The Road Goes Ever On

Monday, September 21, 2009

Highland Park

The Highland Park tour was wonderful. The visitor center does not compare in size or merchandise with the two Irish sites, Bushmills and Jamesons. On the other hand, they have millions of visitors, and they are the only two majors on the island. In Scotland, there are scores of distilleries, and on Orkney, little traffic, only one. That HP has a center, etc., is probably more a tribute to its greatness. The distillery was in full swing, the old 1798 furnace burning, barley on the malting floor, mash in the great wooden vats, distilling underway in the giant copper stills, whiskey barrels in the 22 warehouses aging (no pix...danger of sparks), and so on. It was glorious. A truly fulfillling experience for me, taken in measure. I did not buy the 18 year old ($100) nor the specially bottled and cased 58.7% slugger for $110. But I did get a bottle of 12 year old and a small bottle of the 18, both from the Spanish oak sherry casks (this is important). And a few trinkets.

"To say Highland Park is a cathedral in the religion of single malt whisky is an
understatement. Think Mecca. Think Vatican" (F. Paul Pacult, Wine Enthusiast
Magazine)

Visitor center

One of Scotland's oldest...this building dates from 1798, with changes in 1907 and 1962

The malting floor, in its 5th day...they still do it the old- fashioned way, by hand
(only 4 others do)

The "new" furnace, 1907

Mash

Orkney peat

The old furnace in action

Distilling

And the gift store, where the tasting was done

Kirkwall

We loved the Orkneys. Another day or two would have been grand, but this was sufficient even for a long-time desire.

The 14th started out with another huge Scottish breakfast;
I was hungry enough by dinner-time to have a small sandwich

The B&B proprietess was into duck and gnome yard ornaments, big-time

The morning's catch of coquilles St. Jacques (sea scallops)

Right across the street, harbor-side, from the Kirkwall Hotel, where we had
dinner; I figured the scallops would be fresh

Kirkwall Cathedral, 1137

Kirkwall Castle; needs fixing-up

Kirkwall is the Orkneys' capital, as it were, and largest city (7,000); the place
has personality and charm; the Ba' Game is played on Christmas Day and New
Year's Day, pitting the city's male up-towners (oopies) versus down-towners

(doonies) in a city-wide sort-of rugby match; the city-limits are the boundaries;
there are no rules, to speak of; the doonies have to put the ball into the harbor;
the oopies have to move it past a certain street; games often go on for hours;
the womens' version was banned several years back...too violent

Ring of Brodgar, Stones of Stenness, Maeshowe

Below, a few more of the Orkneys' major complex of neolithic stuff. There is far more spread all around the islands.

Vicki at the Ring of Brodgar; it's the 3rd
largest stone circle, 140m in diameter;
about 40 of the original 60-some stones
still standing

It's really too big to get in one photo

Several of the stones are split; several have

been downed by lightning, as recently as

1980

Me by one of the bigger stones

Half a mile away, the Stones of Stenness, another major site

And a big stone foresight right in somebody's yard

Another mile or so away is Maeshowe, usually billed as

Europe's finest passage monument...but we thought it was

not in the same league with Gavrinis, Newgrange, Knowth;

or maybe I am still bitter about not being able to take

interior pix; Norse-types broke into the "tomb" in the

12th century or so, partied for 3 days (so it says in the

Orkneysaga), and left all kinds of "interesting" runic

graffiti ("Jarvold carved these runes," "Erik bedded Helga,"

"Sonhenes carves the best runes," etc.

Skara Brae

In the 1850s, a huge North Atlantic storm blew away several feet of beach and
upland on the west coast of Orkney's main island and revealed the best instance
there is of a preserved neolithic village, now reckoned to be some 6,000 years
old. It has been excavated, analyzed, written about, and exhibited. There is a
fine museum/visitor center and a "replica" of the most famous room to enter
and touch things, ground level. If you're into prehistory, it's one of those things
you have always read about.... Above, an overview; the roofs (presumably
thatched) are gone now but reveal floorplans, hearth, stone furniture,
implements, etc.

Classic living area, note stone beds, stone storage/display area

Somewhat different floor plan

All the rooms connected to the larger work/commons area

Grain grinding apparatus; Skara Brae was inhabited for about 600 years, then
abandoned

Around "Mainland" Orkney

Stromness, the Orkneys' second largest city...doesn't sound Scottish does it?

