First impressions of Kirkwall
I flew out to Kirkwall today!
Flying
Flights to Kirkwall are expensive. This is probably because they run large propjet planes at well below working capacity. It’s interesting to think about the economics of this: airlines like EasyJet and Ryanair have low prices because their schedules are thoroughly optimized, their timings are tight, and their destinations are popular. It seems like Loganair’s flights to Kirkwall are none of these things.
The flight was nearly empty despite being booked out by a tour group to ‘Idyllic Britain’. I learned about this from the lady behind me. Idyllic Britain is a whistlestop tour through the attractive parts of Britain, starting in Manchester (which is idyllic, apparently?) and then continuing through the British countryside. The woman behind me (Kathleen, I believe) was from Colorado, and had a son working at NASA. She was seated next to Jeff, a Detroit-ese man who had recently retired from a professorship at a medical school. He regaled us with war stories from his time in epidemiology. Besides a story about flight attendants getting a mysterious rash when they flew over oceans (from the fabric of the demonstration life jackets), he told us about his field work with hockey players (rashes in this case caused by lighter but less breathable fabrics), and more serious clinical research that he had done. In particular, he had been commended by Ann Arbor University for his studies which set the standards for care for certain medical procedures. “When you go to the hospital and they swab your nose for staph, that’s because of my studies”. Ann Arbor had been good to him: he graduated 50 years ago, but they sent him a commendation for his work just 5 years ago. Oh, and his son and daughter went there, and he met his wife of 55 years there. It was an Ann Arbor dynasty.
We touched down in Kirkwall airport about an hour late. They wheeled a solar-powered ramp over, and then we waited: Kirkwall airport is about the size of a living room, and it can only load or unload a single medium-sized airplane at a time. They were loading a different plane, so we had to wait our turn to come out. I left the plane, said goodbye to Jeff, Kathleen, and his wife, and met Fiona at the entrance to the airport.
She was sitting near the door. I had pulled out my phone to text her, but she recognized me immediately, likely because I was the only person under 30 in the whole room. (Possibly, I was thinking, in the whole city.) “Jasper?” “Yes, that’s me.” Handshake, and out to her car.
Driving
Driving into Kirkwall is interesting. At first it’s all sheep and highland cows, scattered cottages, and then you come over the crest of the hill and the city is laid out before you in all its glory. Honestly, I was expecting a bit more. She gave me a tour of the town in about 5 minutes. There’s the cathedral; there’s the Tesco; there’s the office and its big wind turbine; there’s home! Don’t forget to put out the bin on Wednesday.
After lounging around for a while I put on my walking shoes and explored the town.
The Cathedral
The St Magnus cathedral in Orkney is made of red sandstone from Kirkwall and yellow sandstone from the island of Eday. It’s the oldest cathedral in Scotland; its construction started in 1137 and finished 300 years later.
The story of St. Magnus is pretty wild. From wikipedia:
St Magnus had a reputation for piety and gentleness. On a raid led by the King of Norway on Anglesey, Wales, Magnus refused to fight and stayed on board singing psalms. King Eystein II of Norway granted him a share of the earldom of Orkney held by his cousin Håkon, and they ruled amicably as joint Earls of Orkney from 1105 to 1114. Their followers fell out, and the two sides met at a thing (assembly) on Orkney Mainland, ready to do battle. Peace was negotiated and the Earls arranged to meet each other on the small island of Egilsay, each bringing only two ships. Magnus arrived on 16 April 1116 (or 1117) with his two ships, but then Håkon treacherously turned up with eight ships. Magnus was captured and offered to go into exile or prison, but an assembly of chieftains insisted that one earl must die. Håkon’s standard bearer refused to execute Magnus, and an angry Håkon made his cook Lifolf kill Magnus by striking him on the head with an axe.
April 16th is St Magnus Day. He also has his own pilgrimage: the St Magnus way! It ends at the cathedral on this stone. Any hike with a name immediately becomes irresistible to me; I may have to do this one.
The entrance to the cathedral has the most fantastic red and white stone arches. To me, they seem very reminiscent of the Alhambra, with its red and white striped stone. On our drive past, Fiona mentioned that the island from which the stone for the cathedral was quarried is the same island which houses the subsea cable for the O2 tidal turbine, and that when you visit the island you can see the quarry.
Also in the vicinity of the cathedral is the Earl’s Castle, a wonderfully ramshackle ruined pile of stone and bricks. Since the roof caved in long ago, the windows lead straight through the the gray sky behind. It reminded me of Stockbridge.
The earl’s castle had a fascinating historical sign:
This archway, known as the water-gate, originally stood at right-angles to its present position and a few yards to the north, forming an entrance in this direction from Palace road. To permit of road widening in 1877 the archway was taken down and rebuilt here.
Fascinating!
Around the Cathedral
Without a doubt, the cathedral is the most beautiful part of Kirkwall. It might have been the weather, which was beginning to become blustery and wet, but I found the rest of the city a little bit drab. Leaving the cathedral, however, you have the option to go down Victoria Street, which boasts shops and cafes, or to continue in the other direction. I left Victoria street for another day and another post, and continued in the other direction. Immediately, I found one of the cutest houses I’ve ever seen in my life.
Second to the cathedral, this was my favorite building on the walk. The windows are painted red and yellow, reminiscent of the sandstone of the cathedral, and the yard has a big anchor and so many different varieties of plants. Tomorrow, I’m going to have to go back and figure out what the building actually is - my hunch says that it’s a church, but I’m not completely sure.
A little further down, there are shops:
And of course, our favorite:
The co-op turns out to be extremely long and narrow. But they do have eggs!
Weather
I left Edinburgh with sunny skies and arrived in Kirkwall to several layers of clouds. This is Scotland at its most Scottish: one set of clouds might not suffice to extinguish every life-giving ray of sunshine; better stack a few more on top just to be safe. Kirkwall is sea-battered and windy; you can see why renewable energy companies love it. There are wind turbines everywhere.
When I first left the house, I noticed mist climbing down the hill.
I walked down to the harbor and found myself extremely grateful that I had chosen to take my raincoat with me on the constitutional. The wind was driving a small but hard rain directly into my clothes, my camera, and my face. What’s oddest was that on one side of me was blue skies, and on the other a storm:
Those two photos were taken at the same time, just in two different directions. I’ll never begin to understand how the weather here works. At any rate, I was grateful that my camera was waterproof.
To try to capture the strength of the wind, I started taking pictures of the grass bending in protest.
By serendipity, one of the Orkney ferries was embarking at the same time. I’m quite fond of the effect.
Closing Thoughts
So that was my first day in Kirkwall. Definitely there are pretty parts to the city. Occasionally you’ll turn a corner and see some beautiful old building and your jaw will drop. For example, just down the street from my house is this old grocer’s:
Look at the font on that sign! Many of the buildings are old and pretty as well, particularly the ones in red sandstone. And I like many of the street signs.
However, my enthusiasm is incomplete. The city is extremely small and sleepy. Honestly it feels like a bit of a stretch to call it a city at all — you can walk from one end to the other in about thirty minutes. On the outskirts, the architecture is extremely uninspired, with depressingly ugly buildings detracting from the beauty of the cathedral. The roads are very wide, but generally lacking in bike paths.
It might have been the gray weather, but much of it just felt a bit drab.
Also, this is their idea of high cuisine.
But there are birds!
I’m excited to start my job here and looking forward to learning more about Kirkwall. Hopefully you’ll join me.