After a long hard morning's watch, followed by soup and wraps humorously served by Gordon, Aft Starboard relaxed in the afternoon, preparing for their next long, hard watch. Following chilli con carne and apple charlotte we geared up for a long, wet watch - five layers of clothing being the record (it took most of the watch to put them on!).
The weather was dreich (wet!) but the craic (that's Irish, not Scots!) was good, hence the four hours sped by in the blink of an eye (well, perhaps not quite that quickly!). We rescued a rather tired sparrow who spent the next four hours recuperating in the warmth of the chart room (OK for some!). At the end we were all very happy to turn into our warm, cosy bunks.
We started Tuesday all in bed (not together!)........ After waking to a beautiful sunny morning the ship came past the old man of Hoy during breakfast of Loch Fyne Oak smoked kippers and boiled eggs (and porridge, of course) into Stromness, Second Mate Kevin's home town. Kevin was quickly on the phone to arrange a bus to take us round the island (depriving the school children of their ride home today!).
We boarded after the ship's photo and our first stop was Scara Brae the famous 5,000 year old Neolithic village recently discovered when a gale stripped the sand that had covered it for centuries. We compared their living accommodation to ours on Tenacious and were very grateful for our comfy bunks and well equipped bar, although it looks like they had more showers.
Next stop the singing stone circle of Brodgagh; thirty seven stones remain standing in an almost perfect circle, pre-dating Stonehenge by some number of years!Our final stop was the Italian Chapel, built from two Nissan huts by Italian prisoners of war during the second world war - the ceiling murals were spectacular. Throughout our tour we were amazed at the lush pastureland populated by lots of healthy looking sheep and cattle - dinner tonight perhaps - yum yum? We all got back on the bus and took a bird's eye view of the ship.
Aft Starboard