Sea cliffs on the west side of the "Big Island"

Hoy is the large island south/southwest of the "mainland," and on its west coast is
a famous sea stack, The Old Manof Hoy, something I've always wanted to see...
here it is,perhaps 15 miles away; there are something like sixty islands in the
Orkneys, but fewer than half are inhabited

Surfing at Skara Brae

Italian Chapel

Italian prisoners of war (from the first Battle of Tobruk, in North Africa, 1941) constituted the labor for building the Churchill Barriers; among other things they built was the Italian Chapel, two quonset huts joined together, now a tourist destination. It really is a trompe l'oiel masterpiece, given the circumstances. There were Italian POWs at Fort Missoula during WWII, similarly talented, who made contributions there as well, and about whom there are books and even a documentary film. Italy came over to the Allied side in 1943, and after that, these men were no longer POWs; the Brits kept them in Orkney, nonetheless, but paid them for their work. After the war, several took their Orcadian wives and children back to Italy. Of the Orkneys, however, none apparently said, as they did of Missoula, "Ah, POW camp in Missoula, the best three years of my life!"

Italian Chapel

Altar

Stations of the Cross

Ribbed vaulting

Behind the false front

St. George...concrete over barbed-wire

War-time Orkney

We awoke the 13th to milder wind and mist, drove in to John O'Groats, looked at the forecast, and decided to go for it. The boat ride—45 minutes—was fine, with increasingly better weather as we got to the islands, and then better entirely as the day progressed. We debarked at the southernmost island and port, whose names escape me, then boarded the turbuss and proceeded on, first through the ChurchillBarriers, then to the Italian Chapel, then to St. Margaret's, then to Kirkwall, then to Stromness for lunch, a dreary wet gray place, then to a western cliff overlook from we could the Old Man of Hoy, then to Skara Brae, then to Ring of Brogdar, then back Kirkwall. At Kirkwall we debarked and, having carefully checked arrangments with the driver, walked to the B&B, the Lerona, on Cromwell Crescent. The place was fine, the hostess hilariously Scottish, the yard decorated with ceramic gnomes and ducks and the rest. We had a very decent dinner at the Kirkwall Hotel, roast beast for Vicki, scallops—very fresh—for me, plus the mixed seafood appetizer.

Yes, we were on a turbuss

After the incident with the U-boat, the Royal Navy erected huge concrete
barriers connecting four of the islands and blocking eastern access to Scapa
Flow, their war-time fleet anchorage; they are now called the "Churchill
Barriers"; most interestingly, they cause the tides to hit the eastern side of
the islands two hours later than Scapa Flow, with a differential as high as
four meters, which we witnessed

The buoy marks the Royal Oak site, now a national cemetery--800 men died

A bit further down the Flow is where the German High Seas Fleet scuttled itself,
74 ships, during armistice negotiations in 1919; they were probably getting tired of
haggis, neeps and taddies; it is now a scuba-diving paradise; bring wet suits

Duncansby Head

We drove on the few miles through Wick, then on to John O' Groats, the traditional Land's End of Scotland (but not really; that's Dunnet Head, a few miles west; and north), which is basically the ferry landing plus a few wind-blown tourist shops, hotel and B&B, tourist office, campground, and car park. We made inquiries at the ferry office and resolved to stretch their “maxi-day” tour of the Orkneys into two, so we could see Maeshowe, the Highland Park distillery, and a few other things. We'll stay overnight at a B&B in Kirkwall. And the Grey Wanderer will stay here in John O' Groats while we are in the Orkneys. After lunch, we drove out to the lighthouse at Duncansby Head, and pretty much stayed in the Grey Wanderer the rest of the day, weathering a hurricane on the cliff overlooking Pentland Firth and its tremendous storms and tidal flows. It's where the Atlantic meets the North Sea. But all you can see today is gray—the sea a slightly darker gray than the sky. Nothing of the skerries and islands just a few miles away and just a bit of the famous sea stacks further down the head. We'll spend the night at a lay-by on the sea just west of John O' Groats, Gill's Bay.

Why the Orkneys, you ask? Well, one reason is the megalitihic stuff. Along with Wiltshire, the River Boyne, and the Gulf of Morbihan, the Orkneys are one of the four or five great neolithic complexes of Europe. We've seen most all of the others, but not this one. We've been reading about it for thirty years. Second, for me, the Orkneys are an historic WWII site, Scapa Flow the great British fleet anchorage into which Gunther Prien's U-47 sailed, on the surface, in October, 1939, and sank the battleship Royal Oak. After the armistice, in 1918, it is also the place where the German High Seas Fleet scuttled itself, 74 capital ships to the bottom, in 1919. And, lastly, but most vitally, the Orkneys are home to that greatest of all spirits, my long-time favorite, Highland Park single malt whisky.

And, finally, you ask, who was John O' Groats? A martyred saint from the Western Isles? A fierce Viking raider or explorer? Another traitorous Jacobite sympathizer? What is a groat, anyway?

Answer: none of the above. James IV commissioned Jan de Groot and his brothers to operate a ferry service to the Orkney Islands from here in 1496. Scotland had acquired the Orkneys from Norway via royal marriage in 1468. Bonnie Jan O' Groots!