Tour Scotland wee video of old photographs of Sanday, one of the inhabited islands of Orkney that lies off the north coast of mainland. The main centres of population are Lady Village and Kettletoft. Sanday can be reached by Orkney Ferries or by plane from Kirkwall on the Orkney Mainland. Kettletoft village, with its pier and harbour, served the local fishing fleet as the main port on the island in the 19th and 20th centuries. It importance as a port has diminished since the construction of a new pier and ferry terminal at Loth at the south end of the island was completed in the 1990s. Quoyness Chambered Cairn on Sanday approximately 5,000 years old, is located by the coast. At the heart of the Quoyness cairn is the main chamber. Standing approximately four metres high, this chamber is accessed by crawling through a nine metre long, low, entrance passage. Inside, six smaller chambers open off from the main chamber. Dug into the chamber’s clay floor is a shallow pit and a short trench, both of which date from the tomb's original construction. The Picts were the pre Norse inhabitants of Sanday but very few placenames remain from this period. The Norse named the island Sandey or Sand-øy because of the predominance of sandy beaches and this became " Sanday " during the Scots and English speaking periods. The similarly named Sandoy is in the Faroe Islands. Seals and otters can be found in and around Sanday. During World War II, the Royal Air Force built a Chain Home radar station at Whale Head on Sanday.
All photographs are copyright of Sandy Stevenson, Tour Scotland, and may not be used without permission.
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