Castle Gordon Walled Garden

I was awake very early this morning, so I had a longer pre-breakfast walk.  It spotted rain most of the time, but was warm and didn’t really come to anything.  At least I wasn’t wet, only a tiny bit damp.  There was no visit to the bakery this morning – you can have too much of a good thing!  A friend had made a couple of suggestions of where to go while we were away, so we decided to follow those up today.  First stop was Castle Gordon garden, near Fochabers.  A lovely old walled garden which has been restored.  It was probably at its peak and was looking amazing.  Lots of flowers, lots of vegetables,, herbs and fruit trees laden with fruit.  A real hidden gem.  We were very happy wandering around it, and it wasn’t too busy.  We even managed a tea and scone in the lovely courtyard café.  Our next destination was Milbuies for a wee walk around the loch.  It was very peaceful and a really lovely spot apart from some very loud kids and a non-socially distanced dog and its owners. Unfortunately the sun seemed to have disappeared while we were there and it was very grey with only hints of blue sky appearing occasionally.  We had planned to have our picnic when we got back to the car, but the picnic site was already taken must to TT’s dismay.
We eventually had a very late picnic at Kingston on Spey, before heading for another walk, along the Moray Coastal trail and up Binn Hill.  An interesting walk as we walked by the anti-tank blocks along the shingle and then we came upon a rifle range, before we headed into the woods and up the hill.  We were promised views from the top (it’s not a very high hill, more of a mound!0, and there were views, but the trees have grown up and obscure much of the view.  On the way down, we took a slightly different route back through the woods and I had totally lost all sense of direction.  I really had no dea where we were.  I was delighted when we eventually emerged back by the village.
We had fish finger sandwiches and chips for tea – quick and easy holiday food.  Then there was more Dr Who and Spiral.
This is the walled garden at Gordon Castle, with a couple of extras from the garden.  The last two extras are at Milbuies and then at Kingston on Spey.