Our next big day is Norway's National Day , the 17th May. We begin our day at St Olaf's cemetery in Kirkwall at 10.30am when we have a short ceremony to honour the 19Norwegians who are buried there. Then we go back into Kirkwall for our Tog, followed by speeches and entertainment outside the St Magnus Cathedral. We then have a lunchtime concert in the Town Hall. In the evening we have a dinner dance at the Standing Stones Hotel in Stenness. There is a public service bus at 18.30 from the bus station on Junction road in Kirkwall which will get you to Stenness just at the right time, and ONFA have hired a bus to take people back to Kirkwall just after midnight. 

We are expecting many Norwegian visitors this day so get your tickets, price £17.50 in good time from the Orcadian bookshop in Kirkwall.

We will have posters around the town and also on this website and Facebook with more information.

Look forward to seing you on 17th.

SAT 18 MAY 'Snøhulemannen' ('The Snow Caveman')
Directed by Fridtjof Kjæreng

£5 (£3 under 16) 7:30 for a 7:45 start. Bring your own refreshments.

Tables will have samples of Norwegian cake - donations in aid of the Multiple Sclerosis Society.

The Snow Caveman has lived in snowcaves high up in the icy Norwegian mountains for 20 years. Like Nietzsche's Zarathustra, he has developed his own morale code and a biting sense of humour. His life is far from the bourgeois materialistic life in the new Scandinavian welfare states. He is a true ecologist, in his own way, living amongst the blizzards and reindeer high in the Norwegian mountains.

The Snow Caveman is shocked to receive the news that his mother has died. She leaves behind a clear message to him in the form of an ultimatum: In her last will and testament he inherits her apartment in the city, valued at € 100 000, but on the condition that he lives in the apartment or uses the money to purchase permanent housing and settles down like a normal person. What will The Snow Caveman do? Give up his life as a free spirit in the mountains - or forfeit the money from his inheritance? The film about the Snow Caveman centres on the quest for liberty and the human cost of complete freedom.

Watch the trailer here: http://vimeo.com/20828466

Awards
2010 Meetings with Mountain Film Festival - Zakopane: Award of the Mayor of the City of Zakopane, Youth Jury Award
2012 Kathmandu International Mountain Film Festival: Jury's Special Mention

Filmmaker Fridtjof Kjæreng has twenty years experience as a director and producer in the Norwegian film and TV industry and is regarded as one of the most progressive directors working in Norway today. The Snow Cave Man is arguably his most well known production which became an audience hit in Norwegian cinemas.

Happy to share that for 2013 and hopefully 2014 we will still have the Scheduled Flights  from Kirkwall to Bergen via Shetland. More details of timetable and average fares to follow, but we do know the flights will be as before, on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Details and booking from Flybe website www.flybe.co.uk

Orkney residents should note that they can use the Air Discount Scheme on these routes.