A Day Ashore in Kirkwall, Orkney
Off the ship at Hatston and into Kirkwall: the cathedral and the palaces on foot, two distilleries, and the Italian Chapel and Neolithic Orkney a short trip away.
Words by Hidden Scotland
Cruise ships call at Kirkwall from March to October, and most tie up at the Hatston pier, about two miles from the town centre. A free shuttle runs from the ship to the Travel Centre, a couple of minutes’ walk from the shops, and the last one back usually leaves town an hour before the ship sails.
Kirkwall is small enough to see on foot in a morning, with its red sandstone cathedral at the heart of it. With a few more hours, the Italian Chapel and the stone circles of the West Mainland are within reach on a tour or by taxi.
01 · Kirkwall
St Magnus Cathedral
The cathedral was begun in 1137, when Orkney belonged to Norway, and it was raised by Earl Rognvald in honour of his uncle Magnus, who became a saint. It is built of the local sandstone, red banded with yellow, and its nave is far taller than the little town around it. It is a few minutes’ walk from the shuttle stop.
02 · Kirkwall
The Earl’s and Bishop’s Palaces
A few steps from the cathedral, the roofless Earl’s Palace is counted among the finest Renaissance buildings in Scotland. Patrick Stewart, Earl of Orkney, built it in the early 1600s, and its great hall has a fireplace five metres across. The same ticket takes in the Bishop’s Palace too.
03 · Kirkwall harbour
The Orkney Distillery
On the Ayre Road, looking over the harbour, the Orkney Distillery makes Kirkjuvagr gin in small batches from botanicals grown on the islands. Its whisky tour ends upstairs in a tasting room above the harbour, which makes it an easy one to fit in on the way back to the shuttle.
04 · Kirkwall
Highland Park Distillery
Highland Park has been making whisky on Holm Road, on the south side of Kirkwall, since 1798. Orkney’s own heather peat gives the spirit its gentle smoke, and the visitor centre runs a choice of guided tours.
05 · Kirkwall
The Orkney Wireless Museum
At Kiln Corner, the Orkney Wireless Museum is given over to radio, from the grand sets of the 1930s to transistors shaped like sauce bottles. Its wartime rooms show how Scapa Flow and the Home Fleet were protected in the Second World War, with a replica radar station and a U-boat’s radio.
06 · Lamb Holm
The Italian Chapel
South of Kirkwall, on the little island of Lamb Holm, Italian prisoners of war turned two Nissen huts into a chapel while they were building the Churchill Barriers, the causeways that sealed the eastern entrances to Scapa Flow. The road to it crosses the first of the barriers.
07 · West Mainland
Maeshowe, Stenness and the Ring of Brodgar
West of Kirkwall, Neolithic Orkney is gathered round two lochs. Maeshowe is a chambered tomb built around five thousand years ago, its passage lined up with the midwinter sun. The Standing Stones of Stenness are close by, and the Ring of Brodgar stands on a strip of land between the lochs, a great circle inside a rock-cut ditch.
08 · Bay of Skaill
Skara Brae
On the shore of the Bay of Skaill, on the west coast, Skara Brae is a stone village of about five thousand years ago, so well preserved that the stone furniture is still in the houses. It lay under the sand until a storm stripped the dunes in 1850. It is the furthest of these from the ship, so leave plenty of time to get back.
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