Shetland was a place that I had never visited before and was one of the reasons why I wanted to do this particular trip. I didn’t know a lot about Shetland other than what I had seen on the British television series called “Shetland”. It seemed like a pretty interesting place.
Close to where our ship was docked was the Northlink Ferry. This is an overnight ferry that operates between Aberdeen and Lerwick or Kirkwall (Orkney) and Lerwick. People can take their vehicles and even their pets with them and spend the night in a cabin, a sleeping pod, or just a reclining chair. There is a restaurant, a bar, and a cinema.
Once on the tour coach, we drove through Lerwick to see the Capitol of Shetland. The first place of interest was Fort Charlotte. The fort was built back in 1665 to protect the Sound of Bressay from the Dutch during the Second Dutch War. It did hold off the Dutch fleet in 1667 even though the walls were unfinished and there were few guns. But it looked more heavily manned and armed than it was. It was burned out in 1673 during the Third Dutch War. More than a century later, it was rebuilt during the American Revolution, but never saw any military action. Fort Charlotte is an artillery fort with roughly five sides and is presented as it would have looked in the 1780s. It is currently the base for Shetland’s Army Reserves.
We next encountered the home of fictional character, Jimmy Perez, in the “Shetland” TV series. The name of the place is The Lodberrie and is likely the most photographed place in Shetland. The series is based upon books written by the same author who has written the “Vera” books, Ann Cleeves. This building dates to about 1772 and is the last of 21 lodberries lining the foreshore in Lerwick by 1814. They were built with their foundations in the sea and were essentially trading booths, selling the legal goods from the street side shops. Illegal goods were taken into a maze of tunnels running under the streets to bypass the customs men.
The Town Hall has been seen frequently in the series. In the first series, it is where the Up-Helly Aa festival begins. This is an annual festival inspired by the Vikings that takes place on the last Tuesday of January. It consists of a parade of over 1,000 men dressed as Vikings and carrying burning torches. It ends with setting fire to a replica of a Viking longship.
Across the street from the Town Hall are the Court Buildings and Police Station, in both real life and on the TV show. In real life, however, crime is really low in Shetland and serious crimes are quite rare.
Radiating off from the main streets are very narrow lanes called the Lerwick Lanes. Many of the homes, pubs and restaurants seen in the series are located in these lanes.
As we passed the Tesco and headed out of town, we encountered Clickimin Loch and Clickimin Broch. A broch is a circular stone tower built by the northern Caledonian tribes between 400 BC and 100 AD. They are unique to Scotland and are the tallest prehistoric structures in the British Isles. This particular one doesn’t have all of its levels intact but has a pretty decent circumference.
Next we passed a peat bog (several of which are featured in the series) and then had a photo stop for the Mousa Broch. This broch stands on an uninhabited island and is the tallest broch in existence. Its walls are the thickest of any broch yet discovered, but it has the smallest diameter. Perhaps that is why it has survived intact. In the photo, the broch is near the center.
On our way to Sumburgh Head, we passed another location that figured quite prominently in Series Three of the “Shetland” TV series. It was a grouping of abandoned buildings out in the countryside.
At this point, we encountered an anti-littering road sign in the Shetland dialect. Since Shetland was once part of Norway, the dialect seems to have bits of Norwegian as well as bits of Scots Gaelic, Scots and English. I felt the sign’s message was quite clear in its intent.
To get to Sumburgh Head from there, we needed to drive across the runway of Sumburgh Airport. Yup. The road actually crosses the runway. It was rather foggy and raining quite a bit by that time. My photo of crossing the runway shows the raindrops on the coach windows. A plane had landed just before we arrived, so no collisions. Shortly after we crossed the runway, I could hear a helicopter approaching. But the fog was too thick to see it until it got much closer to the ground. Fortunately it didn’t need the runway. It had its own area in which to land and we were far enough away to not cause any problems there either.
We were headed for Jarlshof, to which I have dedicated its own post. Near Jarlshof and visible from it once the rain and fog cleared was Sumburgh Head. This was another location that figured quite prominently in Series Three of “Shetland”. Both the lighthouse, which was built by the grandfather of Robert Louis Stevenson in 1821, and a café that stood in for a hotel were featured in that series. The six episodes of that series were quite spellbinding, both when it came to the characters (and actors playing them) and the locations used.
The afternoon excursion mostly consisted of seeing Shetland Ponies (also with their own post). But on the way there and on the way back to the ship, we saw the landscape of the northern portion of the Mainland island.
Along the way to see the ponies I spotted a crannog. Crannogs were built throughout Scotland, usually in freshwater lochs. In Shetland however, just over half the crannogs were built in coastal waters and all were built during the Iron Age. The crannog is what lies underneath as opposed to the building on top. In the photo, the crannog is in the water to the right.
Crannogs are little islets that are partially or completely artificial. They have been built up with rocks in order to be sturdy enough for a dwelling to be built on top. Most of the buildings were wooden and so no longer exist. The bridge out to the crannog was also wooden. A crannog tends to have a relatively unique look to it and so is fairly recognizable to someone who has seen others. Since I have seen them all over Scotland on previous visits, I have learned to recognize them.
Before returning to the ship, our last stop was for a photo at Scalloway. Scalloway was the former capital of Shetland up until 1838. It has been inhabited since Neolithic times and is only a mile or so from the Viking and Norse parliament site, Ting site, in the Tingwall Valley. The village has a population of about 1,200 and the remains of a castle, which also played a part in the” Shetland” TV series – in Series Five, which had to do with a ring of people traffickers.
Next time – Jarlshof
