Orkney

North. Keep going North. Keep driving – past Bristol, Birmingham, Manchester. Past the Lake District, where low stone walls trace patterns across green fields (and where we stop to buy me a pair of new trail-running shoes). North, further North, into Scotland, where the road becomes smaller and windier. We park the van down by a river and sleep overnight, then continue – North, further North – past Glasgow and the Cairngorms and Inverness, along the East Coast, all the way to John O’Groats: the very north-eastern tip of Great Britain.

From there, keep going North: yes! Across the sea, where the Atlantic and the North Sea collide in a heavy swell – only 10 km (‘I could run that!’ I say, thinking of the distance; and Tom looks at me sceptically, thinking of the ocean: ‘Oh, really?’).

I don’t run it: we take the ferry, and the wind sweeps my hair as I watch the Atlantic and the North Sea collide, as if having a conversation with each other – one moment furious; the next, differences resolved and calm and flat as if nothing had ever happened. A marriage of water.

From the ferry, we drive onto the Scottish island of Orkney – and keep driving North, along open roads where earth and sea and sky come together around us. The treeless moorland sweeps away from us, the ocean takes over, the sky welcomes the sea in its vast embrace. On some days, the world is upside down. The light comes from the water; and the weak, grey sky only tries to reflect it. Other days, grey becomes blue and the light comes from all around.

Orkney. Stop travelling the miles, and traverse the years – two, three, four, five thousand years. First to the Vikings, who left a stone tower (a ‘Broch’) perched on the edge of the water. Then back to the Bronze Age, with chambered cairns scattered across the hillsides (a burial chamber? A site of ceremony and ritual? Or did the Bronze Age dwellers just want somewhere to shelter out of the Scottish wind and rain? Did they perhaps leave random objects behind on purpose and laugh at the thought of future generations pondering their significance? Yes, it would be a good joke…) Then further back to the Stone Age and Scara Brae, the remains of a Neolithic village huddled on the shore. There are standing stones, too, still standing, pointing their fingers to the grey sky. Indifferent to cold and rain and sea fog.

We, too, are indifferent to the weather: or try to be. What else can you do? It is Scotland. We pull on raincoats, pull our hoods up and chivvy Dad along (‘Another chambered cairn!’ – said with various degrees of enthusiasm…)  

We are indifferent to the cold: or try to be. On the white, white sand, we change into our swimming costumes and run into the sea before we can change our minds. The sun comes out – and makes absolutely no difference to the temperature of the water. Afterwards, though, afterwards – you can feel beyond your skin. You can feel the blood in your veins. You are intensely aware of your arms and legs: the cold burns and brings every inch of your body to conscious life.

What would it be like to live on one of these islands? To take the ferry to school, to be so isolated? The number of permanent residents on some of these islands barely reaches two digits. It is interesting to me that many of their voices are not Scottish, but English:

‘Lovely up here, isn’t it?’

I nod, breathless from running to the top of the hill across the moorland grass and heather – and startled by the dog that is also startled by me.

The man laughs. ‘Don’t mind the dog,’ he says. ‘She’s just a bit surprised, is all. We don’t often see people up here.’

He is from the Midlands, he says, but now calls himself an Orkney local. His knowledge of the islands certainly spreads wide across the landscape – matched only by his enthusiasm.

There are other English voices, too – working in the cafes, in the supermarket, in the art galleries. But where are the Scottish voices? Where are the people who grew up on Orkney?

It seems to me that if you were born here, you may well want to leave – at least for a time – to discover what’s beyond the beckoning horizon. And if you are not born here, you are attracted – at least for a time – by the peace and the light and the freedom of that very same open horizon.