The Sands of Evie is a sandy beach

Beach

A beach is a geological landform along the shoreline of an ocean, sea, lake or river. It usually consists of loose particles which are often composed of rock, such as sand, gravel, shingle, pebbles or cobblestones...

 landform

Landform

A landform or physical feature in the earth sciences and geology sub-fields, comprises a geomorphological unit, and is largely defined by its surface form and location in the landscape, as part of the terrain, and as such, is typically an element of topography...

 protected by the Point of Hellia

Point of Hellia

The Point of Hellia is a headland on the northwest coast of the Orkney Mainland, Scotland. This landform extends into the southern part of Eynhallow Sound, a seaway of the North Sea.Gurness, an Iron Age broch promontory fort, is situated on the Point of Hellia...

 headland

Headland

A headland is a point of land, usually high and often with a sheer drop, that extends out into a body of water.Headland can also refer to:*Headlands and bays*headLand, an Australian television series...

 on Mainland Orkney, Scotland

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

. This beach forms the southern boundary of Aikerness Bay

Aikerness Bay

Aikerness Bay is an embayment of Eynhallow Sound on the northwest coast of Mainland Orkney, Scotland. The headlands of Point of Hellia at the east and Grit Ness at the west form the limit points of Aikerness Bay. The beach along the southern boundary of Aikerness Bay is known as the Sands of Evie....

, an element of Eynhallow Sound

Eynhallow Sound

Eynhallow Sound is a seaway lying between Mainland Orkney and the island of Rousay in the Orkney Islands, Scotland. The tidal indraught is "scarcely felt beyond a line joining Costa Head and the Reef of Quendale". An Iron Age broch, Gurness, has a strategic outlook over the Eynhallow Sound....

. Immediately to the east is Gurness, a rather well preserved Iron Age

Iron Age

The Iron Age is the archaeological period generally occurring after the Bronze Age, marked by the prevalent use of iron. The early period of the age is characterized by the widespread use of iron or steel. The adoption of such material coincided with other changes in society, including differing...

 broch

Broch

A broch is an Iron Age drystone hollow-walled structure of a type found only in Scotland. Brochs include some of the most sophisticated examples of drystone architecture ever created, and belong to the classification "complex Atlantic Roundhouse" devised by Scottish archaeologists in the 1980s....

. According to C.Michael Hogan the Gurness Broch is of drystone construction and "the Iron Age round tower fort is flanked by a number of ancillary structures and impressive concentric ditch and rampart outer defences; moreover, the rocky shoreline cliffs posed an formidable approach for marine invaders". A Pict

PICT

PICT is a graphics file format introduced on the original Apple Macintosh computer as its standard metafile format. It allows the interchange of graphics , and some limited text support, between Mac applications, and was the native graphics format of QuickDraw.The original version, PICT 1, was...

ish slab was discovered on the Sands of Evie.