The hundred and fortysecond week of the pandemic

Last Thursday was a busy and extremely successful day on the whole. We woke up so early, that we left far too early to go straight to Pásztó. So we first went to Lidl and not being too fond of the one in Aszód, we motored on to Hatvan, which was OK. When we arrived in Pásztó, there was still enough time to go to SPAR, for the things we couldn't get in Lidl, and having done that we arrived half an hour early for our appointment anyway. I have never seen that office as empty as it was that day. I think that apart from the staff, there were about 3 people there. We didn't have to wait a second, went to see the one lady in that office who while helpful and efficient, was not a particularly smiley and friendly one, but even she ended up smiling eventually. The only vaguely unfriendly gesture from her was that when she saw that I was speaking for Roy, asked with astonishment how he could get Hungarian citizenship without speaking Hungarian?

The newly stashed logs in the corridor

I felt very Earth Mother-like and in fierce defence of Roy told her that he got it through residence and anyway, at his age he is not required to speak it. Interestingly, she didn't respond to that and was a lot friendlier afterwards. She took Roy's photo, fingerprints and signature and that was that. She advised us that the passport would arrive by post in about a week. Friday was spent resting, which was perfectly OK, considering that the weather was not particularly nice. We didn't do anything in particular on Saturday either, except I had a lovely long chat with Ági and David on Messenger, as we haven't talked to them for ages. I also managed to finish Stephen's last 3 forms, so my job was, or it seemed at the time, complete as far as Stephen's citizenship application was concerned.

Next door's pheasant pens through the trees

You may have guessed, but this was a fools imagination that gave me that impression, but more about later. Sunday and part of Monday was spent sending our Christmas Newsletter e-mails to our friends and family around the world, and gathering some new e-mail addresses of our recently made friends, whom we usually communicate with on Messenger. We have already had some lovely responses from a wide variety of friends, especially those that we have not seen in ages. Two like that come to mind: the first response came from Robert, whom we have not seen in a couple of years, I'm sure. He invited us for a meal and a chat, and I have just managed to fix that up for 20th December at his flat in BP. The others were Tibi and Klári, whom we also have not seen in a couple of years, but we talked and that is being organised for some time before Christmas.

Roy with his new passport

The real sensation of Monday, however, was the arrival of Roy's Hungarian passport. Now, I don't think that there is another land where you could beat that. We applied for it on Thursday, it was supposed to take a week, and it arrived on Monday. Normally, in the UK, or anywhere else I would think, if you want that sort of speed you would have to pay for it dearly. Here, he not only didn't have to pay extra, but it was completely free. I was so pleased that I never asked why, but I assume it was because he is over 80. 

Sunset at the back of the garden

Tuesday morning was spent trying to help Stephen with his problems relating partly to the Hungarian translation of his divorce decrees, partly with ideas on how he could get hold of his first wife, who has obviously snazzled both their marriage and divorce certificates, and whose current address is required for her ex-husband's application for Hungarian citizenship, which in and of itself is bordering on insanity. As they parted on extremely bad terms and heard absolutely nothing about each other for the last 13 years, that is quite a steep task for poor old Stephen to solve. I couldn't help him with this, but at least could help sort the translation and even pay for it, as part of our offer to pay for the whole process as a Christmas present for him. Let us hope I won't regret that offer!!!!

Roy busy splitting logs

Tuesday afternoon, as the sun came out, Roy went out to split some logs and I went to help. While he was doing the splitting, I pruned my roses, so other than the few that are still in bloom, have been chopped off.  Amazingly, it is nearly December, and we are still having some gorgeous roses in full bloom. There are also about 8 or 10 buds still on them, and I am keeping my fingers crossed to see if they would fully open up.

My glorious late November rose

Once Roy did one wheelbarrowful of split logs, I picked the barrow up and came down with it to the courtyard. We then stashed the logs along the corridor railing and went back for a few more barrowfuls of logs. These are from the old pile of ancient turkey oak, which produce tar inside the stove, so they will have to be mixed with acacia, which is in the log store nearer the house. We haven't yet started to use the stove, as a low set (20 deg C) central heating is presently keeping us warm enough. Should there be a more severe drop in temperatures, then we will start up the stove, to supplement the central heating. 

