Cormorants

It's our last day in Orkney and this evening we drive on to the ferry to overnight there and save having to get up at some unearthly hour tomorrow morning.

Tony took the early ferry to Hoy and walked up to the high point, Ward Hill.  I'm not sure if he managed to reach the Old Man of Hoy or had a view from the Hill, but he has messaged to say he has visited the Dwarfie Stane, a megalithic chambered tomb, so it sounds like a good day, in the company of mountain hares.  

Meanwhile I took my large lens out for a circuit around the Ness to see what I could see.  There were the usual oystercatchers, which we have become a bit blasé about, but also the cormorants of my blip; eider pairs and ducklings and one small bird which might have been a juvenile dotterel.

Back in Stromness I picked up a crab sandwich and some orkney ice cream from Julia's cafe and have had a relaxing hour back in our hotel room catching up with the Archers!  Now to the packing.

As we leave Orkney I am reminded of something our Shetland hotel host said to us on our leaving to come here. 'We are fisherfolk who croft, they are farmers who do a bit of fishing.'  I think she is right.  Orkney is much greener, lower and more cultivated than Shetland, it's wilder cousin.

The cormorants are better on black.