Orkney 2007

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What a good weekend I’ve just had up there in Orkney, I’ve got friends up there that I dive with, one’s a guy that first took me to Orkney in 1999 to dive on the wrecks of the German high seas fleet that was scuttled on 21st June 1919, and he’s now got a B&B up there and would welcome bikers. I went up for 2 reasons, a) I’ve always wanted to take the bike up there, b) I’ve got a dive trip planned for August and the dive operator, which is a partnership has split up, so I needed to sort it all out and make sure all would be okay when we get up there in August.

I planned to come back Sunday morning but Orcadian hospitality got the better of me. I wanted to remain neutral because the split was less than amicable so I went to the pub first of all to have a drink and say goodbye to one of the parties, but I fell into a drinks buying round so by the time I left to go and say goodbye to the other party, I was well on my way.

I got up to the boat skippers house and his wife was there on her own, so we sat and chatted for a while, she’s a great person believe me, she poured some very large whiskeys in to a glass for me. I made my apologies and said I was catching the morning ferry, but no sooner than that, in walks Fred her husband and dive boat skipper and the cycle of drinks continued. I left Fred and Barbara about 00:30 and walked down to the Galley pub to have a last drink with Neil and Elaine, my hosts, that’s when it got silly

Closing time at the Galley is 01:00 on a Saturday, (or Sunday morning) and the barmaid said she wouldn’t work any longer because she wasn’t getting paid… so I hit on the idea of having a collection the pay the lasses wages for and extra hour or so… I don’t know what time we all rolled out of the pub, but I understand we paid her treble time for her services and my last memory of the night was paying Neil for the extra night’s accommodation before I spent all my ready cash.

When I walked around the village the next morning, everyone just took the micky out of me for missing the ferry and the following morning Fred the boat skipper even came down at breakfast to make sure I caught the Monday morning ferry

A very good weekend was had by all.

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Photos

John O'Groats
John O’Groats is around a 10 ½ -hour ride from leaving home allowing for 2-fuel stops, the first at Dalkeith near Edinburgh and the second at a service station near Dornoch. 500-miles to the ferry giving an average speed of just over 50-mph, not bad going to say I avoid the motorways like the plague.