To Orkney
Monday, May 29, 1995
The ticket-person sold me ticket number one for £99.00 ($218.00 CAN). This included a return trip for me and the car. Jennifer would have to buy her own ticket when we returned from Stromness for £13.00. And we thought the British Columbia Ferry charged too much! This trip to Stromness is the same duration and distance as from Swartz Bay, in Victoria, to Tsawassen, on the BC mainland but it costs more than three times as much. Anyway, I drove onto the ferry St. Ola, and was on my way to the Land-of-Ork.
Egg-salad sandwiches are one of my favourite lunches. The chef on the St. Ola made a classic blend and, combined with the spectacular views of the Pentland Firth, made for a most enjoyable luncheon. The St. Ola’s cafeteria is similar to the ones on the BC Ferries. The ship is nearly-new and a well appointed in eating and rest areas. Large windows allow excellent views of the sea and islands. The Old Man of Hoy — that famous pillar of stone — was the first feature to draw everyone out on the starboard decks. When the elements eroded the western cliffs of Hoy, they left standing a four- hundred-foot pipe of layered sandstone only yards in diameter. It has become a favourite place for climbers since first being scaled in 1967. St. Ola’s passengers were content to just look at it and take pictures.
Loading and off-loading the P&O ferry seemed to take in inordinate amount of time. As an experienced ferry-traveller from Vancouver Island to points east and south, the routine here seemed somewhat archaic. The four-hundred-car-capacity BC Ferries take about twenty-minutes to off-load and load a full complement of cars and passengers; P&O takes forty-five minutes for one-quarter of those numbers. There does, however, seem to be a plausible explanation: our ferries are not crossing the Pentland Firth. The P&O vessels, first and foremost, have to be seaworthy — very seaworthy. This change-in-design puts limitations on the configuration of the loading facilities onboard and on the shore. Our ferry is more like the Scots ro-ro ferries, which they use very effectively in the relatively sheltered waters of the Orkney Islands. On this route (Scrabster-Stromness), one wants a real ship first and the ease-of-loading model second.
