After spending the afternoon in Aberdeen Mark and I boarded the NorthLink ferry MV Hrossey at 5 p.m. for a six-hour journey to Kirkwall, the largest town in the Orkney Islands. We stood outside on the upper level watching Aberdeen disappear when suddenly we were all told to leave. We didn’t know why, yet after we went downstairs and gathered on the stern a helicopter suddenly came towards us. I told Mark that perhaps the helicopter needed to land on the upper deck, as I did see a large yellow circle on the deck, which probably served as a helipad. We wondered why a helicopter would need to fly out so soon after our departure. If someone or something needed to board the vessel, couldn’t a speedboat have accomplished the job, without getting a helicopter involved?
As we saw the helicopter approach the ship, it did not appear to want to land and hovered portside. In order to view this activity passengers had to stare directly into the sun, so Mark and I were glad to have our sunglasses. The helicopter hovered motionless for a long time, as two men looked out at us from a wide open door. Nothing appeared to be going on aside from the deafening rotation of the helicopter blades. The helicopter then manoeuvred directly above the stern so we thought that it would move a little bit ahead to make its landing, but it moved to portside again. Suddenly a man descended from a rope and the helicopter positioned itself so that the man could land on the stern’s deck. As he descended he swung his arms as if he was treading the air. This was to direct the pilot in which direction to move.
We were in awe: what was going on? Why was our ferry being followed by James Bond? No markings on the helicopter indicated that it was an air force or police aircraft, so I didn’t think that our ferry was sheltering a criminal or terrorist. The man returned to the helicopter and then made a second trip to the stern. This time a stretcher was lowered down to him. When it arrived safely to the awaiting man on deck, it was hoisted back up to the helicopter. We concluded that the helicopter and crew were probably conducting rescue exercises since there didn’t seem to be any emergency on board. The man then was hoisted back to the helicopter amidst a show of applause and the helicopter flew off. What an adventure to start our journey to Orkney!
We explored the ship and looked in the gift shop, which for a small place had a surprisingly large selection of books on Orkney and also maps. I was on the hunt for hot water in order to make one of my instant coffees. I didn’t want to pay for a coffee when all I needed was water. I found a restaurant that had a machine that dispensed hot drinks and the cashier kindly allowed me to return later with my own mug to fill up.
We set up a Scrabble board and played a few games in a lounge. Some people saw us and were talking about the game. I could tell that one of them was more than a casual player because he knew about the Collins dictionary. After close to six hours at sea we went outside and saw the lights of Orkney at portside but since it was so dark we couldn’t make out anything else. We docked and then the passengers without cars were led to a small room where we waited for our luggage. A transit bus was waiting and we boarded for the short ride into Kirkwall. We were staying at the Kirkwall Youth Hostel which wasn’t on the bus route, yet the driver let us off at the stop “closest” to it. We had a photocopied Google map and rough directions on how to get there, but it was very hard to figure out where we were in the dark and with street signs not exactly easy to find.
No one was on the streets so we decided to ask someone for directions. The first people we saw were at the open doors of a fish and chips restaurant on Junction Road. We recognized them from the ferry, so they must have just arrived and were settling in. We were looking for Wellington Street and they told us, roughly, where to go, but in the absence of street signs ended up on Victoria Street instead. (Of course we had no idea what streets we were on until after the fact when we had become familiar with the town and had consulted a map.) A woman walking her dog tried to give us directions next. She knew about the hostel but it was not easy to direct us to since it wasn’t exactly in a conspicuous location. Our Google map was of no help.
We knew the hostel was on Old Scapa Road, yet found ourselves on New Scapa Road and continued walking. While towing a suitcase and close to midnight with no one around, I got worried if we’d ever find the place. I considered knocking on people’s doors if I saw households that had a television on. We ended up near the town hospital and Mark advised that I stop with the luggage while he explored further on foot. We were definitely lost so we headed back to where we had turned onto New Scapa. We explored the street that intersected New Scapa with Main and discovered that it was Wellington! So we headed along Wellington, not really knowing where it would lead us but at the fork in the road at Glaitness I rejoiced when I saw a sign for the hostel, indicating that it was 200 yards away. It was the longest 200 yards I had ever walked and we both wondered if we had missed the hostel after we had been walking for what we felt was a lot farther than that. Then we saw another sign for the hostel, leading us down a gravelly path that was pockmarked with potholes. (Not kind to luggage on wheels.) Reception had closed but they knew we were coming and left check-in instructions for us in an envelope at the entrance.
In retrospect, had we been able to tell from our map, we had a much shorter walk to the hostel had we continued past the hospital and walked the length of Foreland Road. Foreland meets Old Scapa and the hostel was a short walk on the right. And as for the potholes, they had all been filled in either on the night before or on the morning we checked out.