Orkney Image Library

My eldest son returned from Australia some four or five years ago bearing the ashes of my mother who died in Sydney, along with her request they be scattered at the shore at Deerness where we spent many happy hours long years ago. When the deed was done we went on a wee sightseeing tour while waiting for the ferry from Stromness. We visited Stenness then the Ring of Brodgar and my youngest son rather fancifully described it as a magical ring with strange powers! I sat in the car while my two sons went up to the Stones and a minibus drew up alongside and the lady driver came over and we had a chat while her people went up to the Ring. She told me she was from Deerness and I remarked that I had lived there with my grandparents during the war, and she asked where. I told her the cottage was named Nethersands and she went pale! She gasped that she had bought that house only three weeks previously.........

A magical Ring? Maybe not so fanciful after all! Of all the people in Orkney to bump into, well, I am lost for words, really!

An encounter i remember well and certainly one of great coincidence or mystery. Don't know if I went pale or not, but certainly every hair stood on end (the lady driver)