With over 6000 years of history incredibly well-preserved and off the mainland of Scotland, sailors visiting the Orkney Islands find it a haven from the world. Sailing around the Islands is the best way to really appreciate up close its flora and fauna. The smaller Islands have the best to offer in this regard, from Sanday with its otters and passing pods of whales, to Westray with its Puffins. Papay Island has a colony of Storm Petrel and North Ronaldsay hosts terns, ducks, gulls and waders for keen birders, The Islands give a particularly unique feeling to visitors when they visit the historical sights due to their remoteness, the absence of that feeling of something well-preserved yet stifled between crude modernity. Features such as the Ring of Brodgar and the Standing Stones of Stromness lay in an area granted with World Heritage Status in 1999. The stone village of Skara Brae is an excavated neolithic sight, allowing you to peer closely at day-to-day life of the original inhabitants of the Islands. There are three marinas which sailors can use, the largest being at Kirkwall and offering 93 births. Stromness has 64 births and Westray has smaller facilities.

Written by  Jane Ferguson.

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