Backblip: almost home but the holiday is not over

The Hamnavoe spat us out into the dark of a Stromness night. Instead of heading for Brodgar as he normally would, Mr L steered us to Warbeth. 

It had occurred to us what a pain it is to kick our heels all day in Kirkwall, doing nothing more exciting than the Tesco shopping, when we might be still holidaying. As we never usually have time to visit Stromness we had decided to stop over night close by and then spend our day in town. Warbeth had been beckoning for some time and I was delighted to finally be there. The views of Hoy are splendid and we were able to see the Hamnavoe sailing past on another run back from Scrabster. We walked on the beach and then too the path around the cemetery grounds before leaving to return to town.

The Pier Arts Centre was open but, having just missed the Damien Hirst exhibition, the ground floor was closed for changing exhibitions. We spent some time in there and discovered Mr L to be a bit of a Sylvia Wishart fan. I enjoyed some of Edmund de Waal's exhibits, and the Barbara Hepworths, obviously.

We passed on the museum, at a fiver a throw, but spent our remaining holiday money wisely in the delicatessen instead. Having missed our fish supper the previous evening we decided that we should taste test the Stromness offering and, by golly, it was the best piece of fried fish that I have had in a long time. The chips were golden and crispy and piping hot. The whole was unfortunately let down by some kind of taint to the frying oil that made the batter taste odd - and also the fact that they use the dreaded Non-brewed Condiment. Why, why, oh WHY would anyone choose to put Acetic Acid on their chips when they could have proper tasty Malt Vinegar instead?! It really does detract from the quality and flavour of the supper. Madness, I tell you - Madness.


Of course the best thing to put on one's chips is pickled onion vinegar ...


We failed in a mission to get a new key cut for Brunhilde so we left for Kirkwall to try our luck there. With time on our hands we stopped en route at Finstown to make a cup of coffee and sat in the sunshine there for half an hour.

Overall, we saw far more sunshine and much less rain on this holiday than we had any reasonable right to expect. Lucky again.

We still have two Brunhilde ferry tickets in our book - they need using before the middle of November so plans are already afoot for the next trip and eyes are being kept on the forecast. We are thinking perhaps The Boring Bits Tour, and trotting down the East Coast. The Great Sticky-Outy Bits Tour is on for next year, when we will explore the NW coast in detail and I have been promised a return to Inverewe in May, for the rhododendrons.

16th September Backblip
15th September Backblip
14th September Backblip
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12th September Backblip
11th September Backblip
10th September Backblip
9th September Backblip