2 Best Sights in Orkney and Shetland Islands, Scotland

This café has an unmanned museum space that heaves with an impressive collection of vintage radios (hugely important to an island community), knitting, spinning, and fishing paraphernalia. The café is popular with locals and visitors alike and sells cakes and soups while trading in knitted and crafty keepsakes made by entrepreneurial Shetlanders. In the mezzanine room is an interesting exhibition on the historic Hoswick whale case, when in 1888 the local fishermen took on an oppressive laird (estate owner) and won.

Military history buffs will appreciate the Scapa Flow Visitor Centre, which displays military vehicles and guns from both world wars. You'll also find equipment salvaged from the German boats scuttled off the coast. In the plain but poignant graveyard here, British and German personnel both rest in peace. If you want to take your car over to Hoy, book well in advance with Orkney Ferries, as this is a popular route. The visitor center is a short walk from the ferry terminal on the island of Hoy.