Fri, May 5
Miracle of miracles, it’s another beautiful warm, calm day. In the morning I work on my netzpatent hat while some of the others go for a walk out along the Ness Road.
Later in the morning Jill and I meet up with Lynn and Jen and we do a really complete check of all the Stromness shops starting with the consignment shop owned by the Cat Protection Society of Stromness
This fella owns this corner and poses for us
where we buy a roller suitcase for all the purchases we’ve been making. At the Quernstone both Jen and I find sweaters we love and, egging each other on, she buys two, I one. And again we check out, more completely this time, its sister gift and housewares store across the street. We also visit one of our favorite stores from the last trip, Cream, which has an excellent selection of local crafts and art.
I’m almost embarrassed to mention it but yes, again we go back to No. 18 for BLTs, which continue to provide us with the perfect lunch. It’s the wonderful Orkney bacon, the vine-ripened tomatoes (perhaps from Spain) and lettuce on really good local toasted bread. We are not tempted to try anything else!
Michael, whose cold has grown worse, elects to stay home and perhaps work on a sketch or two. We all head out to Kirkwall to continue this day of shopping. We walk the entire length of the main shopping district–as in Stromness the street changes name every block going from Victoria to Broad to Albert and ending as Bridge Street down by the harbor.
There’s jewelry at Ortak, yarns and fleece as well as art materials at For Arts Sake where Lynn and I buy North Ronaldsay fleece (from the seaweed-eating sheep) to spin. Ola Gorie’s striking jewelry (yes, I buy earrings), pottery, clothes and a secondhand shop in a cluster at The Longship. Jill really scores with two beautiful pendants--one an Ola Gorie piece–at the secondhand shop next door to Judith Glue’s to which we repair to have cappuccino and cake. We ponder the runic rings and bracelets at Aurora and more jewelry at Sheila Fleet’s.
Along Albert Street
Judith Glue’s shop and cafe
Looking down Albert Street
Chimney pots everywhere
We spend time in St Magnus Cathedral. It’s a beautiful late Romanesque church, the oldest parts having been built in the late 12th century by medieval craftsmen trained during the building of Durham Cathedral in England. The story of Earl Magnus’s martyrdom at the hands of his violent and treacherous cousin Earl Haakon is recorded in all its bloody detail in The Orkneyinga Saga, a must-read if Norse tales and Icelandic sagas are among your favorites. It was Magnus’s nephew who had the church erected as a final resting place for his uncle’s remains. https://www.orkneyjar.com/history/stmagnus/magcath.htm
Façade of St Magnus and site of my blasphemous fall three years ago
Toward the rose window
Four of the banners currently hanging along both sides of the nave and depicting the St Magnus story
We pay a visit to the Orkney Museum in the Tankerness House. The museum seems larger, more inclusive of the islands’ history right up into the 20th century and better organized than in 2014
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And we learn that the gardens behind the house are a popular location for weddings and in fact we do see a wedding party nearby.
After buying food (good god, how much DO we eat!!) at Tesco we drive to Finston and the Peedie (small in the local vernacular) Chippie van by the Wide Firth and buy huge plates of fish and chips.
The Peedie Chippie for dinner–very popular!
Our Stromness harbor
in the gloaming
Michael gets to eat leftovers; he doesn’t do fish or seafood, period. Afterwards there’s more Spite and Malice.