In terms of a "different" walk, one of the more interesting in Orkney is the Holms of Ire just off Sanday's north coast directly across from Airon farm. The two tidal islets--Inner Holm and Outer Holm--are accessible only at low tide. As the name implies, Inner Holm is closest to Sanday's mainland; Outer Holm the furthest distant.
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| April 18, 2022 Whale Point Cairn at Airon; view toward Holms of Ire |
Different, the Holms of Ire walk is also somewhat difficult, at least in surety of footing. It was similar to our walk out to the tidal island of Davaar at Campbeltown in 2019, [https://whitleyworldtravel.blogspot.com/2019/06/ficklness.html] but with a distinction. An actual causeway (called the Dhorlin) to Davaar exists at Campbeltown. Whereas a causeway claimed to go out to the Holms of Ire is true only in the most general sense.
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| April 18, 2022 Tidal channel between Airon farm and Inner Holm of Ire |
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| April 18, 2022 Another view of the big tidal ditch off Airon farm |
The approach to the Holms is shingled with fairly deep piles of ocean-rounded rocks. These are rather "tippy" whenever one's weight is placed atop them. Walking requires an awareness of balance...which sadly senesces with the explorer's increasing age.
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| April 18, 2022 Darla picking her way down from Airon |
The term "holm" is derived from the Norse word holmr, meaning "small and rounded island". That may be true for Outer Holm. "Oval" in shape, it is perhaps a third mile long by a quarter mile wide. But for Inner Holm, not so much. It is narrowly linear, over a third of a mile in length and only an eighth mile wide at its best. So, we defer to the Norse regarding their name of the place.
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| April 14, 2022 View north along spine of Holms of Ire |
Prior to driving out, Sanday locals cautioned us. Take care parking at Airon. The current owner has had people towed. Word to wise. Fair enough.
We then got the laundry list with an accompanying thin veiled eye-roll, the meaning of which was not evident. Call it mixed signals.
Airon had been given to a new not-from-Sanday wife by an older Sanday gentleman, we were told, who subsequently died. To the disdain of some, Airon farm was repurposed to keep Shetland ponies; a menagerie of sorts. That evidently made it a hobby farm versus a "real" farm.
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| April 18, 2022 One of Airon's horses above the Holms of Ire |
Dad was a produce buyer of crops grown in Virginia for markets in New York. A different age. He often bought crops from the last of the old Depression Era farmers with cash, sometimes by the briefcase full. They distrusted any other form. When I could convince Dad to let me tag along, I accompanied him.
One purchase involved kale, a crop in the range of 40 acres. Riding up the dirt track to the farmhouse (business was typically transacted at the kitchen table), I was surprised by a couple two acre field plots of daffodils. I derided the clearly non-manly man farming. Definitely not ordinary. Dad corrected me.
"That farmer is sharp. He's probably making more money on just those four acres of flowers than all the other farmers are making on their entire farms." Pop bought the kale crop...as well as cut flowers which were loaded in waxed "breather" cardboard flats (no plastic in that day), stacked onto New York bound trucks blown full with shaved ice off the loading dock (no refrigeration trailer units in that day either--even air conditioning was very rare.) And a lesson was learned.
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| April 18, 2022 View of Airon cairn from Inner Holm |
Not that we had need to add to our apprehensions, but as we drove to the end of the sealed track (road) at Airon a young man, apparently a service technician, drove out. We hailed him and inquired about parking. That was fine, he said. But, "Be mindful of the tides."
We were very mindful indeed. That is the North Atlantic, after all. It would be an unmitigated disaster to think in terms of needing to sprint across those tidal ditches and rough skerries. Fools rush in where angels fear to tread. We would be no fools. But we were perhaps a little too mindful. We abbreviated our walk on Outer Holm, which in retrospect we had plenty of time. Still, those are considerable tidal ditches, and I'm no kicking spring chicken these days.
