Highland Park Distillery and Orkney Tales by the fire

Today has been a little more proactive than yesterday. This morning we drove around to Kirkwall via the southern road, with good views of Hoy on the way. I tried to get a ferry across with the car to Hoy but they told me they could get me there but could not bring me back today, and there were roadworks on Hoy that prevented me from getting to the north of Hoy where the cliffs are. So it was off to the Highland Park Distillery in Kirkwall, established in 1798. We had the tour and tasting and they even threw in the tasting glass as a keeper, like the distillery in Oban did. Bonus.

After that it was a nice lunch of soup in Kirkwall and then back to Storminess to do some further travel bookings and admin.

Tonight was good, we went to a Orkney Tales by the fireside event at a house about 10km out of Stromness. It was a good turn out of about 25 people. It was set in a special darkened room full of old stuff and lit by fire and kero lamps, with a few small electric lamps that dimmed. The story teller was a woman who sort of dressed up a bit old time look and she told two old time Orkney tales about sea fairies and sea mystics, called Selkies and Finmen. They were good yarns and told with a theatrical verve that made them interesting as well as entertaining. We got back late to the B&B and had a beer and watched a bit of BBC AlbaX, a dedicated Gaelic channel of the BBC that had some good music on it. Then time to write this up and get to bed. Apparently the weather is looking pretty glum for the next few days, storms and high winds.

Pics

Looking across to Hoy

A minion of the North

Tasting room

Malting Floor

Peat and Coke Kiln for drying the Malt

Mash vats

Stills

Barrels

Highland Park Distillery

A house in Kirkwall