St.John's Head - 4 Things to Know Before Visiting

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About St.John's Head

St Johns Head lies 3km to the north-east of the Old Man of Hoy and is best viewed from the Scrabster to Stromness ferry. The headland is breached by only four routes, three of which begin around the grassy ramps at the bottom of the north face. The horizontal beds of sandstone at St John’s Head have weathered to give dramatic vertical red and yellow cliffs, which are especially vibrant with a low evening sun.

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Attractions Near St.John's Head

Cuilags

Cuilags

2.54km from St.John's Head

Cuilags is a summit in the Hoy region or range in Scotland. Cuilags is 435 metres high. A good trekking destination and also there are so many other options too. All the walking routes up Cuilags on Mud and Routes can be found below. The top can be identified by the large cairn (third from E) on possibly man-made mound.

Old Man of Hoy

Old Man of Hoy

2.57km from St.John's Head

A famous 450 foot sea stack- is perhaps Orkney's most famous landmark. It is one of the tallest sea stacks in the British Isles and possibly the most famous. The Old Man is popular with climbers, and was first climbed in 1966. Created by the erosion of a cliff through hydraulic action some time after 1750, the stack is not more than a few hundred years old, but may soon collapse into the sea.

Dwarfie Stane

Dwarfie Stane

6.38km from St.John's Head

This 500 years old monument lies in a steep sided valley between Quoys and Rackwick on the island of Hoy. A huge block of hollowed-out red sandstone measuring about 8.5 metres long, the Dwarfie Stane is thought to be Britain’s only example of a rock-cut tomb. It should be stressed, however, that not all archaeologists share this opinion. The stone is a glacial erratic located in desolate peatland. The site is managed by Historic Environment Scotland.

Graemsay

Graemsay

7.64km from St.John's Head

Graemsay is on of the smaller of the Orkney Islands, which was located between the Orkney mainland and Hoy and features plenty of nature and wildlife attractions. The island is 409 ha in area and is mainly crofted. The island's geology is Old Red Sandstone of the Devonian period, with two volcanic faults. On the north coast there is granite-schist, a great rarity in Orkney.

Ness Battery

Ness Battery

8.1km from St.John's Head

Ness Battery in Stromness is one of Britain's best-preserved wartime sites and a guided tour offers a fascinating insight into the lives of the soldiers who defended Scapa Flow in two World Wars. Several of the original wooden huts which formed the accommodation camp are still intact, and in one of these is a painted mural covering three walls, depicting rural English scenes. An extensive programme of stabilisation and renovation was completed in 2012 and the site is now open for guided tours.

Stromness Museum

Stromness Museum

8.76km from St.John's Head

A beautiful small independent museum, which including First World War artefacts from the scuttled German High Seas Fleet, items from Orkney's involvement in the Hudson's Bay Company, and collections brought home from Orcadians travelling abroad. It also houses numerous Victorian natural history collections of birds and eggs, mammals, shells, fossils, butterflies and moths, as well as antiquarian collections of artefacts.

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Orkney

Orkney

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Orkney, also known as the Orkney Islands, is an archipelago in the Northern Isles of Scotland, situated off the north coast of the island of Great Britain. Orkney is 10 miles north of the coast of Caithness and has about 70 islands, of which 20 are inhabited. The largest island, Mainland, is often referred to as "the Mainland", and has an area of 523 square kilometres, making it the sixth-largest Scottish island and the tenth-largest island in the British Isles. Orkney’s largest settlement, and

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For more information about St.John's Head, visit: https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/crags/st_johns_head-3034