It was another chilly night, though when I woke up in the middle of it for a pee I opened the tent to a beautiful full moon landscape not unlike that which might have greeted neolithic man at the door of his smoky roundhouse thousands of years ago. I sat for a while, watching the clouds move across the moon and strike halloweenesque poses - then went to the toilet block like neolithic man definately wouldn't have.

I'd booked myself on the first Rousay ferry out, expecting it to be heaving with tourists like the Hoy one was. Not so though, in the end there was only me and a couple of cyclists there which was unfortunate as I normally work out what to do by copying the guy in front. So I didn't know that with these tiny 9 car ferries you had to reverse into the boat until one of the crew told me. Going down a wet slipway backwards in a car, then up a clanky and slightly shifting gangway onto the boat - that was something I had to work out on the fly myself. I wouldn't fancy doing THAT with a caravan.

The journey was lovely. A tad shorter than the Hoy one and slightly more sheltered. I didn't have my destination Island looming over me muttering 'Feck off ye bastards' under its breath all the time either, Rousay seemed quite fluffy and welcoming. And I could smell something nice cooking in the ships cab, and the person collecting money offered me a student discount - everything seemed to be boding well for this trip.

Mind you, I say that but I didn't get what he was saying at first. 'Schtood-ah!' he growled at me and I looked blank. 'Schtood-ah!' he demanded of me again and I considered bursting into tears. This is the one thing that really bugs me about Orcadians, if you don't undertand, they don't help you at all by adding a little context round the word like 'Are ye a schtood-ah?', they just keep barking said random word at you until you work it out. Like the woman in the Co-op the other day who kept saying 'Kishba!' at me and expecting me to reply. I was almost tempted to reply in French or make up a similarly nonsensical word and say this back at her but she wouldn't proceed until she got the correct reponse, and kept saying this word at me - kishba. I looked around me for possible context...she was processing my card payment. 'Oh! Cash back?' I finally guessed and she nodded frantically. All sorted but a simple 'Di ye woan't kishba?' would have helped. Bah.

Oh and this is one of only three places in the world where I sound posh. The other two are America ('gee is that an Ingerlish accent? Ain't that so cute') and Wigan.

Anyway, back to the Rousay ferry. Another great thing about the journey was - and I can barely believe I was lucky enough to see this but - half way during the crossing I saw a Sea Eagle attack a gull! Some sort of bird type fracas caught my eye, and then it became clear that this big brown bird with white wing tips was trying to pull a gull out of mid air. When the gull managed to out run it, it gave up and did a low swoop over the sea, trailing its claws in the water. Then it flew off a short distance, met another eagle, and they did a little dance together in the air before flying off together. Like, wow man! I saw another couple of eagles of a cliff edge a bit later so clearly Rousay and her straits are eagle central.

I half hoped I would get to see locals waiting at the Rousay ferry terminal ready for a day's commute to the mainland, but there wasn't anyone there. Feasibly one van on it's way down as I drove away (looked like a local) but otherwise, nothing. How come big unfriendly Hoy gets all the visitors and friendly rural Rousay does not? I don't get it. From the hill at the top of the ferry stop, I watched the ferry back out of the tiny little harbour, do an 180 degree turn then go straight across a much shorter strait to Egilsay, a 5 min journey with likely as not no waiting passengers at that jetty either. Rousay was already feeling like the back of beyond and I hadn't even strayed from the harbour yet.

Midhowe cairn was first on the agenda. The carpark was completely empty so I feared that it might be shut because it was too early in the morning, but that's not how things work on Rousay. On this island, all its precious cairns have been enclosed in hefty protective buildings but none of them are locked, so you can pad around these structures quietly at whatever time of the day, and shut up after yourself when you are done. It feels a bit like letting yourself into a church and looking around, or like you have just broken into a museum after hours and are having a look around on your own. It's quite nice, if a little spooky.

Midhowe is protected by a subtancial stone barn with big thick doors - but you let yourself in and find this marvellous chambered cairn inside with gangways over the top of it so you can look in. And there are no screaming kids running around or anyone else getting in the way, it's just the sound of your footsteps and the wind howling over the roof of the barn. Its a very sublime experience - you can really concentrate on what it must have been like to be there at the time.

Midhowe broch is just next door. Brochs are huge hyper fortified Viking stone huts - walls which are feet thick with steps in them so you can run up the interior to the top, where presumably you can stand and shout rude names down at your aggressors until they decide to go away and pillage elsewhere. It was okay. I wouldn't say no to a Broch at the bottom of the garden to skulk in but only if they were on sale or something. Otherside a shed would do fine.

And on the shore just below the broch, tourists had been doing ad hoc henges as I've seen all around Orkney (I first saw a knee high henge on the beach next to Scara Brae and thought 'oh that's clever' and I've been seeing them all over the place since). I had to join in so I built myself a little mini chambered cairn and even put a couple of bones in it (gull probably). I'm wondering if people will be excavating again in another millenium and trying to work out why all sorts of ancient Orkney stone age sites are surrounded by lots of tiny little replica henges. 'Offering to the Gods' they'll probaby say. 'Ceremonial'.

