The message from the public meeting last night to discuss the possibility of a new leisure pool for Kirkwall, was clear - people want to see it developed at Kirkwall Grammar School.

That is in stark contrast to the results of The Orcadian online poll held earlier this month, when 77 per cent of respondents said that a new pool should be built at the Pickaquoy Centre.

However, all 22 people who turned up for the meeting in the Kirkwall Town Hall, agreed that new facilities are needed.

Three acts to go through to the final of Battle of the Bands next week were chosen on Thursday night in the second heat of the event.

Wench, Hivida and The Duffers were selected from six bands, and will compete against Bigg Muff, Peter's Finger and Immunition for the grand prize next Thursday, May 6.

The order of appearance in the final will be, Bigg Muff, Wench, Peter's Finger, The Duffers, Hivida and Immunition. Tickets for the final are on sale from Grooves, priced £5.

Hall of Clestrain, Orphir

The Hall of Clestrain has been selected as one of the historic buildings to feature in the BBC television programme Restoration.

The news was broken at a packed official launch of the Orkney Boat Museum project in Stromness on Wednesday night.

The museum hopes to display up to 40 boats, showing 5,000 years of boatbuilding and would be part of a larger project involving the restoration of the derelict Hall of Clestrain - the family home of John Rae, the man who discovered the fate of the Franklin Expedition.

Click here for full details

An octogenenarian Danish accordian player will play outside Denmark for the first time at this year's Orkney Folk Festival.

Karl Skaarup's visit to Orkney is believed to be the first trip outside Denmark and a Danish film crew will follow him to the festival.

The Orkney Folk Festival programme was launched on Thursday and includes details of the 20 visiting acts as well as the local acts, events and sessions

Link: www.orkneyfolkfestival.com

The running total for cash raised during the recent Ingrid Rosie cancer fundraising weekend stands at £5,370.28.

Organisers are delighted with the total and have vowed to continue their efforts in memory of Stromness woman Ingrid Rosie, who died at the age of 25 last year, following a battle with cancer.

British Telecom have confirmed today that broadband Internet access in Kirkwall will go live next month.

But although Kirkwall will go live on May 26, it could take up to the end of summer 2005 before all seven Orkney exchanges which achieved their trigger levels are enabled.

BT has leased spare capacity on a wireless link to Orkney which will then connect islanders to the BT broadband network on the Scottish mainland.

British Telecom have confirmed today that broadband Internet access in Kirkwall will go live next month.

But although Kirkwall will go live on May 26, it could take up to the end of summer 2005 before all seven Orkney exchanges which achieved their trigger levels are enabled.

BT has leased spare capacity on a wireless link to Orkney which will then connect islanders to the BT broadband network on the Scottish mainland.

A Kirkwall bar has scooped the Northern Isles pub of the year title from the Aberdeen, Grampian and northern isles branch of the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA).

The Bothy Bar, which is part of the Albert Hotel, was nominated by its regulars because of the range of real ales on offer.

Householders are being warned to lock their doors after a series of thefts in Stromness.

Properties have been entered and cards and cash stolen.

Like many properties in Orkney, the burgled houses were unlocked so police are urging people to lock their doors and deter would-be thieves.

On the subject of areas without a broadband enabled exchange Mr Wallace said: "The Executive has been actively considering the measures required to bring broadband to every community in Scotland as well as activities to further increase take-up. We will announce our plans on this shortly."

Changing owners - Tods of Orkney's Kirkwall premises

Tods of Orkney are to close their Kirkwall bakery at the end of July.

It is understood that the move, which will see staff redundancies, follows an approach made to the company to buy the entire site in the centre of the town. The identity of the buyers is not yet known.

The company's Stromness oatcake business - which received an £80,300 grant from Orkney Enterprise last year - will continue.

Councillor Jim Sinclair

Orkney Islands Council's vice convener has called for a ban on new wind farms in Orkney until a county wide plan is in place.

At Tuesday's full council meeting Councillor Jim Sinclair stressed that there was no still no OIC policy on wind generators, before likening the situation to the oil boom in the 1970s.

He added: "The officials spent a long time negotiating to enable Orkney to benefit from oil. But we have not formulated any sort of policy (on this) and we hear rumours of wind farms all over the place but there is very little economic benefit to the Orkney economy."

Carl Howley (19), and his girlfriend Samantha Dickson, stole over £6,000 from a number of bank accounts after taking cards from the home of 78-year-old Inverness pensioner Christian Walker. The offences took place between Christmas Day and January 8.

Sheriff Alasdair MacFadyen called for background reports asked for background reports and deferred sentence until May 8.

Councillor Bob Sclater said that the OIC had identified bus projects it would like to see developed if additional funding should become available.

He said "These include new bus routes serving the outlying areas, improved frequency on existing routes and the introduction of newer vehicles with better accessibility. This new scheme offers the council the opportunity to develop at least some of these projects."

The draw for this year's Parish Cup - Orkney's best known football competition - took place in Kirkwall on Monday night.

The opening fixtures were drawn by Mr James Miller, managing director of competition sponsors The Orcadian. Full draw results are available here.

This year's Parish Cup looks has a record number of entries with 17 of the county's parishes fielding teams.

Full draw results online now

The VisitScotland 2004 expo attracted over 1,000 international buyers.

Orkney Tourist Board's marketing head Sheila Faichney said: "We were the busiest we have ever been at an exhibition, flat out, with over 130 serious new leads over the two days of the show, a third more than the total for 2003."

As well as information on all bus, air and ferry services in the county, the timetable also includes information on the air and ferry services and bus and rail connections between Aberdeen, Thurso/Scrabster and Inverness, Edinburgh and Glasgow.

Copies of the new timetable will be circulated in the week's edition of The Orcadian or is available online here..

A selection of paintings from the hugely popular book The Shore and Roond Aboot are among those on display in Kirkwall this week.

The paintings by the book's author, and former Orkney librarian, David Tinch, form the exhibition More Reflections on Orkney in the St Magnus Centre.

Open from 9am to 6pm, the exhibition finishes on Saturday, May 1.

NorthLink has finalised arrangement to charter a specialised livestock ship to provide the extra capacity required during the busy autumn livestock season.

The Zebu Express, who operated the serve last year, has been chartered again and will start work in the first week in September.

NorthLink will publish details of this year's sailing schedules and arrangements in due course.

A new book looking at life in Finstown almost 75 years ago was launched in the village on Saturday.

Finstown, the village at the Crossroads by Allan Taylor describes the life of a boy in pre-war Finstown and paints brief portraits of families living there in 1934-1940. Also included is a detailed village map and a list of all the residents of each house.