After breakfast, we went for a walk with Lyn. She showed us High Street in Insch. In the distance, I saw the hill with the ruin that we had seen the day before, so I asked her what it was. She said that was where we were going. Ah! The mystery will be solved first-hand. (Man, it looked really far away though.)
The walk was beautiful, though the path to the ruins went straight up and Cristina and I were sucking wind and taking several pauses to enjoy the view along the way. The view was spectacular.
Alex got into some stinging nettle, but Cristina found some plantain to make it all better.
Back in town, we picked up Seyi and Ope from school (and kind of got scolded from a staff member for not signing in). We went home and had lunch, then loaded up in the car to head to Banff to have dinner with Steve's parents, Arlene and Dennis (although it still feels weird to call them anything other than Mr. and Mrs. Malone).
After getting the tour of their new house, we had tea in the back garden.
We mentioned that we had the Explorer pass and meant to see the inside of Duff House, a Georgian estate house that houses a range of art treasures and superbly furnished rooms. We had gone by it 11 years ago, but didn't pay to go inside. Now with the pass, we thought we should finally do it right. They encouraged us to go see it. Duff House is fairly close to the Malone's house, so we headed over to it before dinner. We got there just as it was closing for the day, so it looked like once again our visit to Duff House would be limited to photos of the outside and a good play on the excellent playground nearby.
Dennis was a professional chef during his working days, and the meal did not disappoint. Just smelling the garlic bread cook was mouth-watering. The main course was pasta with slow-cooked chicken breast, like a cacciatore. Dessert was devastatingly rich and sinful: caramel chocolate cheesecake with caramel-ripple ice cream and fresh Scottish strawberries and blackberries. Needless to say, we were all stuffed.
After dinner, the subject of Christmas crackers came up, which we were all unfamiliar with. Arlene went to look for one, but couldn't find one. She did find some old photos of Steve, Dom, and me lip-syncing on a stage in Lecanto high school football stadium.
We headed back to Insch, returning a bit after 9. Lyn's kids go to bed pretty early, so we prepped everyone to enter quietly to not wake up her kids. But the kids had stayed up because they wanted to see us! So sweet. Lyn had dinner leftovers in case we were hungry and she'd baked a cake. She is a super generous host. I blogged a bit upstairs while the kids got ready for bed. Cristina washed clothes downstairs and chatted with Lyn until way too late.
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