Days 7 & 8: THE LAST WORD

So Andy is getting up really early and posting the blog while I’m asleep and as soon as I’m awake we’re off on another adventure so I am a bit behind..

Day 7, still on Orkney (getting claustrophobic, this island is too small, need to be back on the mainland)…today we are Timeteam..Andy aka Tony Robinson took us to see some stones in the ground and some bigger stones above ground. You have to admire the archaeologists patience cleaning away at rocks with tiny trowels and toothbrushes, I was getting stressed just watching them! The big stone circle is a community meeting place, i.e. a village hall (there are places in England still using theirs!). No highland cattle, lots of black cows of which I ate some (cooked in restaurants by professional chefs not by hacking a bit off one on the roadside!) very tasty and extremely tender. Coat off and on, not much sun but nicely warm. Ferry, just a ferry, whining French children sitting behind us, ugh!

Day 8, JO’G, rain/drizzle/overcast. End of a cliff, birds, wild flowers (tiny tiny wild orchids, amazing) more ruined buildings, rocks, sea, castles. What is wrong with Andy? Why doesn’t he want to climb on every rock we see? He got out of scrabbling down to the tiny beach at Castle Sinclair by saying he would get a better pic of me from where he was, I am soooo sea-gullible! And why doesn’t he want to read all the blurb and look at every tiny detail in the historic Castle? I had to demand he came back to be informed of the installation of bathrooms – Andy: it’s a bedroom, it’s a room, there are the beds, done, next. Angela: love the wallpaper, why only 2 beds as it’s a night nursery and there are 10 children, the bathroom was created by closing off the spiral staircase in the corner and commissioning round baths to fit, the pictures in this room were painted by…Andy? Andy…ANDY! come back here and listen to me telling you about the bath. Ok, let’s walk round the gardens now…Andy? Andy…ANDY!

Tip on packing your sandwich bag poncho, make sure it is completely dry first, today I looked like a giant jellyfish and smelled like an old walking boot…Andy? Oh there you are, I didn’t know you could run!