After Midhowe, I drove to a beach which was meant to have a 'sandy sheltered bay with nearby seal haul out area'. The beach was sandy and sheltered only by Orkney standards (it was a mere two jumperer). I was dying to see a seal haul out area, but walked a few hundred metres down the beach and saw nothing except a group of testy oyster catchers and a bit of washed up boat.

Just as I was about to give up though, I spotted a grey head sticking up out of the sea, and them soon after, a seal dragged itself up out of the water only a short distance away from me and proceeded to bask in the sun. Another beached its self a distance further out to sea on some exposed rock, and another couple of grey heads remained bobbing up and down in the water as the sunbathers watched. It was really nice to watch. I stayed until my fingers started to turn white, then moved on.

The Knowe of Yarso is another cairn sheltered away from the weather by a big concrete dome which has then been grassed over to not wreck the landscape. This chambered cairn felt small and personal. Because I was the only one there it almost felt like I was intruding and should be apologising to someone so I did, just in case. Then I stood around for a reasonable length of time soaking up the atmosphere - there was definately a vibe to this cairn, but a good one, I liked it.

Blackhammer cairn - much the same again only you enter from the roof and a sliding metal door, then go down some steels steps to get to the long low chambered cairn. This one felt less personal though it was bigger that Yarso.

Finally, Taversoe Tuick - much the same again only it is on two levels and you decend down into the second level via some wobbly metal steps. Then you can sit in a dark hole where bodies and bones were once piled up, and hope that the door doesn't blow shut and trap you in because the next tourist to come along could be quite a while and I imagine it can get very creepy there at night.

Yep, I spent a full day on Rousay and never saw a soul. It was wierd and unexpected - I guess cairns just aren't a big enough draw for your average tourist, they need guides and interpretive centres and tea shops before they'll consider the ferry journey. And I thought that the tourists round here were tougher than that. I'd been looking at all the names in the museum visitors books yesterday and the majority were Scottish or Shetlandic, hardly any poofy Unglish. They should have been crawling over the cairns in droves.

On the ferry journey back, I finally had some companions. There were two other cars (so at no point had this tiny weeny ferry been full to capacity yet, or even half full) and one elderly lady, quite genteel looking, who was waved off at the pier and had a huge suitcase with her. It crossed my mind she might be going on holiday somewhere, and how troublesome that would be if e.g. you wanted to go to America and you were a Rousay resident. Ferry to mainland Orkney, taxi to Kirkwall airport, plane to mainland UK, flight to America. I can see why you can get into the Island mentality that anything beyond your immediate borders isn't worth knowing about. Indeed if there are only three ferries per day from your 20km Island to the mainland it makes things a bit of a fag and you'll start minimising the amount of times you do it, even if that's just for bread, milk and petrol. Before you know it, the last time you ventured more than 5 miles from your doorstep was 23 years ago and you weren't aware the Falklands war had ended. It's easy done.

I finished off the day with Stromness museum. It's a lovely little place, more of a reference library than a museum with hoary handed fishermen in there looking up their ancestors side by side with bored tourists killing time before the ferry home. It had a stuffed animal section so I revised my knowledge of seabirds. Have to admit I was confusing my snipes with rails, but my plovers, oyster catchers, curlews, shags, guillemots, skewers and shearwaters are still in order. I've always had trouble telling different species of gull apart, but I think that's forgivable.

There was one particular bird I was after but they didn't have any in the museum - I have been seeing something around which looks like a really big gull, I mean a REALLY big gull with wings out straight like someone had glued a plank on its back and painted it black. And I saw one trying to take off from the water - it was at it ages, running along the water surface and flapping like crazy, it had the takeoff profile of a jumbo jet. All I can think of is albatross but that feels wrong somehow - I thought they were mid ocean birds not cliff/loch birds. I can't think of anything else that big and cumbersome though but I'm sure I'll find the answer out eventually.

Alas it will be time to pack up and leave Evie tomorrow. I've been here so long, nature has started to integrate with my tent - grass is growing round it, beetles are living in it, I have small mushrooms in my vestibule and lichen will soon be forming on the lee side of it. There is a tiny bit of relief I'm going because yesterday someone erected one of those 20ft tents that are meant to sleep 18 people, and in it they have hoards of 2 year olds who run around screaming and falling over your guy ropes, then wailing about it. And having no phone reception at Evie has been a pain, but I suspect that's only going to get worse in Shetland so I may as well get used to it

Otherwise though, it's been a grand little place. Next stop - an overnight cabin on the ferry to Shetland (oh bliss) and as I am running short of socks, I think I'll spend the first night someplace with a washing machine, then head off into the true wilds of Unst and Eshaness. Wouldn't mind having a crack at getting to Foula and/or Fair Isle too but this could be ambitious with the time I have available. With any luck though, all the Shetlanders are in Orkney on holiday so things should be nice and quiet.

Of course as the ferry doesn't set off til quarter to midnight though, so I guess I better line up some entertainment for tomorrow as well. But should I do cliffs or should I do brochs and museums again. Tough choice...we'll have to see which way the wind blows me...