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| April 18, 2022 Jumbled foundation on Inner Holm |
It also turns out that the gratuitous story regarding Airon's current ownership was a bit off mark. As would be discovered later, Airon was the home for nearly two decades of the renowned British composer Sir Peter Maxwell Davies (1934 - 2016). Davies, formerly the Master of the Queen's Music (i.e. something of a music laureate) passed in March 2016 at Airon.
Upon his death at 81, he gifted Airon to his "partner" Tim Morrison. Evidently, this was the foundation of the local's "wife" eye roll. As Morrison put it in online eulogies for Davies, "We were lovers long ago, and
then in the last few years of his life, we acted as family for each
other, latterly as his next-of-kin." Whatever. About the only thing I find a little untoward was Morrison focusing on the "I am his heir" thing. Not to be insensitive, but that sounded too much like Al Haig's "I'm in charge" deal after Reagan took a .22 ricochet in his left side.
Regardless, not knowing what we didn't know at the time we were there, we simply didn't want to be towed. We left our rig as much out of the way as possible at the end of a berm that separated Roos Loch from the ocean. Whether real farm or otherwise, our car hire was unmolested at Airon despite local concerns. We were thankful of that much.
Davies was an interesting character, a prolific composer. He moved out of modern society in 1971 and to the hilly Orcadian Isle of Hoy. Davies spent a quarter century at Rackwick composing music in which he based instrumental compositions upon nature's soundscape. In the late 1990s, Davies moved to Airon farm on the relatively flat and fertile Isle of Sanday. It too became a soundscape source. Several of his compositions commemorate the Holms of Ire and his home at Airon. Thus, they warrant mention.
Among Davies' first "Sanday" based works was Temenos, with Mermaids and Angels (1998). An orchestral piece with flute, the title Temenos means "sanctuary"...which Davies considered Airon farm to be. The most notable work was Litany - for a Ruined Chapel Between Sheep and Shore (1999). Litany is a trumpet solo instrumentation, first performed in 2002. The ruined chapel which Davies' work commemorates is St. Colm's, on the Inner Holm of Ire.
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| April 18, 2022 Outer Holm of Ire |
St. Colm's Chapel, said to be medieval, is of a most uncertain date given its condition. No recorded dedication has been found, but locally it has long been said to be dedicated to St. Colm. If that claim is true, the chapel would be among the earliest in Scotland. What exists is confusing. Several layers of human occupation or activity obscure the building foundation. The location of chapel doorways and other details are not clear. Its dimensions have been generally estimated. The chapel walls were about 2' 10" thick. Its interior measured 13' 6" by 9' 6" inside--which happens to be an almost perfect size for an early medieval chapel (back when the Christian mission tree was still green as it were).
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| April 18, 2022 Are these also vandalized ruins? |
The lines of the building are difficult to determine even by professional archaeologists. There's little more than a rectangular depression partly filled with storm beach debris on the site over the centuries. And there were later works over the site such as kelp kilns and probable worker huts.
And then there's the senselessness. The standing ruins that still exist suffered serious vandalism at the hands of recent visitors (within the last decade or so). Apparently, the party was looking for treasure and demolished much. After which, a crude rebuilding was done by someone else. Whether that was Davies or Morrison or someone else familiar with the site is not known. Whoever tried to repair the damaged chapel foundations must've known the site at least well enough to realize the damage had occurred.
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| April 18, 2022 Plantie-crues on Inner Holm of Ire |
Lastly, on Inner Holm some curious foundations exist...four circular and two rectangular without doorways. One could say that these ruins dominate all those that currently exist on Inner Holm. These are known as plantie-crues. Similar constructions are evident in medieval monastic communities in Europe, particularly in Belgium. These were built on the Inner Holm of Ire to create sheltered plant beds against ocean winds to produce...kale crops.
Now there's a full circle story, solved by walking, as St. Augustine would have put it. Whether these plantie-crues constitute manly man farming or not is for others to decide. They were a hardy lot, though. So just sayin'.
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| April 18, 2022 Plantie-crues on Inner Holm of Ire |
