22 July 2024

Arriving at the pier to catch the ferry over to Wyre, I meet Vanessa with her milk churn which will go for Tori, the milker who lives on Wyre, to take on to Rousay. This temporary system is in place while the dairy farmer, “Shorty”, completes a licence to sell pasteurised milk. For now, he is giving it away rather than pouring it down the drain. Bit by bit, I am understanding the connections in between the islands, but it’s a brain stretcher.

Now I am on Wyre looking back towards iconic St Magnus kirk, and the harbour at Rousay. Remembering that some ferries have to be pre-booked, I hastily call Orkney Ferries. On the phone I am surprised when the functional conversation suddenly switches to social chat: “I’ve never been to Egilsay or Wyre or Rousay“.

Walking along the lane through the centre of Wyre, I meet the postwoman, Heather. She has lived on the island for decades, having moved there to be with her parents. Retired from farming, she works a six-day delivery week, walking the 5-mile route. Three times a week, for one hour, she also opens the post office.

Heather had sheep in the past. Now her fields provide grass for other farmers to use for haylage. This is a new word for me. The cut grass is half dried, turned several times, and then wrapped, in a similar way to silage. Her brother on Rousay, and another on the Mainland, farm in the same way.

The population of the island is 13, two of whom are pre-schoolers. But, as on the other islands, there is an aging population.

Around 100 years ago, the island had an opportunity to buy their own land. Heather indicates where the eight or so farms are located. “Are they mostly English-owned?”, I ask, because this is the situation on Egilsay. No, she says, but then enumerates what turns out to be an English majority. It is becoming clear that English versus Scottish doesn’t register; it’s Island versus Not island.

Heather would have liked to have taken part in Vicky‘s recent guided wildflower walk – if she had been available. But, although she used to work in the shop on Rousay (at a time when it had two), and knew everything and everyone, she hasn’t been off Wyre for years. “I wouldn’t know how to get off the island, now.” I find that hilarious: Heather‘s house is a five-minute walk to the jetty and it’s then 10 minutes over the water to Rousay.

I walk into the recently opened Heritage Centre. Wow – I could’ve spent the day there, reading the noticeboards and books, making myself coffee, using the toilet! I make a generous donation.

Next stop Cubbie Roo’s castle, “… built in the 1150s by the Norse chieftain Kolbein Hruga, whose name was later corrupted to Cubbie Roo. The renowned castle was a strategic linch-pin of Norse Orkney and a symbol of the power of its builder, the chieftain Kolbein Hruga”. See https://www.historicenvironment.scot/visit-a-place/places/cubbie-roos-castle-and-st-marys-chapel/

For me, it’s about the views (wonderful) and the atmosphere (empty, peaceful), and the extent to which I can imagine times past (difficult on this occasion). It seems incongruous that this little island should be home to such an important fortification. But I can see how well placed the spot is, and spend a good while picnicking and soaking up the view.

At the jetty I coincide with a mass exodus oof agricultural machinery. “No one is drinking on the job”, says one guy – who turns out to be Tori’s stepfather. It’s obvious that everybody is doing just that. But this is a land where MOTs aren’t needed for vehicles only used on the island – at least on Egilsay. There are laws and there are laws.

Tori arrives and another piece in the jigsaw finds its home. In the 10-minute crossing to Rousay, and subsequent five-minute drive up to the shop (she kindly takes me there), I learn the milestones of her short life: her journey via agricultural college into agriculture, the tragic consequences of TB in the farm she was working for and the need to supplement her income by holiday covers, the move up north two years ago, the niche she has carved out for herself as a milker, her toxic relationship with her neurologically disabled mother – strangely, her reason for moving up here, at which point she fell in love with the boy next door – and her guilt about this.

She is very positive about community life, including the equipment and landscaping that Heather had referred to earlier. It turns out that it’s Heather’s fields that are used for her family’s grazing – but ownership is kept in Heather‘s name so that grants can still be obtained. Tori is living the dream, and yet…. she acknowledges that it isn’t easy for everybody to forge connections on the island. The other young mum on the island has not had it so easy, perhaps because she isn’t embedded in the agricultural work cycle.

The little shop, 3 miles north of the pier, is stocked with everything my heart could desire (except dark chocolate). But, as I will have to lug everything back on my back and also need to gauge what I truly need for the next 36 hours, I continue to ration myself (interesting that Google speech recognition doesn’t clock “ration”!)

Tori’s “leg up” allows me to dawdle back to the jetty, looking across to sun-dappled Egilsay and the little finger of St Magnus. I love being able to see the entire length of the island, north to south. And I can spy two little sandy beaches in the small segment of coastline so far unwalked.