We were all up early and both big and little people were excited. Well Me and Maddy were at least.
We got down to Burray pier, were helped aboard the boat by John and Magnus and off down Water sound into Scapa flow at very high speed.
I was looking at Maddy to see if she was getting upset at the bouncing around going over and through the waves.I need not have bothered, she was grinning all over her face and was really enjoying the trip.Magnus takes people out on trips regularly and so knows where to go to keep people interested. He showed us some of the wrecks on the sonar or fish finder or whatever it was.Whatever it was, it is a brilliant tool. You can see the outline of anything on the seabed and at one point a sunken submarine appeared on the screen outlined so well that even I could recognise it.
We then went off to one of the scallop beds that they dive and John dived down to gather scallops, taking an extra bag down with him in case he found anything interesting for Maddy. (He was brilliant with maddy throughout the trip and she loved all the attention.)
We left John to swim round on the bottom of The Flow gathering scallops and went off for a tour round the world war one and two defences around Flotta for 40 minutes before we came back to pick him up.
He had fetched up 3 starfish. One was a spiny starfish, one a sun starfish and I can not remember what type the other was. There was also a sea urchin and some purple stones
Maddy was fascinated by them all and it must be good for kids to see things being fetched up from the sea so that they know where things are from.
We then went off towards Lyness, passing loads of grey and common seals. At Lyness John and Magnus dropped us off to have lunch at the museum while they went off and dived for some more scallops. They left us a radio so that we could call them back when we were ready.It felt quite decadent being able to call a boat to come and collect you when you were ready to leave.
(They told us when they got back later that they had seen 8 porpoises right by the boat as they left Lyness. We always seem to just be in the wrong place for seeing whales and dolphins.)
It is the first time that I have been to Lyness. It was the main navy base in the two world wars and it has a large museum mainly about the naval bases. This is great for kids as most of the exhibits are very big and very durable so there is no problem about childrn climbing all over them.
We had lunch in the cafe there and wandered round the museum. They had a "dressing up box" which Maddy loved and she was impressed by the big guns and torpedoes.
They even had some railway engines from the naval railway, one of the very few bits of railway that Orkney has seen.
We then radiod up for the boat which came to pick us up loaded with even more scallops, a big lobster and some more starfish.
After that it was off back to Burray. As we got back out into the Flow, we saw The Pentalina coming in from Gills bay.Magnus put his foot down (or whatever the equivalent is in a boat) and we shot off over The Flow towards it as fast as he could go.
I wondered at first if he was just trying to get into Water Sound before The Pentalina for some reason but I soon realised that he was just out for a bit of fun.
There is a big set of bow waves that comes off The Pentalina and with a look back to make sure that we were all safe and happy Magnus took the boat striaght into them. The boat was leaving the water altogether as we crossed some of the waves and the passengers on the ferry were laughing and waving. Maddy though it was great and was waving back while still making sure she held on tight with the other hand.
Altogether it had been a brilliant trip and I need not have worried about Maddy. She had been thoroughly spoilt by John and had enjoyed the exciting bits. (I think that she inherits some of her fathers adrenaline junky traits.)
After getting back we went to The Hope for some groceries and just to round off the day nicely, as we drove back Pam saw an otter on the edge of Water Sound. Of course we were in the one place where I could not stop suddenly and safely so I did not have chance to stop and see it.
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