may not have been a good idea to get out of the car so we will have to come back again sometime.
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