The happy helper complete with wheelbarrow

And then today, I spent a large amount of my time on the phone and online again, as I was trying to sort out why our television no longer provides Roy's favourite channel in English. We were first thinking that we did something to the settings, but I found the central language setting on English, so it couldn't have been that. In the past, before Vodafone bought out UPC, there was a facility where you could set the language for every program manually, at the time you needed it. That has disappeared instantly, as soon as Vodafone took over. But that was over a year ago, and the English provision stayed the same until this week. Then suddenly it went.

The channel Roy has to say good bye to

I managed to get through to Vodafone Hungary's customer service department and spoke to several people, most of whom were pretty useless, until I got a guy who sounded as if he knew what he was talking about. And he told me, that languages cannot be changed, and if it turned Hungarian, nothing he or we can do about it. How nice, I thought, especially that this happened without any warning, considering that it constitutes a break of the contract. I then put this problem up on my FB expat groups and up came some interesting reactions. The most significant was a guy who told me that Vodafone is now mostly owned by the government of Hungary and thus it is dominated and bullied by them. Therefore the decisions are not made on commercial but on political grounds and, as we know, our dear government is not exactly fond of foreigners. Whether this has anything to do with it, (it might), or not, it is now something we have to either deal with or ignore. We may change to another supplier in BP, but we are stuck with them in the village, as they are the only provider of fast broadband internet, which is fairly important. Poor old Roy now has to do without his favourite Viasat History, as he doesn't understand any of it and he can't even have subtitles in English, which we tried and failed to achieve.

The ghastly supplier we're stuck with

To finish on a much happier note, I must tell you the story of one really exciting achievement this last week, which I am very proud of. I have never made Somlói Galuska in my life, but had a go with ingredients that we had in the house, and it turned out fantastic. Somlói Galuska is a typically Hungarian concoction of sponge, custard, nuts, sultanas, chocolate sauce and whipped cream. In consistency it is somewhere half way between trifle and torte. I gave a portion to my sister Nelly and she only complained about the quantity. Apparently, she could have eaten a trayful, she said.

Somlói Galuska, yum, yum!!

All the best to all of you, stay happy and healthy and I'll be back in about a week. 😉

The hundred and fortyfirst week of the pandemic

We had yet another extremely busy and stressful week, but what is new? One hassle was a debate with HMRC about my tax returns in the UK. For several years now all my returns were 0 rated, ie: they came up with nothing to pay. I couldn't be bothered to correspond with them about this, but this year I came across a questionnaire on the HMRC website, where if you answered all your questions they would tell you if you need to submit a tax return. I duly filled it in, and not surprisingly it advised me not to bother. Still, I had to notify them that I won't do it, and that was when the fun started. I won't bore you with the details, but I have unilaterally decided not to bother, and they can come after me and chase me, if that is not correct. To be honest, I know that HMRC, along with large numbers of government departments in the UK, are in a state of conplete chaos and near complete breakdown, so I don't expect too much hassle from them in future. However, because of this chaos, I won't be surprised if the computer starts chasing me, expecting me to do a return ad inifitum, but I'll treat that with the contempt it deserves, and that is that.

The best amount of tax to owe

Last Thursday is dead empty in my diary, and to be honest, going back a full 6 days, my memory is a total blank, so we'll move onto Friday. That became the climax of my main anxiety of the last few weeks, namely the cruise insurance. It turned out that for it to be valid, we needed to have a UK doctor. I doubt if we are still on the list of Dr. Chang, so that was a no-no. I had to cancel, but I was a full week late with that, so it looked as if we were saying good bye to over £500. Thankfully, Holiday Extra was particularly decent and agreed to cancel and reimburse the purchase price. Phewwww, I was a happy bunny.

