One hell of a busy week with lots of fun, some interesting new people and two anniversaries

The few days we had spent in Bér were busy. The 4th, which was the day we arrived was our 45th wedding anniversary. we cooked a nice meal for ourselves and toasted the event with Canadian Icewine which we have been keeping for a special occasion since 2007.

Chop, potatoes, peas with stinky for Roy, the same just with salmon for me.

On this day we actually took our very first selfie as well, which didn't turn out very good, but it was fun all the same.

The selfie

On Friday we took Nelly and the little car out for a run to Hatvan.  We also discovered the delights of Lidl, which was actually quite nice. I found a German Fennel tea, which I have been drinking ever since like there was no tomorrow.


After the shopping we took Nelly to the Fenyves Fogadó for lunch, which also went off extremely well.

As the little car has just recently come out of mothballs, we spent some time washing, polishing it, followed by internal hoovering and cleaning. Roy also had to do some mole killing, which was much overdue, but only on our return from the Fenyves Fogadó could we buy the necessary pellets for committing the dastardly deed with. I am always upset at killing anything, but this was necessary again and I had to lump it.

The Fenyves Fogadó

 On Saturday we departed to town, as I had a concert in the evening and we also had a very busy week ahead of us, jam packed with activities of all sorts.

The concert was very interesting. This year there are only three violin concerts in the Festetics Palace and this was the first one. The violinist was a young man by the name of  László Nyári and he was very talented and a joy to listen to.

László Nyári

On Sunday I went hashing, but as we only had the 3 of us (Rabies, Baldrick and me) we went on a hike instead. We took the bus out to Tesco's on route 10 and started from there. It was rather steep, as we had to climb a big mountain to start with.  We went past an old cave and took some pictures from there as the views were pretty. At the top of the mountain we had a beer at a newly refurbished and reopened old buffet, which this time got a bit more upmarket and a great deal more expensive.  Descending the big hill was not easy, as we found ourselves surrounded by broken trees, destroyed by an ice storm in December. After the circle we phoned Roy and ended up having a lovely meal in our favourite resto on the other side of the river.

Baldrick and my good self on the Hash

Baldrick and Rabies pondering the route

Some interesting rooves in the distance

On Monday I managed to buy some new Opera season tickets for next season, as we all got a bit fed up with the old ones. This time we have all of them on a Shakespeare theme, 5 operas (3 Verdi and 2 modern ones, a German and an English one) plus 2 ballets, between next October and spring next year. I hope it will turn out to be a good decision.

Tuesday  was a busy day with Stephen arriving and me going to the Opera in the evening. Stephen came over as he was having a gig on Wednesday evening and he came early to acclimatise. The performance of  Bánk Bán was very good. I  forgot how nationalistic Erkel was, although this time probably the current prevailing political climate didn't help either.  Still, there were a few very good singers on stage, the best being a foreign guy whose name escapes me, but whose voice was powerful but like velvet. I must look him up, as his name was totally unfamiliar to me.

Bánk Bán

Wednesday was the day of Stephen's gig at the Brody Studios, which turned out to be a fantastic venue. When Roy went along and nosed around a bit he described it as an upmarket ruin pub.  Well, I think he was spot on. The place was in an old XIXth century block which they have renovated to have an interesting archaic and grunge look.  Some walls had no plaster, others did have some plaster but still looked like an old Roman ruin. It is a private club, so there is membership only for just eating and drinking there, but when there are special events, non-members can attend too, albeit at a higher price than members. Stephen's performance was well received and I am sure he will be back. He told us that the owner offered that Roy and I can come any time, provided we ring up beforehand.  We might do that some time.

Stephen in full flow

On Thursday, after putting Stephen on the plane, we went to see the Kunz family whom we got to know over the Internet in relation to family history research. Roy took on a project which was aimed to find out if their branch of the Kunz family was related to the famous linen trading Kunzes from the XIXth and XXth centuries.  Needless to say Roy proved that they were and how in about 4 hours. They live in a lovely little house and we spent a really pleasant afternoon with them.

Friday was an equally busy day, but the activities were different.  During the day I went geocaching with my friend Andor, who has been quite distant for some months last year, but finally this year got back to his old self and wanted to go caching again. I picked about 14 caches in the Buda hills, of which we found 6.  It still took us a hike of 15.5km with 400 metres of height climb and about 6 and half hours. The ice storm of December did some horrible damage to the forests, but in spite of that we had a lovely time.  I went into valleys I have never been in before and enjoyed the lovely views and forests all day.

Andor photographing the view

It's definitely spring now

The Elizabeth Bridge from about 3 miles away

In the evening we went out to dinner with our friends the Nemesházis to a brilliant Indian restaurant. It is a very long time since I have eaten really authentic Indian food, but this was it. Laci and Koxi are always good company and we had a really enjoyable evening out with them.

Some of the goodies from the Punjab Tandoori

On Saturday we went to see a guy and his daughter not far from our flat. I met the guy last time I was flying, as he was sitting next to me on the plane.  We got chatting and he said he was thinking buying a little cottage somewhere in the country and would I find him one in my village.  I never thought he meant it, but apparently he is serious and he invited us to talk it over. He lives in an amazing old flat, done up really nicely and his little 6 year old daughter Olivia was great fun. You do meet interesting peole on planes occasionally or at least I do.

Early this morning I managed to get up and watch the first F1 race of this season from Melbourne. I am really pleased that Lewis Hamilton won so easily as I am rather fond of the young man and would like him to retain his world championship title from last year, but on the other hand, if he and Mercedes will be this far ahead of the whole field, like he was today, the season will be seriously boring. Hopefully, other teams will do some catching up, so that he can still win, but not as convincingly, so that we might get a little excitement in the meantime.

A happy Lewis Hamilton after his win

And this takes us to the main event of the week.  The anniversary Hash run of The Incredible Hulk's return to the hash after his operation last year.  He was hare and the run was more or less in the same place as last year.  Unfortunately this year there were only 6 of us doing the run and that included Hulk and Haggis, but while somewhat diminished numerically, the 6 of us had a really good run arund, followed by an excellent lunch in the same restaurant as last year, where Roy also joined us for the festivities. I am very fond of Hulk and Haggis and hope that Hulk's health holds and he will be with us for a long number of years yet.

The hulk at one of his checks

The beer stop

All of us at the restaurant