Juniper Cup & other excitements

It's nearly a week since I posted and life had been pretty hectic in the meantime. On Monday we managed to clean the Bunkhouse after our guests and lock it up. On Tuesday we departed with a plan of going food shopping in Auchan and the organic supermarket, followed by a visit to the New Jewish Cemetery and then home in time for me to get ready for the concert. Unfortunately we didn't leave early enough to do it all, so the cemetery was put off until later. Dezso Ranki was superb. He played mostly Schumann and Beethoven, which I love anyway, but it was so soothing I nearly went off to sleep. Mind you, the latter had probably more to do with my cold and cough, rather than with his playing. In the meantime Roy's cough got worse, so we were a right pair of invalids. Wednesday and Thursday was spent mostly in bed (in my case not even getting out of my pyjamas!!) and slowly, but surely we were getting a tiny bit better as a result. Friday I decided to buy a day transport ticket and got all over town to a variety of places. The first was back to the organic supermarket to get a few homeopathic medicines, which my advisor suggested. Then for 10am I managed to get to the top of Castle Hill to the National Gallery for the Thorma exhibition. I have never heard of this painter before this exhibition, but apparently neither have a great many people. And that in spite of him being one of the founders of the Nagybanya artist colony, which we have all heard about. Apparently, the all powerful boss of fine art in the communist days didn't like him and therefore he didn't exist. Well, I am glad I went to see his pictures. He started with mostly portraits and very realistic landscapes and life pictures. Later he came under the influence of impressionism and Gaugin, but I liked all his stuff. The exhibition was comprehensive, with many exhibits from private collections. I had a good time. On Friday evening we had a really good time in the Caledonia pub with Colin and Nata, some new friends we met through the Hash. It was especially Colin and Roy that hit it off, they are more or less the same generation and life experience. This takes us to Saturday when we departed for the first orienteering event of the season. My cold and cough was still around, but I felt considerably better, so I decided to risk it. The first day was really good, although I had a brainfade at one stage, wasting about 2-3 minutes. As I have just gone up to the next age group I managed to win, even though I wasn't running too fast. The weather was kind, with lovely sunshine, although the temperature was still decidedly wintery. The second day was even better and I became the proud owner of a fancy certificate and a nice little icepack for sandwiches and such like. The overnight was spent at a place we have eaten many times before, but never managed to get a room in. This time we had a comfortable, if somewhat hot, night and a good meal on the Saturday night. Now we are back in town. We are staying until the weekend and try to get rid of our colds, if possible. Unfortunately, on top of the cold now I have a pulled muscle in my lower back and down my left leg, which is a pain (in more ways than one), but such is life. I might go to the baths this coming week to see if the lovely thermal waters might help it along the road to recovery.

A very wet, but still lovely weekend

This was the third time the Hash came and stayed with us for a weekend, but the first visit in the winter. The forecast was not that good, but finally 12 of them came, all but 2 by Friday evening. The chateau was closed, so I suggested the Aredo en route, which they enjoyed. This meant we could not join them as the Aredo is about 45 minutes away, but they all arrived before 10pm. In the morning we actually got going with only about a 5 minute delay, which was pretty rare for this lot. We decided not to wait for Andrea and Erik, as we were not sure when they were likely to arrive. I marched them up to the top of the hill behind the other side of the valley and took this photo from there. The weather was not the best, but at least it didn't rain (much). This picture was taken by some large rocks, which looked great. As I have been up in that part of the forest many times before, I decided to get adventurous and from the next valley turned the group to the right, where I have never been before. First we passed the lake where I have been before, but after that we climbed up to a large conifer patch which was mapped and added to the Ber orienteering map, but I have never been in it before. I led the group by rough compass and feel and we did arrive exactly where I wanted to - at the edge of the big clearing above Viragos. It was quite deep snow there, but we bravely marched onwards and upwards. After a small(ish) loop in the forest above the clearing we turned towards the inn where we ordered lunch for 1pm. There used to be a zoo up there in the past, but now there are only a few animals left, horses, camels and ostriches amongst them. The dinner was piglet roast, which tasted OK, but overall was a tad disappointing. It was much better last time when both the temperature, quality and especially quantity of it were more acceptable. Still, the palinka went down well and so did the local wine. Some of our group managed to hijack some of the top hats on show and be silly. After lunch the soft underbelly of the group made straight for home, but the hard core hikers carried on. We descended a very steep and rocky mountainside, picked up a small, later a bigger and eventually a very big path, the last one having taken us all the way home. We were only out another 75 minutes, but that was pretty good if wet hiking. In the evening Nata and others made use of the fully equipped kitchen they don't normally use and presented us with a lovely spaghetti and salad meal. Copious amount of wine, beer and spirits were also consumed into the early hours. On Sunday I unfortunately woke with a cough, sore throat, weak limbs and a pressure on my lungs that made it very difficult to breathe. I had to give up the idea of hiking that day, but in spite of atrocious weather the hard core had gone out again. I gave them a map, one of them had a compass (and knew how to use it!), so they were OK. They went up to the andesite and then retraced their steps from the previous afternoon just in reverse. We got to Viragos a bit before them, where they had a very good venison stew for lunch and returned in time for them to pack up and depart still before dark. This was yet again a very successful weekend, I only regret that the lurgy finally got the better of me, which is not surprising after the physical jerks of the last two weekends. Now I must get better quickly as the orienteering season is starting next weekend with my beloved Juniper Cup.

