Flow Country
Inland Caithness is the desolate flat peat bog and moorland of the Flow Country, one of the last true wilderness areas in Europe. While the population of the Flow Country is sparse, it is a popular home for numerous rare plants, insects and birds.
The mound of stones you see in the distance is one of the ‘Grey Cairns of Camster’. The cairns are hauntingly sited on a windswept moor, in the middle of Caithness ‘Flow Country’. This lonely location has likely aided the cairns’ preservation, protecting them from the ravages of modern farming.
There are two cairns, very different in appearance. This one forms a circular structure some 18m in diameter, while the other sprawls along a ridge line for just under 70m. Both were built during the Neolithic era some 5000 years ago, but there are signs that the round cairn is the earlier of the two. Excavations in the 1800s found burnt human remains, flint tools and pottery. Its passage had been deliberately blocked, and inside two skeletons were found, apparently placed in a sitting position.
As you can see, there are boardwalks across the low, marshy ground to the cairns.
Flow Country
Inland Caithness is the desolate flat peat bog and moorland of the Flow Country, one of the last true wilderness areas in Europe. While the population of the Flow Country is sparse, it is a popular home for numerous rare plants, insects and birds.
The mound of stones you see in the distance is one of the ‘Grey Cairns of Camster’. The cairns are hauntingly sited on a windswept moor, in the middle of Caithness ‘Flow Country’. This lonely location has likely aided the cairns’ preservation, protecting them from the ravages of modern farming.
There are two cairns, very different in appearance. This one forms a circular structure some 18m in diameter, while the other sprawls along a ridge line for just under 70m. Both were built during the Neolithic era some 5000 years ago, but there are signs that the round cairn is the earlier of the two. Excavations in the 1800s found burnt human remains, flint tools and pottery. Its passage had been deliberately blocked, and inside two skeletons were found, apparently placed in a sitting position.
As you can see, there are boardwalks across the low, marshy ground to the cairns.