Insurance thank goodness cancelled

It was expensive, so I was glad to cancel

 

Mind you, I then had to start looking for something different, some insurance company that offers a decent level of cover for a reasonable price and you can have a not neccessarily UK base. You will not believe it, but I found one. It is called globelink.eu and I can recommend them unreservedly. The price is reasonable, the cover pretty good and the admin really streamlined. They are based in Cyprus, but so far I have only talked to women in the UK, clear, honest and very friendly. I finally purchased the insurance today, £150 cheaper than the other outfit and as good, if not better, cover, with very flexible attitudes all round.

New insurance, much better

Confirmation of payment

In the meantime, Stephen finally got on with his Hungarian citizenship application, or to be more precise, with the collection of the documents necessary to make the application. Poor sod, he is really lumbered with having to get 2 marriage and 2 divorce certificates, as well as the usual birth and other ones. I offered to help, so I provided Roy's birth certificate and our marriage certificate, and as the forms have to be filled out in Hungarian, I got on with those. I have so far done 6 out of the 9 required, so hopefully he should be ready to book an appointment soon.

I really like East New York

I was also catching up with my US serials, which got a bit neglected of late. Then on Sunday we departed for BP, as Roy's citizenship oath ceremony was looming which rather stressed out both of us. Roy is a complete language illiterate, couldn't learn more than a few words with no grammar during the last 16+ years. I was hoping that the 7th district being rather lefty, it should be OK, and it was. While all Fidesz ruled districts go heavy on the Great Hungarian chauvinist crap, this ceremony was really lovely. 

The main cast of Fire Country

There were about 20 people taking the oatch, as well as a few friends and relatives sitting in the visitors' bit. The Deputy Mayor made a lovely speech about inclusivity and how welcome people from other lands and cultures were, which was very nice. Roy's pitiful knowledge of Hungarian got lost amongst the murmur of the oath. He was called out last, was handed his certificate and we moved on to celebrate in our favourite pub on the Körút. Once we got home, we also downed a large glass of port (me) and an equally large glass of pálinka (Roy). Now the last job to be done is to get a passport for him, which I set about organising yesterday.

Roy's citizenship certificate

Needless to say, that the earliest appointment for this in the 7th district of BP was on 10th January 2023, so I switched our operations to Pásztó, and we are off to apply for his passport tomorrow morning at 11am. I hope our lovely ladies, who were so nice and efficient last year about all our administrative troubles, will do their best again.

The celebratory port and pálinka

Today it poured with rain all day, so we didn't go anywere, which of course, caused Roy some distress. He loves eating out, but I decided to stay put and he didn't want to go without me. Instead, we did a bit celebratory dinner with a tiger prawn stir fry, with a bottle of champagne between us. I am rather tipsy, but I am still awake. Not Roy, he has been sleeping like a baby for about an hour now, and I should think he'll carry on for a while yet.

And finally, what we aim for now

Tomorrow we go straight to Pásztó, deal with the passport application, then shop for food at SPAR and go home. These few days in town were a bit full of stuff, but we go home with a sense of achievement. We have done the oath ceremony, we have found a good insurance company for the cruise and now we can spend at least a couple of weeks in Bér. Next post in about a week, all being well.

The hundred and fortieth week of the pandemic

As the weather turned rather miserable since I last posted, there have not been too many things happening to write about. Most of our life in the last seven days went on indoors. The only exception was Monday, when suddenly the sun came out and we decided to go to the Mátra to replace one of my missing geocaches. 

The route we didn't dare take up the mountain

When I placed it nearly 5 years ago, we drove up into the forest with no restrictions, but when we arrived at the start of the rough road this time, there was a brand new sign that only with the permission of the Forestry can you drive in. There was no mention of a penalty or fine, but I have heard stories about fines of up to 200.000 forints, so we didn't dare. 

The school where Gabi works

 

As we happened to be in Bátonyterenye, it dawned on me that while we were there, we might try and discover that lovely lady who last month rescued me from the forest and took me all the way to Pásztó to catch a bus back to my car at the top of the mountain. I promised to ring her as soon as I got home, but once I was home, I could not find her number anywhere. It was either on a piece of paper that I lost, or, more likely, I put it into my phone and then forgot to save it.

