Almost the first thing you notice making your way out of the ferry terminal at Lyness on Hoy, apart from the last remaining oil tank servicing what was the naval base there and the building housing the Lyness Naval Museum is two flags and two upright stone markers.

This is the Arctic Convoy Memorial. Some of the convoys’ ships sailed from Scapa Flow.

Memorial from road:-

Memorial Plaza:-

Memorial Dedication:-

Russian Inscription and Flag. (I note that the flag, strictly, should be that of the USSR):-

Russian inscription:-

British Inscription and Flag:-

British Inscription:-

The Orkney Museum is located in Tankerness House, diagonally across the road from St Magnus Cathedral in Kirkwall, Orkney.

Armorial cartouche above the arched entranceway into the museum:-

We would perhaps have gone in later in the day but the rain prompted us to go earlier than we would have. Just as well. The museum is stuffed full of great exhibits from Orkney’s long history. We spent a long time inside perusing them all. Fascinating stuff.

This quaint old building in the museum garden is known as Groatie Hoose and is decorated with seashells (or groatie buckies.) At the time there was a party in from a tour ship and I couldn’t avoid getting some of them in the shot.

This, from the images page on Google, is a better view:-

“Umbrella” feature on the exterior:-

Internal structures:-

We were told these iron spirals were built in before the roof and walls were put up. As you walk round them the walls bend in and the space around you is changed:-

Fountains at the edge of the external plaza:-

There are external and internal exhibits at the Guggenheim.

The steel spheres are Tall Tree and The Eye by Anish Kapoor. They are surrounded here by FOG, an installation by Fujiko Nakaya. The mist switches on every so often:-

The giant spider (Maman) protecting her clutch of eggs is by Louise Bourgeois:-

Salbeko Zubia Bridge, Bilbao, FOG and Spider:-

Tulips by Jeff Koons:-

Tulips, Salbeko Zubia Bridge in background:-

Puppy by Jeff Koons. A giant West Highland Terrier covered in flowers. The flowers bloom at different times of the year so the exhibit is always changing. From Museum:-

Puppy, museum in background:-

Puppy and museum:-

The attraction, for me, of the cruise we decided to take was the opportunity to visit the Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao, whose url I note has a Basque Country (Euskadi) stem.

Designed by Frank Gehry, the museum building is distinctive and idiosyncratic. It has no straight lines in its construction.
This view is from Aretxbaleta Bidea in the hills above the city. The Salbeko Zubia bridge over Ría del Nervión O de Bilbao is in the middleground here in front of the museum:-

This model, in the museum shop, bears a resemblance to a ship:-

The musuem from road and tramway:-

Closer view:-

Moving towards entrance:-

Part of exterior:-

Exterior (other side):-

There was a man in the waterway with a fishing net!:-

There is a good wee museum in Abernethy, Perth and Kinross, open Wednesday to Sunday 2pm-5pm from early May to September well worth a visit if you happen to be in the village in the summer months.

The village has other reminders of the past as well as the Tower itself, the graveyard and the War Memorial.

Stone with Pictish inscription (hard by Round Tower):-

Almost next to the Pictish stone and set into the tower near its base is this manacle. Presumably it was a punishment site of some sort:-

To enter and leave Groningen Museum you have to cross a branch of the canal:-

View outside through window almost at water level:-

Ditto only the other side of the museum:-

Just to the left of the above:-

I blogged about the outside of Groningen Museum here. On this May’s visit we actually took a look inside.

The first thing that strikes anybody on entering is this elaborate mosaic-tiled staircase:-

Similar tiling adorned another staircase:-

I was taken with this model of Groningen city centre made from fabric. It was under glass so it’s a little distorted:-

Thee was some not very aesthetically appealing German modern art as the main exhibit when we were there. I’m not averse to modern art but I must confess I preferred these traditional Dutch landscapes:-

In a history of Groningen section was this textile of a sailor and flags of different nations which was of Great War vintage though of course the Dutch were not involved in that conflict:-

German Great War memorabilia in Hooge Crater Museum. In my own Great War collection I have a mug similar to one shown here:-

Trench Art including inkwells in the shape of Renault tanks:-

British Great War memorabilia (above) and German (below.) Again I have some of the featured British items in my own collection:-

More trench art, Renault tank inkwells with poilus’ helmets:-

Trench art cabinet:-

More trench art:-

Mock-up of British dugout:-

If you are ever in Ypres/Ieper I would recommend a visit to Hooge Crater Museum as well as to In Flanders Fields Museum.

More Exhibits.

A canvas carrying pannier:-

Mannequin of soldier with full canvas carrying pannier. How could he have even moved with all that weighing him down?:-

Artillery shells of various calibres:-

Mannequin of a soldier in the uniform of the Liverpool Scottish:-

Artillery shell fuses and grenades:-

Machine guns, trench mortars, projectiles, barbed wire roll:-