When I told the folks back home I was heading to the farthest north, darkest place in the UK for the solstice they said I was nuts. When my mate in CT emailed me to tell me he awoke to -6c last Saturday with a foot of snow, one might ask who is the daft one!
As I’ve posted, my Mum passed on my Dad’s birthday July 14, 2015. I moved in with him for his last year. It was hard at first because he would tell his aide that he didn’t know who I was but I was a good cook. It really didn’t get any easier as the time went on. Dad joined Mom on July 13, 2016. Had he not had Alzehimers he might have figured out it was leap year and hung on one more day. And then in November there was Trump. This was the first election I ever vote against a candidate rather than for one. With 320m people our choices were rubbish. So 2016 was I very dark year for me.
Today here in Castletown sunrise was 9:03 local time and sunset was 3:21. 6 hours and 18 minutes. This year I will forget the Gregorian Calendar and consider 2016 to end today because moving forward each day will be a little brighter than the one before.
I went to Thurso in the AM and then back to the hotel. Couple hours later I grabbed the bus to John O’Groats. The bus driver was a wealth of information and since there were never more than 4 others on board we had a lot of time to chat. As he dropped me off he told me he’d be back in two hours. After taking photos of the signpost I realized that there was next to nothing to do and I had a hour and 55 minutes left. But this is Scotland where the people, especially Highlanders are very friendly and outgoing so I chatted with the few folks in the couple of shops that were open and had a cup of coffee . Northern Scotland is pretty spectacular in the winter and I must make a point of returning some summer. I had hoped to visit the Orkneys but Storm Barbara is arriving and the seas were rough. I don’t mind rough water but I was worried that once there I’d get stranded so that will have to wait. I think you’d need at least 3 nights to get the taste of Orkney. With prehistoric sites and Scafa Flow where the British fleet anchored in both world wars and whose bottom is littered with the remains of the German Fleet it will be on my future to-do list. This is the eighth time I’ve been to Scotland so I know if I don’t see something one time, I’ll see it another.
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