On the trip back from St Margaret’s Hope to Scotland (which Orcadians, rather than ‘the mainland,’ call the nearest part of Britain – to them ‘the mainland’ is Orkney’s largest island) we passed the gun batteries on South Ronaldsay.

These are I think called the Hoxa Battery.

There were gun emplacements here in both World Wars to protect Scapa Flow. These remains have the look of World War two constructions.

In 2017 I photographed them from a bit further away.

St Margaret’s Hope was our last stop on Orkney as it was where we picked up the ferry for Gill’s Bay in Caithness. I mentioned it in 2017. Its War Memorial is in the form of a kilted soldier atop a tapering square plinth.

The front of the memorial is dedicated to the men of South Ronaldsay who fell in the Great War:-

War Memorial from rear:-

Word War 2 Dedication, on side of memorial:-

In June this year were off up to Orkney again. We used the same ferry company, Pentland Ferries, but the boat was a newer one, the MV Alfred. (A couple of weeks after we got home the M S Alfred managed to ground itself on Swona island in the Firth. Lucky we missed that voyage.)

MV Alfred: Ferry from Gills Bay, Caithness, to St Margaret’s Hope in Orkney:-

Lighthouse on the island of Stroma in the Pentland Firth:-

Views at St Margaret’s Hope:-

We made the crossing to Orkney from Gills Bay in Caithness via the Pentland Ferries’ catamaran the Pentalina. It skelped along at a fair pace:-

Landfall was at St Margaret’s Hope, South Ronaldsay, the third largest settlement in Orkney:

Closer view of the town:-

This is the Northlink Ferries’ ship Hamnavoe in Hoy Sound on its way from Stromness to Scrabster:-

This video (click on picture to get to my flickr to play it) shows the Hamnavoe steaming through Hoy sound with Hoy in background. Unfortunately I zoomed in and as a result the focus went awry:-