Forest in the Mátra, where I got unwell

Thankfully, I did remember part of her name and the fact that she was a teacher, so I stopped a lady in the street and asked where the nearest school was. She told me how to get there and when I enquired about the teacher lady in the school, they seemed to know instantly who I was talking about. I was told that she no longer worked there, but the other school where she taught  now was not too far. So we went over there, where we were faced with a problem of how to get to the school, as the entire road was dug up in front of it, with a guy directing the traffic in an unhelpful manner. So I took a guess, and turned left just before the school, which turned out a good move, as I could walk a bit behind the school from there and get in through a small gate in the fence.

Chaske Spencer and Emily Blunt in The English

Then came a bit of bad luck, as she happened to be on holiday that day. However, she shares her classroom with another teacher, and that lady was very helpful. As I started telling her colleague the story what happened to me in the Mátra all those weeks ago and why I couldn't ring her as I promised, she suddenly looked amazed and asked me if I was the lady that her colleague rescued from the forest? I said, yes, and she agreed that if I give her my name and telephone number, she would give it to her the following day and ask her to ring me. Unfortunately, it is now Wednesday and she still hasn't called, but I live in hope that she might do so later.

Emily Blunt

In the last seven days I have spent more than half my time indoors either reading or watching TV on my computer. BBC's The English was tremendous, and I say that as not a very avid fan of westerns. Emily Blunt is magical, not only as an actress, but as a producer too. I watched her interview with Stephen Colbert and she came across like a really lovely human being. That was two days' of binge watching, but worth it.

The stars of SAS Rogue Heroes

 

And then I started watching SAS Rogue Heroes, also on the BBC, and am almost half way through it as I write. I am enjoying this one too, in spite of the fact that I am not really a fan of the SAS. The cudgel of the bourgeois state, often ruthless and cruel, are not my favourites on the planet. But! The stories themselves about the creation of the SAS, whether true or not, are funny and well acted, as well as a true psychological study of the head cases that initially fought in the SAS. The British spy chief is the same actor as the one that played Prince Charles in series 5 of The Crown. I have never heard of him before, but from now on I will remember Dominic West, whom I have since Googled and realised that I must have seen him in a few TV plays or series, just not bothered to look his name up. He was a tad familiar, I must admit.

Sunday roast in the oven

Another "event" in our household was using the new cooker's oven for the first time. Roy roasted some pork and peppers and it turned out great. In fact, we had done some cooking together this week. I helped with some schnitzels and they turned out fantastic, also I cooked a full English breakfast on Sunday, which was also delicious. Obviously, we missed sausages, baked beans and black pudding from it, but we didn't mind at all, as we could hardly eat it as it was. It contained fried bread, bacon, eggs, mushrooms and tomatoes. Yum, yum!!

Schnitzel, chips and peas with lemon and garlic mayonnaise

 

Roy promised to give our good friends Laci and Márti one of our trailers, as we do not need two and they need it for fetching their government subsidised wood for fuel. That worked quite well, Roy even found the electrics and the wheels for it in the barn. He did notice, however that one of the little tyres was a bit flat. So, en route home from the Mátra we popped in to a garage and got some air into it. Talking of Laci and Márti, they wanted to come and spend a weekend with us in early December, but I have already planned a day geocaching with Viktor that day and any others we could also not do or they couldn't. Currently, they are trying to find out if Márti's sister arrives late in the afternoon on the 18th December or earlier? If they are into the evening or late afternoon, they might come out on that weekend and go to the airport straight from here to pick her up. If not, they might take a day off on Friday or not come until January.

Fried bread, eggs, bacon, mushrooms and tomatoes

It looks like we will be quite busy in December, as Ros's 70th birthday party is also that month. Another interesting thing has also happened, namely Gyuri, one of my caching friends had cancelled our caching trip together on 24th of this month. Not that it has surprised me at all. He is yet another excuse merchant, that I have masquerading as a friend. Still, I'd better stay on his right side, as he promised that he would take me on the weekend of the spring Festival/Competition to the same place. Call me a pessimist, I am sure he'll invent another set of excuses why he won't be able to do that either, but you never know, it might just happen.

