A Day of Time Travel

Welcome to Jarlshof and thousands of years of history!  This is where we spent our Saturday morning.

The first picture of the family is taken from the platform in the house in the background of this one.  The kids were being brave explorers - they had an amazing time.  The house is a laird's house from the Middle Ages.  It was seen in decay and called Jarlshof by Sir Walter Scott and is featured in his novel The Pirate.

Here the kids are exploring Iron Age ruins, a whole village of round houses.

 These are the real Viking ruins that Samuel's been waiting for... but I think he likes the stone houses next door better.  You can see the main longhouse in the center.

And here's one of the wheelhouses built by the Picts.  The whole site is really fascinating and worth seeing more of on their web site. 

Fishing in a Loch

We just finished listening to the children's story, The Water Horse.  It's a delightful story about the origins of the Loch Ness Monster.  I was hoping the kids would play along and enjoy pretending about something mysterious and exciting in the loch, but they were much to realist for that... or maybe they just enjoyed their own pretending more than mine.  

There seem to be fun stone ruins everywhere.  Samuel was defending the fort here - thank goodness his dip net is also a powerful gun in the hands of a fine marksman.  Evelyn and I are thankful he saved us from the invaders.

One rarely gets a picture of Samuel smiling.  I'm glad he was having too much fun to remember to growl at the camera.

And here are the fishermen.  Sadly, they only caught rocks today.  Hopefully we'll have trout for supper next time.

Samuel Meets an Orka... or Our Visit to Sumburgh Lighthouse

 We parked our car down by the little light, which once served on Muckle Roe, the island we'll be staying on next week.  Now it serves as the entrance and ticket office to the museum.

Here's Drew with a model of the light house.  It even included a model of how the fog horn works, with a pretty good sample blast.  Everyone needed a turn pushing the button!

Now here is the actual light, looking toward the "Mainland."

And here's Samuel's new friend.  There's a nice marine wildlife museum at the complex and it is a great place for bird watching.  We all got to see a puffin, but alas, the camera wasn't out.  

A Visit to Lerwick

Today we went into town for the afternoon.  It is such a quaint place.  Here's the view up from the water and the lovely public garden that has a children's playground, bowling lawn and the most elegant little put-put green you've ever seen... but the flags weren't out, so you'll have to wait for a warmer night to see a picture of that.

Cunningsburgh Cottage

We thought everyone would like to see where we're staying!  Our little cottage is pretty basic, but the views are amazing - here's Samuel's favorite.  He calls it the viking ruins, which it isn't of course, but it sounds so much more exciting than old croft (farm) house.  He is going to get to see some Viking ruins soon and maybe that will help clear things up.  It also gives him something to do as he gets bored during the big kids' school time, he shoots pretend Vikings out the window.  Not sure what he'll shoot when we move to a different house this weekend, on a smaller island farther north - pretend viking ships, maybe?

We're out of the country again - so back to blogging.  Has it really been 4 years, well yes it has!   I think Samuel has a lot to do with that!  It's late and I'm just getting my new camera to work with my computer, so here is a picture and a goodnight!