Kirkwall; Sunday, 06 August, 2006

With a full breakfast inside me I headed out into a bright Orcadian morning (which was surprising as 30 minutes earlier it had been bucketing it down!) and wandered the short distance through the town centre to the Cathedral. I wasn't visiting the cathedral today, instead it was the place from where I was to be picked up for the Wildabout Orkney tour of Stone age and Iron age settlements.

The full-day tour was very interesting and well presented. First stop of the morning was the Unstan chambered cairn. From there it was a short drive to Maeshowe, possibly the most impressive burial mound in Northern Europe. The tomb is at the centre of a massive network of stone age sacred sites with two stone circles lying in a processional route towards it. Inside are carved runes from both the time of creation and later when the Vikings used it. The site itself dates back to approximately 3100BC making it older than the pharaohs pyramids in Egypt.

From there it was on to the Standing stones of Stenness. Originally a 12 stone circle there are now just 5 remaining, but the whole place has an air of mystique around it and I couldn't help feeling totally relaxed and de-stressed whilst in the centre of the circle. It was a short drive from there to the standing stones hotel where we had a spot of lunch before driving back past Stenness to the ring of Brodgar.

This is an even more impressive stone circle. Today 27 stones remain, but when it was built it would have had about 60 stones. From there we travelled onto Skara Brae on the coast.

Like Jarlsholf (see Shetland Islands) this Neolithic village laid under sand and earth for centuries before being revealed following a massive storm ripped off the covering land. Unlike Jarlshof, Skara Brae appears to have been abandoned about 2500BC and is consequently perfectly preserved. You can get a feeling of how the people of the time lived, in an almost subterranean life.

The land that Skara Brae now stands on is part of the Skaill estate, and the old house can also be visited.

Final stop of the tour was the Broch of Gurness on the North coast of the main island (Skara Brae being on the South). By the time Gurness was in use it was 300BC and times had moved on. No longer the small farming community leading their life with not much more than nature to fear. Gurness is a fortress with the villagers living around the central Broch that would defend the village when it was attacked from the sea. It is very clear to see that in the nearly 3000 years that separate them the standard of living for the inhabitants of Orkney had gone decidedly down hill.

At the end of a long, exhausting, but thoroughly enjoyable day I was dropped back at the cathedral in Kirkwall and walked back to the hotel to drop by bag off, before heading back out for dinner.