Property Details
The exact age of the establishment now known
as Dunnet Head Tearooms is not known, however it goes back some hundreds of
years. It was rebuilt in 1930. It is also known as "Windhaven"
and the "old post office" The whole building including the house was renovated
in 1930, when it was converted into the"Post Office & general store". The
store supplied fuel and light for the whole village in the form of oil and paraffin.
The internal wall tongue and grove boards were fitted in 1930 with the shelves; the same
boards that you see today, standing the test of time. The walls are about 2 feet of solid
stone. The roof was re-tiled in about 1988. The telephone box outside the Tearoom
was installed in 1930.The post box can still be seen in the corner. Mr. and Mrs. Eden, the
previous proprietors, had considerable work done on the property over the 18 years they
spent at Dunnet Head, and it is now cosy and attractive. Mr. Eden can remember a
time when he was lying in the bath and could see the stars through the roof! |
Caithness Croft
The Tearoom itself was a Caithness Croft. A cow lived on one side and the occupants on the
other; a slate floor still remains under the raised wooden floor built in 1930. An
older part of the building was a separate earlier Croft or bleak house; there was a hole
in the roof for the smoke. This was also the"Old Inn", in the days of sailing
ships; sailors and locals would probably mix and drink ale from the barrel. Now the Ale
room is a utility room. |
Byre communications
What was the cow byre is an office come Radio Shack, (Ham Radio) and communications centre
for E-mail and the Internet. With bunk sleeping facility. Australia for example is in easy
reach, without the need for a telephone line or a mains electricity supply. |
Tearoom
and Restaurant
We are proud to think that our desire to keep the original wallboards in the Tearoom has
pleased customers over the years. To modernise the decor of the tearooms would spoil the
originality of the place. |
Earth House
Less than two miles away along the coast there is an earth house, or Pictish House. There
are quite a few in this region. It is interesting to view the sites that were chosen by
people in those times. The old Inn, now communications room and utility was probably such
a dwelling as its location on the coast, coupled with the fact that it is in part below
ground level. When the doorway was built the builders were not in the habit of using a
spirit level for lintels, symmetry was obviously not important in such times, right angles
and the like were the last thought on their minds.
The conclusion of the above, which is not unreasonable, dates the building or site, in its
different forms, two thousand years of age. Even then another further two thousand years
could be added to this making a total of 4,000 years.
Remarkable perhaps, but worthy of serious investigation. Many Stone Age flints can be
found in this area. Flint is not a part of this areas natural geology; it had to be
brought here. |
Castle Like Rock
The village of Brough is so called because it has a castle like rock; it is understood
that "Brough" means"The place with the Castle like Rock". Caithness
(Keitness) has its ethnic roots substantially in Scandinavia Thurso (Torso) and Wick
(Vikk). Many farms have a suffix that is Nordic. It is a reasonable assumption that
the now indigenous population is a good % Nordic, if it were not so, then the place names
would probably not be as they are, they would have been changed back to Scottish/British,
evidently this did not happen. You may or may not draw the same conclusion. |
