Ring of Brodgar

The third of the four Orkney Neolithic World Heritage sites, having already visited Skara Brae and Maeshowe.

A haar made the day rather cool with must hanging around wherever we went. It made Brodgar quite moody. As part of the Nature Festival guided tours were available. Well worth it as the knowledgeable guides brought the site to life in a way that simply walking around could not.

As with archeology nowadays there are more questions than answers and so many unknowns which make these places so fascinating. Nobody knows why these places were constructed, all this is known is that they were incredibly sophisticated communities able to work together and be wealthy enough to devote the manpower to their construction.

Nearby is the Ness of Brodgar which was only discovered in 2003 and is proving to add a whole new dimension to the Neolithic story of these islands. The Ness is only open for visitors for the six weeks of the digging season and it seems this year will be the last and the site put under wraps for the duration. Neil Oliver presented a series of 3 programmes on Orkney shown on BBC Scotland in March. We’ve just watched the first. Marvellous TV.

A scone and coffee were called for after all this Neolithic overload which we found at the Barrier View Cafe overlooking one of the Churchill Barriers.

We were on our way to see the Hoxa Tapestries, one of the 25 or so places that form the Orkney Creative Trail. Leila and Jo Thompson created some exceptional work which was well worth the journey to see.

On the way back we stopped off at the Sands ‘O Wight beach and were entranced by the whiteness of the sand and the assemblages of various tiny colourful seashells which we collected.

Another very fine day.