Venues range in size and in history, from a cinema and a theatre to a cathedral and an arts centre by the sea.

The Phoenix Cinema is part of the Pickaquoy Centre in Kirkwall, and the Centre’s arena is also the venue for the Family Day.

Orkney Theatre, linked to Kirkwall Grammar School, is the main evening venue, along with The Orkney Club, down on the waterfront.

The King Street Halls are in Queen Street, and run by Kirkwall East Church. We sometimes use the upstairs hall, and sometimes the downstairs one.

The venue for the Sunday evening concert of music on theme of Helgoland is St Magnus Cathedral, and earlier that day there is the Festival Service.

Just across Palace Road from the Cathedral is the Peedie Kirk, with its hall the venue for lunches of local fare and also the closing ceilidh.

A new venue this year is the Old Library in Laing Street, Kirkwall. It was Kirkwall’s library for many years, and it’s now been refurbished into a meeting place combining elements of the old and the new.

In Stromness there is the Pier Arts Centre which houses a nationally-renowned collection of modern paintings, and Stromness Museum, also set by the sea, with a rich mix of maritime elements and aspects of Orkney’s environment and wildlife.

There is a fine view over the harbour from the Robert Rendall Building, the location of ICIT, Heriot-Watt University’s International Centre for Island Technology.

Island venues include the Hoy Heritage Centre in the Hoy Kirk. A Friday evening boat from Stromness makes it possible to go for the evening and get back on Stromness pier by 10.30, but both ends of the island are worth a longer stay, with the south end including much wartime history and the north end being fine walking territory to explore, with walks to the Old Man of Hoy and the beach at Rackwick and to the ancient woodland of Berriedale.