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.