Cruise Round Scapa Flow

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Souvenir from the our visit to the new museum at Lyness

On Saturday 6th August, we set off at 07:00 from our comfortable visitors mooring at Longhope to motor-sail round to the historic wartime base at Lyness, 3 miles away.  The forecast was for approaching heavy rain and winds up to NW F7 later and we were keen to get moored in snugly before the worst of this weather arrived!

We were glad to find that our favourite mooring place at Lyness (from our previous visit here in 2018) was still available and we quickly set to tying up our mooring lines to the wall and to the dock-top above us.

Our favourite mooring place at Lyness

Luckily there is a good ladder here and one can carefully climb up to tie on the lines to a variety of strong points.  Once in, we were well sheltered, with only the top half of our mast showing above the wall.  It seems that very few vessels use this part of the harbour, so this iconic setting was all ours :)

Well sheltered from strong winds

The very impressive new Scapa Flow Museum is next door and, having just opened on 2nd July this year, we were very keen to visit.



The museum is based around the original pumphouse, that once received fuel from tankers to store in the Lyness shore tanks - both above ground and built into the hills behind.  This fuel was then pumped to lighters to service the Royal Navy's Grand Fleet moored in Scapa Flow during WW1 and WW2.  The base at Lyness had many thousands of people working there and had a significant effect on the islanders.  Because of this base, new roads were built and farms were encouraged to modernise and increase their output to provide for the troops stationed there.  This has had a long-lasting positive effect on the Orkney islands economy.

Original pumping equipment inside the museum

We had been planning to go to a musical performance at the nearby Hoy Gable End Theatre but the thought of leaving our boat to an uncertain fate in its lonely mooring in the rising wind made us decide against this. 

Next day, the rain had stopped and we set off again in a fresh breeze to visit the town of St Margaret's Hope in its well protected bay on South Ronaldsway.

View of St Margaret's Hope from our anchorage in the bay

As we were approaching the narrow and shallow entrance to the bay, we noticed that the Pentland Ferry from the mainland was also heading here.  We decided it was OK to continue and just got through the entrance before they steamed up fast behind!

The fast catamaran ferry "Pentalina" in St Margaret's Hope

Our anchorage at St Margaret's Hope

As is often the case, we were the only visiting yacht in the harbour.  We braved the buffeting wind to row ashore and take a look around the town.  Many of the houses back onto the bay with their own quaysides and you can see how the town must have once had a strong association with the sea.

Community garden at St Margaret's Hope

We visited their lovely community garden that provides some welcome green space to complement the tightly packed houses lining the shore.

It was still blowing hard when we returned to our boat for the evening aboard.  The weather in the Orkneys can be quite volatile and we needed to plan ahead to ensure we were always heading for a safe harbour for the forecast wind direction and strength.

Next day, we headed off at 08:00 to return to Stromness for a few days.  We were looking forward to having the creature comforts of showers, restaurants and good shops as well as good connections to explore other parts of Mainland Orkney.  

The strong SW winds forecast for the next few days made us disinclined to sail northwards to other parts of Orkney as we would have a very hard time returning south for our booked day to dry out alongside this coming Thursday.

So we decided to explore by land from Stromness for a while.




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