Aysgarth, Yorkshire Dales to Lyness, Hoy, Orkney
A wise friend said...
“Make sure to take it all in. You won’t get the firsts again.”
I would like to have the final part of the journey etched in my memory for as long as possible. The anticipation was off the charts!
Aysgarth to Hoy is a hell of a way.
We had 2 options open to us, drive to Aberdeen & et the 6 hour ferry across to Kirkwall OR drive up Thurso way & get the 1.5hr ferry across to Stromness.
We opted for the Aberdeen option as it meant 3 and a half fewer hours of driving / being stuck in a van. Plus we do like a ferry trip!
But it wasn’t to be, there was no space for the van. That meant 8.5 hours on the road (if we didn’t stop), so we could get super close for the earliest morning sailing.
We hit the road at 8.45am, dropped off the Kiki dog at the kennels, she does not travel well, and continued on to Wick. We arrived at 6.45pm. 10 hours…eurgh!
We arrived at the B&B hoping to grab a quick shower, freshen up & hasten out for some tea then head back for an early night. Our chatty hosts had other ideas & we spent a good hour talking to them and learning about all the potentially bad things that could happen, plus all the different Scottish laws. Basically, if it’s blowing a hoolie, we will likely be garrotted by some wayward corrugated iron & if that doesn’t get us, we’ll end up fined £40k & in prison because Kiki dog worried a sheep.
If things go well, we’ll have to shell out thousands for tradespeople who only work 4 hours a day, IF they turn up, Orkney will become an independent state & we will have to naturalise as Scottish.
I have to say, as we headed out to dinner at their recommended spot, a crushing disappointment with terrible beer & substandard food, the shine had been taken off a little bit.
That said, they did pass on lots of great info, give us a tour of their ‘allotment’ and Polycrub and they clearly LOVE their life, it just didn’t translate so well!
We got up and set off after the crack of dawn to head to Scrabster ferry terminal in Thurso.
Yes the journey north was long and hard work (mostly for Erik obvs), but the landscape beyond Perth was absolutely stunning & when we hit the mostly coastal road after Inverness, it just got better & better.
Then we came to Scrabster Ferry Terminal in Thurso.
That the rock we could see in the distance was our new home – Hoy. It was a pretty special moment.
The ferry trip was choppy, walking in a straight line impossible & the stairs on a wobbly ferry in my boot, tricky to say the least. But we got out on that sun deck & the sun did shine on us. It was a wee bit breezy & tad chilly but wow, to stand on deck & approach Hoy like that was breathtaking.
The ferry comes into Stromness which means the route comes along the West side of the island, around the Old Man & across the North – SPECTACLIAR as my own old man would say.
On the way we got a call from David, our solicitor, PURCHASE COMPLETE!
Yes yes yes yes yes! Orequoy is ours.
On arrival our next step was to hunt out the selling agent K Allen Properties, so we headed to Kirkwall, parked up – turns out parking is not that easy in a van – and walked slowly into town. Or city. Yep, another big city!
I say slowly because as much as I like to march to places when needed, my ankle is preventing it. I can’t walk quickly, I can’t walk on sloped pavements very well & the fact that my booted foot is a good inch higher than my trainered foot means my hip hurts most of the time. I hit 10k+ steps every day for 5 days and it’s far from ideal at the moment! Still, I see the physio on Thursday 😊
Anyway…we walked to what looked like a residential property, which it was, but also housed the K Allen offices. They’re going through a renovation at the moment, so the entrance to the office will no longer be through Karen’s (of K Allen) front door.
I immediately blurted out, we’re here for keys, to the lady who popped her head out, who to my shame, I didn’t actually catch/remember her name. SORRY!
She had just got back from a week’s leave so wasn’t expecting us, Karen was at the vet’s with her poorly, gorgeous dog & even she wasn’t expecting us till the afternoon.
But it all came right, she found the keys, Karen came back, we stayed and chatted for about an hour, I had a cuppa & a cuddle with poorly dog and we felt SO DAMN welcome.
I knew at that moment that this was a good decision.
We would be welcomed into the community, it was the right fit for us and well just look outside, we knew it was what we wanted.
It was all a bit of a scramble after that. We were booked on the last ferry out but looked to see if we could catch the 1 pm or 3pm – judging by the website no, but you don’t try, you don’t get.
So I limped to Tesco to get supplies for the weekend while Erik fetched the van, because of course the two were in opposite directions.
Mad supermarket sweep dash & a basket full of food & local beer later, Erik caught up with me at the checkout to help with the bags. We then hot-pedaled it to Houton, arriving in PLENTY of time for the 1pm.
The guy in the ticket office confirmed it was fully booked, but said we could wait & it would be the ferry operative’s decision as to whether we could squeeze on.
So we sat there for a good 15 minutes, irrationally swearing at every new car, caravan & van that tuned up!
And then, success, we got a spot!
We were heading to Hoy.
There are 2 ferries to Hoy and we took to ro-ro ferry rather than the pedestrian-only ferry, obvs! But there are two routes, one goes via Flotta & the other is direct to Lyness on Hoy, Lyness our new ‘village’. This route went via Flotta, so it took an agonising 1h20 mins rather than 35mins.
I mean I say agonising but again, the sun was shining and although it was windy as fuck & a little choppy, that didn’t take away from the spectacular views.
We ro-ro’d off the ferry at Lyness and I stuck my phone out the window casually filming our arrival when Erik said, that’s our house. We could see it from the road.
OUR HOUSE!
Now that was a moment - check it out on Instagram
Written 22nd August 2022
.