A sick Callum and the 'Estate'

I forgot to include in yesterday's post that I managed to talk to Callum after a hiatus of nearly a fortnight. Unfortunately, him and his mother are sick at the moment, although Meaghan had returned to work yesterday, even though she wasn't quite right yet. Well, the rigour of the insufficient number of sick days is a curse you have to contend with. Callum was really cute, no tearing around, said hello and good bye and generally was engaged in conversation. Once he was quite animated, he wanted to blow bubbles. I managed to catch a couple of good shots which were quite sharp. Normally he passes the camera at about 100 miles an hour, me catching an indecypherable blur. Today the sun came out, so I decided to get outside to take some pictures. You will notice that all the snow has gone, but I am not sure - unlike most other people - that spring is just around the corner. We have had snow in May before, so I reserve judgement on that yet.

Elian, trip home, w/e visitors, geocaching and opera

Just to wrap up the last couple of days in Brighton: after our arrival back from Bristol we went to the Bank and sorted other official stuff, then met Pete in the Basketmakers. In the evening we babysat again, which was great. Elian is such a gorgeous little poppet that even when he is mardy, teething and just a bit fractious, he is still great. His cold was not getting much better all the week we were there and his little cheeks got redder and redder most evenings due to teething. But he had his bath and had lovely cuddles and was as good as gold falling asleep in the middle of his dinner like he normally does. On Tuesday we had our compulsory fish and chips lunch, this time with Tish (or shall I say Pat?) at Ramsbottoms on Blatchington Road. It was so nice to see her again after all those years. The trip home was pretty uneventful on Wednesday and we were indoors by early evening. Roy went down to the village on Thursday so that he could put on the heating and start cooking. We were expecting 7 friends for the weekend. I went out food shopping with the couple that were giving me a lift out on Friday and having also picked up Klari we arrived safely, laden with a lot of food and four people plus luggage. The weekend itself was amazing. This was a repeat w/e after a very successful one last summer which had just 4 of them coming, but all girls. Both weekends were great, but very different. Last summer it was a girlie w/e; lots of classical music, a little hiking and a lot of cooking, not so much drinking. This time, as there were 7 of them and a couple of the girls brought their husbands, it changed fundamentally the activities, the atmosphere and especially the drinking. Nearly one whole litre of Roy's palinka went. There was NO classical music, but a lot of hiking, story telling, chatting and communal singing. In a way this was fun too, but I wouldn't mind if the next gathering returns to the more genteel, cultural weekend that we planned originally. Unfortunately quite a few of the crowd (including Roy and me) had the coughs and sneezes, which is spreading countrywide like wildfire at the moment. Roy did all our cooking, which was very kind of him, but the coughing affected the hikers a bit, although - interestingly - it was the men who were the laziest and the fastest to find excuses to return to their booze instead of climbing another mountain. The real hardcore of the hiking crowd was the women: Jutka, Klari, Bozsa, Ildi and me. Saturday morning we just went up to the andesite, but in the afternoon we all went by car to the Eagle's Lair lookout tower in the sparkling sunshine. As it happens, the snow was so thick that there was no way of getting off the road to park, so it was only Jutka, Ildi and myself who braved the 4 mile walk home in the thick snow, the rest of them drove home the long way round, as not only parking, but even turning round was impossible. We got home only about 15 minutes after those in the cars, so that was a good march. The lookout tower was closed, but we have discovered that had we rung or faxed them 3-4 days earlier, they could have come out to open up. I never realised you could do that in the