It’s often said that Orkney is a little piece of Norway beyond Scotland, and it’s true that its fertile soils and temperate climate has meant that wealth was accumulated easily by growing cattle, either for its first neolithic settlers, right through to the Norse Vikings that followed centuries later. That’s why the Earldom of Orkney was always such a rich and fought over piece of land, and occupied by various peoples over the millennia.
Well, we moved there too, twenty years ago, north from the Central Belt to start a new wildlife tourism business, hoping to enrich people's lives by sharing Orkney’s treasures. We also started a family and raised our son here. There’s nothing more adventurous than that, raising a child amidst the constant sounds of the sea and the wind, and nurturing the calves born on our small farm along with our son, Sami.
Life in the islands is tougher than people might imagine. Sometimes it’s physically impossible to stand, such is the power of the wind at 59° north. Winter brings darkness and short, six-hour days if you’re lucky. Sometimes the sun is absent for weeks and low overcast cloud blankets the land, along with your mind.
But cast forward to the spring, and another world awaits. Suddenly, the willow catkins, celandines and primroses bloom. Out emerge bumblebees, in come migrant birds, and the light returns with vigour. At first it’s low and teasing, throwing shadows and hope. Then the sun is high, the seabirds are back on their rock citadels, the hen harriers are sky-dancing, and the moors are liquid with the sounds of curlew, snipe and plover. Orkney in spring is simply delightful.
We chose Orkney as a business base for the hard-nosed reason that few places in Scotland have its combination of rare wildlife and ancient history. I know Scotland well, and I suspected that island life in the far north would lead not only a successful business, but a series of events and experiences that would enrich our lives as we carved our future.
Neolithic peoples first settled in Orkney to farm almost 6,000 years ago, and their stone buildings and monuments remain. Such totemic sites as the Ring of Brodgar and the stone-age village of Skara Brae never fail to raise the hairs on forearms, and such depths of emotion in visitors that it scarcely seems credible. But people are fascinated by who came before them, and even the neolithic is but a blink in the human story. A neolithic farmer was just the same as you or me, it’s as simple as that.
Eventually, along came the enigmatic Picts with their stone-fortress brochs which are ubiquitous here. Each one has a story to tell. Imagine the disruption caused by the tumultuous Viking tsunami, which has produced a permanent presence in the Orkney DNA and psyche. After all, Orkney was ruled by Scandinavia for around 500 years before it was stolen by the Scots, not yet to be returned.
It's worth dwelling on some of our wildlife, especially hen harriers. This is one of Britain’s rarest raptors, and Orkney holds some 20% of their breeding population, as many as 100 pairs in good years. Each spring they set up territories in the moors and display like no other bird of prey. Both birds throw themselves up and down in the air with gay abandon, hence the sky-dancing description. This courtship takes place in April, just when the weather is at its most capricious, but harriers are superb fliers and strong winds only enhance the experience.
The commonest question I’ve had over the years is “where can I see a puffin?” I don’t like to disappoint our guests and for sure we see puffins, and their comical ways always amuse. For me though it’s the rumbustious gannets that win the day. We have two small gannetries in Orkney, and the tractor-throbbing noise made by the birds – and their smell! – add to the experience of cliff-top viewing. Their argumentative nesting behaviour, vertiginous feeding dives and constant fly-pasts leads to hours of pleasure.
Over the years I’ve also come to realise that the power of the sea is not just physical. It has overlays upon overlays. It’s the sea that surrounds us. It’s the sea that brought the settlers to Orkney in the first place. It enters your very being through noise, smell and salt. Every day I witness its pull, either in the dramatic waves that crash over the Churchill Barriers, or its sublime beauty on those rare still days that sees blues marry greens in a quite un-Scottish way.
The seas also carry orca, killer whales, an animal that perhaps encapsulates our Orkney adventure. One year I had a guest burst into tears upon seeing a pod of orca, they’re such powerfully emotive creatures. Twenty years ago, they were rare beasts indeed, and it was a red-letter day when they appeared. Nowadays they are seen regularly, with several pods patrolling our shores, though still unpredictable as befits their soubriquet, the “wolves of the sea”. They hunt seals by surprise and come un-unnervingly close to shore such that you can hear their blows and smell their breath. No-one can explain why they’ve become commoner, perhaps because of an increase in prey, or a cyclical location change. They’re modern Vikings for sure, moving between the Northern Isles and especially Iceland, but also across to Norway occasionally.
There’s a solitary neolithic standing stone at Clouduhall on our island of South Ronaldsay which I pass frequently. If fine, I’ll stop and admire the seascape SW over the nearby island of Swona and across the Pentland Firth. I imagine generations before me who’ve sensed the same islands, the same sea, the light, the mountains of Caithness in the distance, the memories, the emotions. I’m certain that neolithic farmers, bronze-age metallurgists, Picts, Vikings, or my next-door neighbours would all in their turn have felt Orkney. It gets under your skin.