Abandoned

The wonderful weather we have had for the last 3 days couldn't last so today we have had grey skies and a marked drop in temperature here in Westray.

It seemed the ideal day to visit the Westray Heritage Centre and continue my family history research using their records so I have studied the census records of one the commonest Orkney names for 1841, 1851, 1861, 1871, 1881 and 1891 fortunately in alphabetical order.

We discovered that in all these years some family members had been in a tiny 3 acre holding the head of the family being described as a " farmer". I can only imagine they must have lived a fairly frugal life probably supplementing their existence with fishing.

Nick discovered the place on his OS map so when the centre closed we set off to look for it and as it looked fairly deserted I decided to drive up the farm track - near the top we met huge craters in the road that would have needed a tractor to cross so I walked the last bit.

I have seen some derelict farm steadings in my time but rarely one as bad as this one - machinery from a very long time ago lay decomposing around the collapsing buildings and in a shed ( see extras) . I left feeling quite sad for what my wife calls " the dead Rendalls. " - easily seen it is not her side of the family!