The Ajka geocaching circuit

While chatting to him on the phone, I also asked him if he could have a word with the local forester about my access to the forestry road in the Mátra and he also promised to do that as well. Another idea also came up and that, hopefully, will happen, but I am not holding my breath over that either. I missed a nice event near his place on 1st October, where you could log both the hiking moving cache as well as one for planting trees. He came up with the suggestion that in the spring he might help me to organise one in Bér. If that comes to pass, that'll be a very good event. I'm sure I will put it on, but will he provide the trees to be planted, as promised? I'll report on that in the fullness of time here.

Some gorgeous tulip trees

 

Must go now, as Roy and I have to practice his citizenship oath, as the ceremony is now only 6 days away. Keep your fingers crossed for him, as he is the most challenged learner of a few sentences in a foreign language I have ever come across.

The hundred and thirtyninth week of the pandemic

As I mentioned before, I made friends with Viktor, a fellow cacher back in the spring, when we accidentally met up caching during the spring Festival/Competition in the Bükk Mountains. We have been in touch on and off since, but finally, this time we found a mutually convenient time for going out caching together. First we were going to go to the Börzsöny Mountains, but the bad weather forecast made us change the locale, so the logistics were that we would go to the flatlands with sandy dunes and forests South of BP. I jumped on a train to Kecskemét and he drove from his home to the same place, picked me up and off we went. 

Fishing lake in the puszta

As I don’t know him very well yet, I was quite surprised to find that he is an avid moving cache hunter. So, my carefully prepared plan for the day went for a burton straight away, as there were two moving caches about an hour SW of our area and he was so keen to get them. Luckily, both were still there, and for once we just logged them and didn’t take them away to be placed somewhere else later. Neither of us was sure whether we could go caching again soon, and between the two alternatives of not moving them, as against moving them and then sitting on them for weeks, we chose the former. 

Stages of the cross on a hill

 

After those two, one of which was placed near an ordinary static cache which neither of us had, we got that one too and then set off towards where we were supposedly caching the rest of the day. The weather was still dry, but it was getting darker and darker all day, looking like evening by about 2pm. As we were in very sandy, mostly flat areas with a few dunes, we were not only grateful for the grass or forests that held the sand together, a bit of rain during the previous days came in also very handy for hardening up the sand where it was exposed. I have tried in the past driving around in the puszta in bone dry sand and I can tell you it’s pretty frightening. In the middle of absolute nowhere, miles from habitation, if you sink in soft sand, it’ll be quite a lot of time and possibly also money, before your car is free. 

Pretty autumn leaves

Our caches were scattered in the glorious puszta, where you can see forever, even on a dull and miserable day as we had yesterday. We visited old abandoned buildings or the place where one used to be, then an old hill which apparently had something to do with chopping off people’s heads, a nice wood-built lookout tower, the place of an ancient, dried-up lake and the memorial to a Swiss educator, who came to teach in Hungary in the XIXth century and never went home. 

The Weber Ede lookout tower

However, if I have to choose a favourite, that’ll have to be a lake, which is more like a large swamp, especially after years of drought. We approached from the West, where we got lost a bit, but then we found a local lad who told us about a newly cut road, covered in cinders, that led to a riding stables and from there we navigated our way amongst the dunes, lanes and forests all the way to a lovely hide, where you could see a bit of the lake’s water surface. Unfortunately, no birds, as most of them have gone by November, but I could imagine what a heaven for bird watchers that place must be in the summer. We walked on wooden boards in the high swamp vegetation, it was magical. Definitely the highlight, along with the lookout tower, of the day. 

The wooden walkway to the hide

 

When we finished in the wilderness at the lookout tower, it was still light, by the time we arrived back in Kecskemét, for our last multi-cache, it was pitch dark and it was raining. Two drowned rats with torches must have looked a bit spooky looking for tiny boxes in a big ancient cemetery, but we found all three points, two of which were inside the cemetery. Then Viktor quickly took me back to the station, I caught the 5:48 pm intercity train to BP and was home just before 8pm for a salad tea, logging my finds on the computer and fall into bed just before 11pm.

