Day 10: Searching The Ancient Stones For Jamie & Claire
Last night when we departed the port of Ullapool on the west coast of Scotland the fog set in during dinner, to the point that you could barely see beyond the railing outside the windows. All night long the fog horn sounded every minute or two, and you couldn't see ANYTHING beyond the balcony. Adding to the eeriness of the night voyage was the waters were quite rough and there was alot of rocking of the ship as everyone settled in for the night. But by the time we woke up around 7am we were in calmer waters, and approaching our docking point in Kirkwall. BUT the fog was still exceptionally thick. It made for very coolish weather - never out of the mid-60's all day - and made for a "dramatic setting" to the ancient Neolithic sites we visited. Of the three hours we were out and about, we spent a little over two hours visiting three ancient sites. The first was the Standing Stones of Stennes which are well beyond 5,000 years old. We've been to the Orkney Islands previously and when I went on a similar tour we could not go right up to the stones ..... thus I could never test my theory that I might be able to be transported back to the 1700's as had Claire had been in the popular TV series "Outlander" (one of our most favorite series we watch!). But today, here we were able to do so. Kim and I focused very intently, but as you can see - since I'm still journaling online via my laptop - we were NOT transported back in time and STILL are continuing our quest to find the happy couple. We'll have one more big chance tomorrow when we are in Edinburgh and are going on the "The Ultimate Loch Ness and Outlander Experience" excursion! A short walk from the stones was the Barnhouse Village. All that remains from this thousands-year old ancient village are the foundation blocks and small parts of the walls. We returned to the bus and went on a long, epic bus ride of 3-and-one-half minutes (LOL) to reach the second stop, "The Ring of Brodgar" where twenty-seven stones remain standing from the Neolithic Age, some 5,000 years ago. Like the other stones we saw, it's still a mystery what they were used for/as. It was intriguing when our fabulous guide, Chris, explained that they have found the holes for 33 other standing stones in this ring would make a total of 60 that once stood there.....the same as the number of seconds in a minute and minute in an hour - COULD this have been an ancient clock? We walked the ring and then headed back into Kirkwall, a short twenty minutes away and had one final stop at the Cathedral of St. Magnus, built in 1137. Ironically on this the tenth day of our European adventure, it's the FIRST cathedral we've seen! A short bus ride of less than ten minutes brought us back to the ship just in time for lunch. Tomorrow we are in Edinburgh - maybe, JUST maybe we'll find the Loch Ness monster or Jamie & Claire!
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