HMS Proserpine ahoy!
Jul. 31st, 2025 07:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shewhomustYesterday, at durham_rambler's request, we visited the new, modernised Scapa Flow Museum. To do this, we drove to the ferry at Houton, as the morning mist was just lifting, and tatters of cloud still veiled the high hills of Hoy - from which, in fact, they didn't quite clear all day. But the sun was beginning to break through as we boarded the ferry as foot passengers, and half an hour later we disembarked and walked up the hill to the museum.
This was not our first visit. The first visit recorded in this journal, in 2008, seems not to have been the first either; and in 2022 we left Hoy the day before the reopening. About time for a return visit, then.
In its current incarnation, the core of the museum is the naval base at Lyness. The navy finds it easier to cope with ships, so all naval premises are regarded as ships, and Lyness was HMS Proserpine. I wondered if this was a quiet dig at the Orkney climate: six months of summer, but six months of every year in Hades? Apparently not. I asked Ross, one of the attendants, and he produced a copy of an account of the naming process. In 1939 various names were proposed and rejected before the Admiralty decided on Proserpine (I think there was a pattern locally of initial P). It wasn't entirely successful, causing postal difficulties as letters turned up addressed to 'Prosperine', 'Phospherine' and even 'Porcupine'...
Anyway, it's a big museum with many things in it, and even so I remembered from previous visits thing that I could not now find (mostly, I thought I remembered more about the details of everyday life on the base). But here are three of the highlights:
We made our way back to the ferry terminal, and were delighted to see that first off the incoming ferry was the mobile library, the celebrated Booky McBookface. Back on Mainland, we drove along the south coast, calling in at the Round Church at Orphir, and managed to snag an early evening table at the Foveran Hotel: big juicy scallops, served with really good vegetables and a zesty Chilean sauvignon blanc, and lemon posset for afters. And a huge picture window looking out onto the Flow...
durham_rambler's request, we visited the new, modernised Scapa Flow Museum. To do this, we drove to the ferry at Houton, as the morning mist was just lifting, and tatters of cloud still veiled the high hills of Hoy - from which, in fact, they didn't quite clear all day. But the sun was beginning to break through as we boarded the ferry as foot passengers, and half an hour later we disembarked and walked up the hill to the museum.This was not our first visit. The first visit recorded in this journal, in 2008, seems not to have been the first either; and in 2022 we left Hoy the day before the reopening. About time for a return visit, then.
In its current incarnation, the core of the museum is the naval base at Lyness. The navy finds it easier to cope with ships, so all naval premises are regarded as ships, and Lyness was HMS Proserpine. I wondered if this was a quiet dig at the Orkney climate: six months of summer, but six months of every year in Hades? Apparently not. I asked Ross, one of the attendants, and he produced a copy of an account of the naming process. In 1939 various names were proposed and rejected before the Admiralty decided on Proserpine (I think there was a pattern locally of initial P). It wasn't entirely successful, causing postal difficulties as letters turned up addressed to 'Prosperine', 'Phospherine' and even 'Porcupine'...
Anyway, it's a big museum with many things in it, and even so I remembered from previous visits thing that I could not now find (mostly, I thought I remembered more about the details of everyday life on the base). But here are three of the highlights:
Despite the new extension, the museum is still built into the pumphouse. There's a limit to how much I want to know about the management of fuel oil, but there machinery itself has a certain visual appeal. I see that I felt the same way back in 2008.- You can no longer go into the big oil drum which looms over the site. But if you ask what is in that shed over there, a member of staff (the ever-helpful Ross) will get the keys and show you. All sorts of treasure, but we both loved the Otter Bank. It's a boat! which is also a bank!
- You find a comics connection everywhere. The Museum has Jim Baikie's The Dome. Explanation by museum curator Ellen Pesci, who happens to be Jim's daughter; biographical piece about Jim Baikie from Orkney Museums Service (scroll down for a better image of The Dome).
We made our way back to the ferry terminal, and were delighted to see that first off the incoming ferry was the mobile library, the celebrated Booky McBookface. Back on Mainland, we drove along the south coast, calling in at the Round Church at Orphir, and managed to snag an early evening table at the Foveran Hotel: big juicy scallops, served with really good vegetables and a zesty Chilean sauvignon blanc, and lemon posset for afters. And a huge picture window looking out onto the Flow...
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Date: 2025-07-31 08:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-08-01 05:00 pm (UTC)Old boats can be surprisingly durable, can't they?