Wheelhouse, South Uist

I'd spotted signs from the road for something called the Hallan Wheelhouses. I had no idea what these were but decided to investigate. Following signs down side roads and a track I parked outside a modern church with a large graveyard, seemingly in the middle of nowhere.

I then walked down a sandy track assuming I'd know when I got to the wheelhouses. I did even though they weren't signed. There were actually three information boards on the opposite side of the track but they had been placed on the ground behind a bit of a dune, so are not visible unless you go around there. I like poking around and so I found them.

The remains of the wheelhouses are thought to date to the early years of the first millenium. Archaeologists have found evidence of them being lived in for about 1400 years, some of the most continually lived in properties in Britain.

the houses are round and have thick stone walls with entrance passage ways and fireplaces. They also have burial places within them and bodies have been excavated. This seems to have been a way of honouring a respected dead person or as some sort of good luck charm. The houses are known as wheelhouses because of the round sides and spoke-like chambers leading of the main central room. Others have been identified in the area but many are buried underneath the drifting sands and these are the best exposed examples.

I could see that if I continued to follow the track I would have come to the beach, but as time was getting on and I'd only stopped for a quick look, I left and walked back the way I'd come.

The following day I followed a short walk in my walking book entitled 'The Wheelhouse'. this started slightly further south than my walk the previous evening and at first I thought it might be a walk leading to the same wheelhouse. A check of the map showed that this was a different location albeit not very far away.

For this walk, I parked on the side of the one of roads I had driven down yesterday. I then set off across the machair and cultivated fields along a good track for about 1km. Coming to a crossroads of tracks I turned right along a distinct track though it wasn't as good as the one I'd just been walking along. I knew the wheelhouse was somewhere off to the left along here and the book warned me it could be hard to see. I kept veering off to look at any mounds of hollows, but when I came upon the wheelhouse it was actually really obvious. It wasn't as distinct as the ones yesterday, but was still clearly a wheelhouse.

I continued on my way turning right after a short way to head north along the dunes and the beach. Finally I left the dunes to join up with a path leading east and back to my car.

As I walked along this path I kept getting glimpses of the graveyard where I'd parked yesterday. If I was to do this walk again I'd join both together. Walking a bit further along the beach I'm sure I could have come inland at the sandy track I'd followed to get to the Hallan Wheelhouses. It would then have been a relatively short walk along the quiet lanes to get back to my car.

Stonehenge and Greenland

Womad falls at the wrong part of summer. I'd much rather it was at the beginning of the summer holidays and then I could head south for the festival and then go up to Scotland for the rest of the summer. As it is I'm going to have nine days of holiday time before the festival. I'd spend the first few days at home anyway as I always have lots to do and sort out before I can go away. But nine days! I'll feel like I'm wasting my precious time off. So I'm going to head down to the Wiltshire / Somerset area and have a few days wandering around before Womad starts.

I'd been wondering what to do for these few days, but not doing any actual research as I've got other trips to plans first. I've just watched a documentary on iplayer about some new archaelogical excavations on Orkney and the programme was linking what was being found there with the later stone age 'buildings' of Stonehenge and Avebury and so on. I like this kind of stuff so I started thinking about doing some kind of walk linking the various neolithic remains together. Then just as I was flicking through my 'Walk' magazine (it's the magazine issued by the Ramblers) I came across an article about a proposed Great Stones Way which does exactly that. It links Avebury to Old Sarum via Stonehenge, Silbury Hill, Salisbury Plain, the Kennet and Avon Canal, Woodhenge and Durrington Walls. It all seems quite easy to do on existing paths except for for the slight problem of the MOD firing range on Salisbury Plain. The route is about 38 miles and so three easy days would do it, though it should also be possible to walk it in two if need be.

Feeling happy as I always do when a plan starts to formulate in my mind, I turned the page. An article on Greenland. More specifically an article on walking the Arctic Circle Trail which seems to be a cheap way to see Greenland. I've been looking at ways of getting to Greenland for a few years and haven't yet managed to come up with a cheap way of doing it. I'd have to fly from Copenhagen and all in all flights would be about £1000. But once there the walking is free, I can wild camp or stay in free huts and even the canoe I would need to paddle across one of the lakes is free. I'd take my own lightweight dried food and so would only need to buy fuel for my stove. The trail is 165km long and to divide it into a hut-to-hut traverse would mean taking nine days. With a few days spent at either end that would give me about a fortnight in Greenland. I could then spend the rest of the summer cycling and camping in Denmark. I'm already feeling quite excited about this. I won't be able to do it this summer, but I don't have anything on my calendar for next year yet!