Sometimes it amazes me how much we do in a day here — but when the sun rises at 3:30 AM and sets after 10 PM, there’s a lot of time for adventuring! Today was such a day.
We drove back to Kirkwall to catch the ferry to the northern isle of Westray. What a jolly fine day for it!
Awaiting the gaping maw of the Westray ferry!On the ferry! It was about a 1.5 hr ride.
Easy peasy to get to Westray. It’s quite a small island, and there is one main road, so finding our pod for the week was also pretty easy!
Ruins near our home for a few days, and a beautiful, quiet bay.
Another storm pod!! Hopefully, no storms this stay — we only have a few days here and there’s a lot to see and do! Especially: PUFFINS!!!
I can see for miles.Pretty! The closest house. Also one of the few hills on the entire isle. Our storm pod! Some swallows were nesting in the archway, and very very annoyed by us coming and going and just existing in general.From the front porch.First things first. PUFFINS at Castle O’Burian.Ah! A little puffin flotilla. Oh my. My first glimpse of a real and true puffinry. Hundreds of mated pairs just on this stac.Aaaaaand quite dead whale, blubber and bones is all that remains.The stars of the show. Unflappable, so to speak.
No need to caption each photo and video. I could hardly tear myself away, to be honest, even on Foula the puffins were not so close or unfazed by human presence.
I love them amongst the flowers.
However, move along we did, as we had a several mile walk to get back to the car on the circular walk.
Beautiful sea stac, a little further up the way.
The start of a quite lovely walk, several miles loop to where we parked.
Gorgeous cove.Hi there More Puffins!Magical curlew. What a haunted sound they make.
Ruinous barn.White sand beach, flat rocks. Lovely.What a perfect day.That-a-way!Textures and layers. I fell in love with Westray.Wild orchid.The shore of the bay by our pod.
Ringed ploverEvidenceAbandoned barn, maybe formerly a croft? Now used for advertising.Sunset, so pretty.
Debkakes in the UK 2025 