Ride all the OS mapsToday was my first truly “non-map” day, but it was a day to remember nonetheless. The morning got off to a beautiful sunny start. Our first stop, 15 mins to the west by van, was the stunning Farr Bay. On my end-to-end in June 2008 we stayed at the inn here and walked alone on […]
The car ferry to the Scottish mainland leaves at 11.30am about half a mile from where we stayed in St Margaret’s Hope, so it was a relatively easy start to the day. I had scrambled eggs with salmon for breakfast and I think they gave me almost the whole fish! The smooth crossing took an […]
We didn’t really want to leave our lovely home for the last 2 nights; and our excellent airbnb hosts Hilary and Edward at their charming farm “Heima” (which we highly recommend); but after breakfast on a beautiful day it was time to head south towards the final map of the Northern Isles section of my […]
I learned quite a few things today and one of them is that the old name for Orkney Mainland is Pomona. You don’t see it on an OS Landranger map; but you do see it on older hand-drawn ones. It is also the name of a pub and a cafe in Kirkwall. Pomona was the […]
Westray seems to find ways of keeping hold of you. Jo, a 20 year resident of Orkney (but originally from Hampshire), and her Orcadian husband, were setting up a pop-up craft shop in the front room of the small hotel and told us about their previous trip out to Westray, when the weather was so […]
We took the ferry 90 minutes north out of Kirkwall to OS map 5 Orkney Northern Isles and the island of Westray, home to 600 people and many sheep and cows. On the way we met Colin, one if its residents, a quietly spoken retired businessman from Aberdeenshire who built his own home next to […]
After yesterday’s exertions, Jenni was pleasantly surprised to discover that her legs were still working this morning. The weather forecast was for very high winds of twice yesterday’s strength and a strong probability of rain. Not very enticing and possibly rather dangerous for cycling in; even though the actual weather, when it arrived, turned out […]
Day 2 dawned with the sun making a welcome reappearance; but a stubborn 25 mph headwind was still blowing from the south west. We made an early start, allowing almost an hour to catch the 8.40am ferry from Unst to Yell, and in normal conditions should have covered the 6 undulating miles comfortably enough. In […]
And so it begins! Early start today fuelled by our local Unst host Willie McLeod’s excellent cooked breakfast. We rode our bikes on a dry but windy morning out to Britain’s most north-westerly road head at Hermaness, where a boardwalk path leads over the hillside to emerge dramatically on the edge of sheer cliffs above […]
Well, it has begun. Or at least I have left home and travelled towards the far North! Three trains took us and our bikes to Aberdeen, via an overnight stop in Edinburgh, and now we are on the overnight ferry to Lerwick in Shetland. It suddenly feels more like a proper adventure. So far the […]