Guests will be arriving at different times today - some on flights, and some by ferry.
When everyone has arrived and settled-in, John with gather the group for a welcome to Orkney, introductions and a chance to discuss your plans and aims for the week.
This evening we will meet for a group meal at The Ferry Inn.
NB - Lunches and drinks are not included, and are to be paid direct.
After breakfast we will head to Bisray Bay for a morning of panoramic seascapes overlooking the Brough of Bisray, an uninhabited tidal island with the remains of Pictish and Norse settlements and a modern lighthouse. From our vantage point there are beautiful views towards Marwick Head. While you are painting, keep alert for dolphins, harbour porpoise and minke whale, which often feed in the waters around Orkney. This is one of the best spots to see Orca in the Orkney Isles. We will have lunch at Bisray Bay Tearoom before moving to Skiba Geo this afternoon, where we will find terns in cushions of clover like pink thrift, and Costa Head for nesting sea birds. This is your holiday, so feel free to wander off and do some discovering at your own pace. Please inform John if you are slipping away for a bit, so that he isn’t searching for you, and always be waiting ready to hop on the Minibus at the allotted time! On any excursion away from the others in the group, please bring back your artistic observations, and share your stories. We will return to the Ferry Inn to relax and review our sketchbooks before our group supper in Stromness.
We will aim for an early start today to arrive before other tourists at the Ring of Brodgar, which is located about 10 miles from Stromness. During June, the Orkney archipelago enjoys almost non-stop daylight. The sun rises at 04:09 and sets at 22:10 today, locals call this ‘simmer dim’. Depending on our locations and the weather, some days we will stop for lunch at a cafe, other days we will take a picnic for our painting excursions. The Argos Bakery is in walking distance and opens from 8am to 4pm offering sandwiches and salad bowls, a selection of savory pastries, pies, cakes and fresh fruit. The Ring of Brodgar is a Neolithic henge and stone circle, part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site known as the Heart of Neolithic Orkney. The interior of the Ring of Brodgar has never been fully excavated and the monument's actual age remains uncertain, it is thought to have been erected between 2500 BC and 2000 BC. When we have finished our sketches and paintings (or too many tourists arrive!) we can move on to a nearby quiet Lochside bird reserve. On the West Coast, we may decide to stop in Sandwick at the Skara Brae Café for refreshments/lunch (and to use the facilities!) The Skara Brae Café is located inside the Skara Brae visitor centre, open daily 09:30 to 17:30, a 10 min drive from Yesnaby). This afternoon we paint sandstone cliffs and birdlife in remote Yesnaby, situated between Skara Brae and Stromness. The Yesnaby cliff top walk for the famous sea stack 'Yesnaby Castle' is an easy walk but can be slippery when wet, so please watch your step. Drawn to the edge - Sea Cliffs and Stacks ‘Here is where the land reveals its core, where rambling moors and grasslands end abruptly in sliced, giddy verticals. Much of the “excitement” of our landscape is in this contrast’. We’ll stop regularly to paint landscapes and catch up with breeding arctic skua on the adjacent moor, and fulmar on the cliffs...and hopefully some incredibly rare and tiny purple primula scotica along the way - though we may be too late for these! Group supper at The Ferry Inn.
The Churchill Barriers are four solid-fill causeways which link Mainland Orkney to four smaller islands. They were built during the Second World War, largely by Italian prisoners of war, to keep out submarines and protect the British Naval Fleet based in Scapa Flow. They now serve as vital links between island communities and are also great for wildlife watching. Along the 4th Barrier beach, which joins the isle of Burray to South Ronaldsay, is a Little Tern colony. These birds, which are amongst Orkney’s rarest seabirds, lay their eggs here in shallow scrapes in the sand and shingle. We will stop and paint at a time when eggs may be hatching, and these elegant, feisty birds are busy feeding their young. This is the only location in Orkney that the terns are known to use for breeding and John will help you to capture the energy and fragility of this small colony on the wild 4th Barrier. If time allows, later this afternoon we may visit the Tomb of the Eagles, a 5000-year-old Neolithic Stone Age tomb and bronze age site, perched above the dramatic South Ronaldsay cliffs. When the tomb was excavated in 1976 archeologists discovered parts of human skeletons, animal bone, pottery, stone tools and jewellery. Amongst the animal bone was a large quantity of white-tailed sea eagle bones, so the tomb was thereafter known as the Tomb of the Eagles. The walk to the tomb is about 1 mile across farmland, which in summer is alive with birds and wild flowers, it’s quite stunning. We will return to the Ferry Inn to review our sketchbooks before supper at the Ferry Inn.
After breakfast this morning we will take the ferry to Hoy. Hoy is the largest RSPB Scotland nature reserve in Orkney, at 3,926 hectares, and is home to an impressive range of wildlife. We will paint sweeping moorland with scattered copses of native woodland. Red-throated Divers breed in the Hoy wetlands blanket bog of deeply coloured bog mosses, heathers and hares-tail cotton grass, and sub-alpine heath. In 2018 RSPB Scotland announced that Hoy’s resident pair of sea eagles (also known as white-tailed eagles) successfully hatched a chick, the first in Orkney for nearly 150 years. Hardy wildflowers cling to the towering sea cliffs, swirling with seabirds. Around the island shorelines Great Skuas, the pirate birds of Orkney, harass nesting tern colonies We will bring a picnic lunch today (there are toilet facilities at RSPB reserve).
Rackwick Bay is nestled in the heathery Hoy Hills, a beautiful sandy boulder strewn beach with a flagstone croft and a traditional bothy. The walk to the Old Man of Hoy sea stack starts from here. Late afternoon we head for the ferry dock. We return to the Ferry Inn to freshen-up, rest and unwind with a drink before our dinner this evening.
Today we head north to Birsay Moors for sweeping landscapes of wild and windswept moorlands with buoyant hen harriers, pipits and larks dancing in the skies, and the shimmering tranquility of isolated Lochs. This is an important breeding site for hen harriers and red throated divers. Short eared owls glide over the cotton grass and heather, hunting for Orkney voles. You may like to climb to the hide on Burgar Hill (looking out for nesting Oystercatchers on the track) for views of red-throated Divers breeding on Lowrie’s Water.
We can take a picnic or have lunch at the Smithfield Café in nearby Dounby village (approx. 4.5 miles/7km) Today we head to Birsay Moors for sweeping landscapes of wild and windswept moorlands with buoyant hen harriers, pipits and larks dancing in the skies, and the shimmering tranquility of isolated Lochs. This is an important breeding site for hen harriers and red throated divers. Short eared owls glide over the cotton grass and heather, hunting for Orkney voles. You may like to climb to the hide on Burgar Hill (looking out for nesting Oystercatchers on the track) for views of red-throated Divers breeding on Lowrie’s Water. If time allows this afternoon we may move to the heathland of RSPB Cottascarth, one of the highest density breeding sites for curlews in Europe. Before a farewell supper this evening we review our favourite Orkney sketches and paintings from the week. John will offer advice on selecting sketches to work into paintings in the Studio.
After a leisurely breakfast we will check-out of our rooms at the Ferry Inn. There will be time for some last sketching around Stromness before heading back to the bustle of the mainland. The tuition will finish at lunchtime today.
