Stonehaven-Day 3 & 4

Yesterday was more of a casual day, hanging around Stonehaven; playing at the park and the shore, strolling through town, watching a movie in the apartment, enjoying a family meal overlooking the harbour.  It is a pleasant surprise to watch the kids enjoy "free" activities as much, if not more, than events we have to pay for.  The joy and excitement they had simply by digging in the sand and playing by the water was a blessing to see.  There was definitely some complaints about all the walking, but nothing a scoop of Aunty Betty's ice cream wouldn't fix.
Today, however, was the exact opposite.  We left the house at 11am and didn't return until 8:30pm.  The kids and I made our way to Aberdeen to a giant amusement park there.  Unfortunately, the outside portion where all the rides were wasn't open because it isn't summertime for their students yet and they don't feel the need to open the entire park when the majority of their customers are still in school.  Thankfully, it didn't seem to phase my 3 - we played miniature putt-putt, endured a terrible game of bowling, played a multitude of arcade games, and climbed around on a giant pirate ship playground.  They had an absolute blast and I'm just glad I survived.  Almost 5 hours in a place like that and I understand why they serve alcohol at the pirate ship playground...just a nip to help the parents survive the day.  Caleb, Emily, and Maddie worked hard to accumulate as many tickets as they could and walked away with over 1,000 tickets for their efforts.  The highlight came when Emily won 200 tickets playing "Deal or No Deal" on her very last coin.  I wish you could have seen the sheer joy and excitement on their faces at accomplishing such a feat...priceless!  We walked out of that place with a backpack full of chinsy carnival prizes but you would have thought they just had a shopping spree at Toys "R" Us (the bow and arrow Caleb got actually works!)  Once we survived that experience, we walked along the beach and then met up with Tim's colleague and his wife for dinner.  We went to TGIFriday's and enjoyed an "American" meal...man can not live on fish-n-chips alone!  We traveled back to Stonehaven and enjoyed one more scoop of ice cream before crashing into bed.  Our time here has come to an end and tomorrow will be a day of repacking and traveling, heading to Glasgow for the weekend.  We've enjoyed the convenience of a washer and dryer this week and I think most of our stuff is clean at this point - one more wonderful thing about our time here in Stonehaven.  I am going to miss this place but look forward to what lies ahead on our journey.  Truly hard to believe we've only been gone for 11 days.  Cheers!