Orkney by Sarah Anderson

I put my car on the ferry from Scrabster to Stromness on a whim. I only had a few days, no plans, and nowhere to stay. On the boat I picked up a leaflet advertising the Merkister Hotel. I rang them; they had a single room for that night, and I took it. The room was delightful with a view of the loch. I felt this was a good omen since single rooms in most hotels - if they have one - tend to have no view.

I could hardly believe how much there was to see and do on the Mainland. The port of Stromness, where the late poet George Mackay Brown lived, has an excellent bookshop, and the Pier Art Museum has a superb collection of twentieth century British art. I wanted to pack in as much as possible and to give myself a taste for future visits. Kirkwall’s imposing red sandstone St. Magnus Cathedral was begun in 1137 but has gone through many incarnations since. Maes Howe is an impressive Neolithic burial chamber whose innermost cell the sun illuminates at the winter solstice. Skara Brae was a Neolithic fishing and farming village. It is extraordinarily well-preserved in spite of the howling wind which I experienced. Birsay in the northwest was the center of Norse power for many years, and featured in the historical novel Magnus by George Mackay Brown which I was reading.

The Churchill Barriers link the Mainland with some of the smaller islands. On Lamb Holm Italian POWs left behind the Italian chapel - made from Nissan huts and barbed wire - and further south one can drive to Burray and South Ronaldshay . The family-run Tomb of the Eagles, where one crawls into the burial chamber, was one of the many high points of my stay, as was an afternoon spent flat on my stomach watching seals playing on the beach. I plan to return to those wild, treeless, beautiful, mood-changing islands as soon as possible.