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| Arcadi Volodos |
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| The bar at Rizmajer's |
On Thursday we had the event of the week, which took us to Csepel Island, to meet Feri for a beer in a lovely craft brewery pub. The place was called Rizmajer, which is the name of the owners and it is still run by that family. Their brewery is a few hundred yards away and the place itself is friendly, a bit spit and sawdust, which Roy likes and the choice of beers is mindblowing.
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| Feri, Roy and me at Rizmajer's |
I like drinking beer, but not normally in the winter and so far had bad experiences with fancy, newfangled fruit beers and such like. This place, however, was completely different. Here the plain lager was the weekest and the other stuff the strongest, so we had to try it. The one we both loved a lot was called Popcorn. Silly name, but great taste and strength. 6.5% alcohol is pretty high for a beer and it tasted gorgeous. On first taste in your mouth it was aromatic, light and fruity, but the moment it went down your throat it was bitter, very bitter. I new after that first mouthful that Roy will love it and I was right.
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| Petit fours |
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| Truffles |
Feri was great company. Funny stories, jokes and some personal stuff was passing back and forth. He felt really good, as he planned this outing to say thank you to Roy for ferrying us round while caching, a pastime he does not enjoy. Amazingly, Roy looked seriously happy too. I had my doubts initially, mostly because he doesn't like fancy beers and is slow to take to people he doesn't yet know. No worries on either account, he felt at ease with Feri and the beer went down well too.
Friday was spent packing and doing last minute stuff, inlcuding my favourite truffles and petit fours. Ros brought me two pound packs of marzipan, and I used one of them to make my usual petit fours with tempered chocolate on top with a large half walnut. I have been collecting half walnuts for months and they still look and taste great. The truffles are my favourites, nothing too difficult to make, just high cocoa butter content dark chocolate and cream. Once they are shaped into little balls, they get rolled in Dutch cocoa powder and they are ready to eat.
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| Shrub in Laci and Márti's drive |
We left for Csobánka to spend the weekend with Laci and Márti, around 2pm and got there at 3:30pm. This, of course, included catching the trolley bus to the car and then driving via the M0 to Csobánka, but believe me, on a Friday afternoon that hour and a half was pretty fast. It was already almost dark when we got there, so we postponed having a look at their new house being built to Saturday or even Sunday (as it finally happened).
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| Autumn in the forest |
We love spending time with those two, as they are a picture of happiness and that is really uplifting to watch. I always say, that one should never give up the hope of finding someone to be happy with, even in their later years, as all four of our firends living in Csobánka prove that. The plans for the weekend, assuming the weather would allow it, were as follows:
1. Inspecting the new build, which was especially important for Roy, as he is into this sort of stuff.
2. Going out geocaching (just the three of us), in order to clear out the last remaining caches in the area.
3. Have long chats, good food and drink, which is something you can always rely on at their place.
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| Márti and ... |
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| ...Pedri |
Saturday loomed murky and we had to put off leaving on our hike a bit, hoping for better weather. Thankfully, the rain stopped and the sun came out, so we got going around 11am. We went for the furthest cache first, the one that Roy and I missed the last time we were in the area, due to the new railway line blocking most routes that our little old TomTom knows about.
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| Carpet of bronze leaves in the steep forest |
This was a lovely hike of about 4km, mostly along a ridge, in the gorgeous winter forest and with some views, albeit hazy in the distance. The cache was called: The views from Tök Mountain. Thankfully, there were views this time, unlike at Badacsony the weekend before. We found both parts of the cache easily, took some lovely photos and as we took Pedri the boxer with us, he had a good time too.
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| The view from the lookout point |
Next on the list there was an easy one, also in two parts, but only about 500 metres from the car. This was a very new cache and it showed parts of an old calvary and the top of the hill above it. The greatest adventure took us to the last cache, which was also a fairly new one and it required some steep climbing. My good friend Blue Mali (aka Gabi) put this one out, including doing voluntary work beforehand on painting up the waymarks to the cave, where the cache was situated.
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| Mysterious view of the calvary crosses |
We got there quite late and as it was gone 3pm I was hesitating whether we should risk it, as it was very likely that we would get benighted while still up the steep mountainside. After some deliberations I decided that we should risk it and we got going. Initially I went very fast, as I really didn't want to come down in the dark, but had to slow down after a while, as my heart and lungs could not take that speed.
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| Pedri discovering the cave |
The really scary bit was once we turned left to the cave as that was not a properly built path, just a track which was not flat, but at 45 degrees to the left. As it has been quite wet in the last week, it was also muddy and very, very slippery. Even Pedri was sliding about on all four legs, so we had to hang onto anything that we could grab: trees, bushes, rocks, each other until we arrived at our destination practically on all fours. Very exciting, if somewhat dangerous for my poor knee, which is still quite unstable and needs care.
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| Western (garden) profile of new house |
The cave was quite spectacular, not very deep, but wide. We even managed to photograph the village below us in the fast disappearing light and Laci was very kind by finding the box for me and handing it up for logging. We could not find a pen in it, so I put one in out of my stock. Gabi, the cache owner thanked me for that later in a Messenger message, which I appreciated. The route back down was a lot less scary than I thought it might be and we got down in 15 minutes. The whole trip, including the climb up, the sliding about, the looking for and finding the cache and finally the descent took only an hour, and we got back with about 5 minutes of daylight to spare. Great cache, fun trip and we were all ready for a shower, a rest, food and drink, which we got plenty of on our return.
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| New roof over the steps down to the cellar |
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| The old cellar |
While we were hiking and caching, Roy had a little trip of his own. When we arrived, Laci told us that his lane is blocked further on, so we have to turn the car round when we leave. That maneuvre was quite scary, as their lane is barely wider than most cars. The blockage is actually a slippage on the steep mountainside, which happened the week before and the result of which was one car dropping down onto its top in the garden below. Roy, being curious, went and saw it, which looked really funny and a bit scary. Thankfully, there was nobody in it when it happened, but still, no rescue of the car is currently possible, as the mountainside is too soft and unstable for a crane to come onto it.
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| The old house which is a storage area now |
Finally, on Sunday, with the sun shining, we went to inspect their new house being built. It is a lot larger than I imagined, but its position is so spectacular, that its environment might be the reason it looks so large. It is basically on three floors, but the basement is only about half the size of the floors above. The basement has a workshop/utility room and the old cellar, the ground floor the lounge, diner, kitchen, stairs both down and up and a guest room, while the attic has the master bedroom, toilet, bathroom and a study. Out of their master bedroom there is a spectacular panoramic window, showing up the entire Western range of the Pilis Mountains, which is a view and a half to wake up to every morning.
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| Roy and Márti in the roofspace |
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| The view towards the Pilis Mountains |
After our inspection we were treated to lunch at the Emma in Pilisszentkereszt, which was great. We left just before it got dark, filled up at our favourite cheap petrol station in Pomáz and were home before 5pm. Lovely weekend, great company, 3 good caches and the new house. Brilliant time was had by all, we must do it again!!
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| Looking East from the back of the house |
On Monday morning we came back to the village, via Tesco. We seemed to buy out the entire shop, but we will be here for 2 or 3 weeks, so we had to stock up. The pottery stove was a bit reluctant to light again, but we managed it eventually. The weather didn't help, as there was not even a tiny bit of wind and without wind it is always an uphill struggle to get that great big stove going. This week we are having a plan to visit the Medves Plateau, as one of my caches needs maintenance. Also, we have to pick up two enlarged photographs that I ordered from the Geopark, plus there is a moving cache that has been staying in one place nearby for about a month, which I think I ought to move.
Next post next week hopefully.
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