Pat here:
As our regular readers know, I traveled with Mary Jo into the wilds of Scotland—Orkney and Shetland, (map) not the Highlands. Mary Jo wanted to see ponies, puffins, seals, and farm crofts. I wanted to see Neolithic ruins and castles. Both of us did our best to sample the culture, the 
dialects, and the distinct differences in landscape. I’m not sure what that says about us, but we’ll never completely cover all that northern Scotland has to offer.
For one thing, stating the obvious, Orkney and Shetland are islands. We had to fly or ferry from one to the other. I think Vikings could travel faster than we could. They’d just pop onto a ship 
and row off. We had to wait in terminals for the fog to lift or on massive ferries that took all night to travel from one island to another. (see the map above—we went from Kirkwall to Lerwick on one flight) So we had to choose the easiest ports and islands and pray for good weather. It is painfully obvious that our ancestors were made of stronger stock than we are!
In the interest of seeing as much as possible without getting lost along the way, we hired tour guides in each area. They created easy day tours where we could see a broad swathe of the islands we visited while lingering as we wished on each site. History here dates back to possibly 7000 years BC, so you can’t kick a rock without stumbling over it.
While I was intellectually fascinated by the Neolithic ruins like Skara Brae and Jarlshof and standing stones at the Ring of Brodgar and marveled over how people so ancient could be so sophisticated, I’ll admit I was more emotionally involved in later periods. The tales of St Magnus, who was apparently far too saintly to live as a king, fascinated me. The cathedral built in his name was one of the most moving I can remember entering. The Barony mill that’s been in business for 300 years was a work of art. It grinds barley that can only be found in this area and the bannocks the meal produces are beyond scrumptious.
I can give you links with better descriptions and photographs than I can produce here, but it’s 
impossible to understand what it’s like to walk the land people have been traversing for thousands of years, seeing the marvels they created from little or nothing. And this doesn’t even touch on the beauty of nature itself, the inlets and heather and wildlife and wildflowers everywhere.
I’ll have to talk about Edinburgh another time, rightfully so, since it’s a different world entirely. Have you been to Scotland? What did you think? And if you haven’t been, what would you like to see if you could go?