Viktor in the birdwatching hide

 

On Sunday I tried to rest and recuperate from the previous day, so nothing much happened, except Nemesházi Laci rang and it was really nice to chat to him and Márti for a good while. On Monday morning we departed and went to do our food shopping in Aszód. First Lidl and then Penny. We knew that we had quite a lot of stuff still in the freezer, so we didn't overbuy, as we usually do.

The new cooker in situ

 

This was also the exciting time when we used the new cooker for the first time. We decided to go for our easy to cook and delicious pasta dish with fusilli, feta, cocktail tomatoes, olive oil, lemon juice and fresh basil. The cooker works like a dream, although we haven't yet tried the oven. It has all sorts of fancy modes on the button, I'll have to read up on that yet.

The birdwatching hide

I had a phone call from our neighbour in town to let me know that yet another census enumerator wants to talk to us. Insane, the whole chaos they are in, but he did leave a telephone number, so I rang him. Luckily, he was a really friendly and intelligent young man, who took my word for it that we have already been counted in Bér and was also willing to ask the remaining 3 questions, which were about the flat, on the phone. I was asked the size of the flat, (40 square metres), how many rooms, (1), and how we heat it, (gas central heating). That was painless and I was eternally grateful for the guy's flexible attitude.

Late flowers in the puszta

 

I finished our Christmas Newsletter, that I actually write right through the year, now all I have to do is to proof read it and then send it to all our friends and family. That usually takes longer than writing it. Any other time is being spent mostly indoors, reading, (me), watching TV, (Roy) and being online, (both of us). One interesting outdoor activity was done mostly by Roy, as he apparently promised to give Laci one of our trailers, and he had to dig it out of the barn and find all the electrics to go with it. As Laci is an electrical engineer, I doubt if he needs Roy to bother himself with that stuff, but he wants to hand it over pristine, as usual.

Another fishing lake

We also brought in the cacti, as it is getting very close to zero outside in the night. Otherwise the weather is not nice at the moment, so we are keeping indoors to stay healthy. Viktor, my new geocaching friend, has obviously enjoyed himself last Saturday, as he is already writing e-mails to me, asking about stuff, which suggests that he is planning another trip sometime. Very good, I hope this friendship will last and will not disappoint me, like so many others did before.

The vast emptyness of the puszta

 

Talking of disappointing friends, I had a call from Gyuri, whom I have not cached with for at least 4 or 5 years. When I mentioned this to him, of course, he blamed it on the pandemic, which is nonsense. At the last count, the pandemic is still less than 3 years old here, so what happened in the previous 1 or 2 years? Anyway, I stayed very friendly, I do not want to fall out with anyone, and it seems that Gyuri is in a good frame of mind and we might, WE MIGHT, still go caching later on this month. Details to be advised later, as I am not holding my breath on this one. I am very familiar with practically all his excuses, so I will be the first one to be utterly flabbergasted if this plan ever materialises. Let's hope I'm wrong!!

Thatched cottages in the forest

 

And yesterday, so that we should stay with the topic of missing friends, Jutka phoned, but only after I tried to get her to let her know about my telephone number change on the landline in Bér, which she used to be using in preference to her mobile.  We had a nice long chat, she is really enjoying retirement and does not have a second to spare for the next month. Any suggestions of getting together was sidestepped, so I got the message, but we still had a good chat.

Abandoned narrow gauge railway

 

I'm now going to make our morning coffee and biscuits, or I'll be in trouble with Roy. Next post, hopefully, next Wednesday.

The hundred and thirtyeighth week of the pandemic

Apologies for the tardiness, but this last week has, yet again, been crazy busy. Soon after I last posted, I managed to sort the Vodafone UK problem, after a fashion. It has been confirmed that even though one has money on one's telephone, it cannot be used abroad at any cost without purchasing a package which only lasts 8 days. On the other hand, a lovely young woman by the name of Mary negotiated for me two £8 packages, which include calls, SMS and internet free of charge. That was kind of her and I will activate them as and when I need them.

