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We saw quite a few things on Orkney for which we don't have photographs.

We went on a tour of Maes Howe, an amazing burial chamber for several reasons. The long narrow entry passageway was perfectly aligned for the setting sun on the Winter Solstice. About 1000 years ago some Vikings broke into the interior chamber through the roof and left lots of graffiti on the walls in runic writing.

Scapa Flow is a large body of water surrounded by many of the Orkney islands. It served as a major Royal Navy base during both the First and Second World Wars. At the end of the First World War the German fleet was held in Scapa Flow during the initial armistice and was scuttled by the Germans. Some of the German ships are still on bottom of the bay. During the first year of the Second World War a Nazi submarine entered Scapa Flow through a narrow channel between two islands, thus bypassing the antisubmarine defenses across the main entrances to the anchorage. The U-boat sunk a major battleship and many Royal Navy sailors died. The U-boat escaped.

We drove across the causeways to the string of islands to the southeast. The causeways were built during the Second World War to prevent any more U-boats from entering the east channels to Scapa Flow. Many of the workers for the causeway construction were Italian prisoners of war captured in North Africa. POWs were not to be used for military works, so they were told the causeways were for the economic benefit of the inhabitants of the eastern islands. Since the War the causeways have indeed had that benefit.

The Italian prisoners were housed in several camps of temporary buildings, which the British call Nissen huts and Americans call Quonset huts. The Italians, on their own initiative, decorated one hut as a chapel. That chapel is the only Nissen hut that wasn't dismantled after the War. The painting on the interior of the Italian Chapel is remarkable, as are the photos of some of the former prisoners returning to Orkney as honored guests about ten years after the War.

In Kirkwall, the largest town, we visited St. Magnus Cathedral, an impressive medieval Viking cathedral. Across the street we toured the ruins of the Earl's Palace.

Also in Kirkwall we spent a few hours in the Wireless Museum. It isn't a big building, but it has an impressive collection of early radio equipment. They have several rare pieces of Second World War electronics, including a spy's radio, and a U-boat radio. Then there is a table of albums full of Second World War photos taken on Orkney. During the War the people in Orkney on military duty tripled the population of the islands.