The initial group photo before the hike

We sorted the silly Census problem too. Finally, a really nice young woman enumerator came and it was over in about an hour. On Thursday  we went to the surgery and we got our flu jabs, which were quite painless, although the upper arm where it went in was a bit painful for a few days. I also managed to arrange the cruise insurance, which was a bit of a pain, but after a gruff and not at all helpful guy, we found another lovely young woman, this time called Jo, and she advised us that to buy a year's insurance would probably be better value, which we then promptly did.

Two well-behaved, beautiful caching hounds

And then came the major disaster of the week. I have been organising a geocaching hike for about a couple of months, and Saturday was the day we went to the Mátra and nearly 30 people turned up. We started downhill first and initially I was fine. However, as soon as we entered thick fog, or possibly it was low cloud, I could no longer breathe. I started getting very week, feeling dizzy and once I bent down to take a photo of a salamander, then even with help I could barely get up. Once we got to the forestry road, I knew that there was no chance that I would be able to do the climb, which was considerable in the second half of the hike.

One of the pretty salamanders

I was extremely lucky, as even though that there should be no traffic on those roads, suddenly a little car turned up. I flagged him down and he took me into Bátonyterenye, where he passed me over to his wife, who then, like a good Samaritan, drove me to Pásztó. She was so kind, I was moved to tears. There I had an hour and a quarter's wait for the one and only bus that went from there back to where my car was. Needless to say, as soon as I was in a car, where I could rest and the air was dry and warm, I was fine.

In the cloud

Once back at the car, I was well enough to go and get another cache, which I have tried to get for ages now, but all the time the place where it was, was closed. This time they were open and as it was a Minerals Museum, I went in to look around, as well as found the cache. I love rocks, semi precious stones and all manner of lovely natural stone. I took lots of photos and managed to resist buying one. 

A rest place in the forest

I also sent messages to everyone that I was OK, and was home by 4:15 pm. This made my daily count of caches only 4, but no probs, the boxes will be there for a while and they will wait for me when I go back for them. The only bad luck after my fantastic rescue out of a remote forest while having difficulty breathing, was that while being driven to Pásztó I asked for my rescuer's name and phone number, which she gave me, on the condition that I ring her as soon as I got home. When I did, I could not find her name and/or number. I couldn't even remember whether I wrote it on a piece of paper and lost it, or I put it into my phone and then forgot to save it. I think it is the latter, as while I was getting a lot better at the time, I must have still been in oxygen debt, so my brain easn't working properly.

An amethyst geode

On Sunday I booked our flights into and out of the UK with EasyJet. It was quite expensive, compared with prices from before the pandemic, but I had to get it, so that is what I did. Another interesting upshot of the disaster in the hills, was that one of the guys there rang me later to find out how I was, and we decided to go caching together to make up for my disaster. Initially we were thinking of going to the Börzsöny, but the weather turned bad, so we decided to switch to mostly car caching South of BP. That is tomorrow, I hope it will not chuck it down, but a small amount of rain is useful in the sand dunes, as it compacts the sand, so we hopefully won't sink in it.

Some pretty rocks

In the meantime, finally I managed to urge Roy to practice his citizenship oath and singing the National Anthem. I don't think he'll be able to do it properly, but at least he'll be able to pretend to be doing it, which is about as much as I can expect of him. And finally finally, today's great events were as follows:

The new cooker still wrapped

1. The gasman had finally appeared and connected our new cooker. As we had to rush into town immediately after, I have no idea how well it cooks, even if it cooks at all. I'll report on it next week, once we had a good go.

The Callas cafe

Me, Roy, Abe and Sylvia in the cafe

2. In BP today we met up with a family history friend of Roy's from Mexico, whom we have met before, but this time he brought his wife with him too. They took us to a posh cafe, where I had a Sacher Torte and tea, Roy had apple pie and a cappucino, and they also had a cake and a drink each. Nice people, although the meet up was quite hurried, as they were trying to squeeze too much into a short lightning visit. They tore off to the Synagogue for a service, only to rush back to the Opera for a guided tour later.

The map of the caches to be found on Saturday

 

We are staying in BP, so that I can take the train to meet up with my caching friend tomorrow, then we'll rest on the Sunday and go home, via Lidl in Gödöllő on Monday. I promise I'll try to keep to Wednesdays with my posts in future.