winter, but I might do it for the next lot of guests. On Sunday we just had a small hike around the village on paths I have never tried before, so I had a lot of fun in the deep snow as well. About half way through it we managed to come down the stream amongst the big andesite boulders (including Anna with her bad ankle!) to have a look at the mill renovations. They have really got on well with it and it looks impressive. Unfortunately the views on Sunday were not a patch on Saturday, because the sun was pretty reluctant to come out that day. Still, it was interesting all the same. Once back in the village, some of us decided that it was too early to return home yet, so we went up Gipsy Hill through a very thorny jungle, climbed some rocks and showed Bozsa what she can expect should she try orienteering one day. When we returned lunch was ready, which consisted of all the leftovers from Friday and Saturday. Yum, yum!! Roy cooked us a curry on Friday and then a leg of pork roast on Saturday, so with all the leftovers from those plus the strudel we bought in the market, nobody left hungry. We have already agreed to do this again in the summer! On Sunday I got a lift in to town to save me having to use the bus. Roy stayed behind as he went really badly down with the cold and cough, so he is looking after himself in the warm. On Monday I went geocaching with Andor again, but this time the weather was such that there was nothing to photograph. We managed to get 5 caches on a hike of 11 miles with over 1500ft of climb. Considering that I am still suffering from a cold and cough, that was pretty good. No views though, due to fog and drizzle. Yesterday's visit to the baths got cancelled because of my cold, but the Opera was great in the evening. A really weird modern production of Handel's Xerxes got most people giggling. I took a bit longer to get into the spirit of it, but enjoyed it all the same. The music was perfect and eventually I learned to like the humour of the production too. I'm off to the village in a couple of hourse, so I'd better ring off. Bye bye!!

Sheila's 80th Birthday

Carmella arrived on time and and we had a really pleasant journey to Bristol. It took less than 3 hours, even though there was a bit of snow en route. Our hotel was cobbled together from three old Regency period terraced houses with uncontrollable central heating and single windows. The first night we slept with the window open, but poor old Roy got a cold, so it was tropical on the second night. Still, the presence of three staircases made me feel safe in case of fire.

We did find a smashing pub on the first night where both the decor, the food, the drink and especially the atmosphere was fantastic. Unfortunately, while there, we received a phonecall from Jo that Sheila had fallen over while crossing the road and was rushed to hospital, but eventually her injuries turned out to be more of a fright than real ones and she was released the same evening. On Sunday, thankfully the rain stopped while we walked to Sheila's hotel by the Clifton Suspension Bridge for the party. There was only a small group of people there and the room we had for the lunch was in suitably Regency splendour with Venetian chandelier and gorgeous views.

Round the table the company consisted of: Sheila, the birthday girl, Roy and Pam, her siblings, Chris and Toby,her sons, Chris's wife Jo with her parents Margaret and David, Toby's family, Carmella, Sheila's grandaughter with boyfriend Glen, Sandra, Sheila's cousin with husband Ron and myself.

The meal was excellent, well prepared, from first class ingredients and beautifully presented. Most people had three courses, except Margaret who had no entree and me who had no sweet.

The cake was made by Margaret, traditional English fruitcake covered in marzipan and icing, lovely. We stayed in the room until 6pm, chatting, eating cake and drinking wine, until we had to leave. I very much enjoyed a relaxed, understated family get together and the chance to see relatives I have either never seen before or not for a long time. The chance to photograph the three Grant siblings had also rounded up the day perfectly. The total number of years in this photograph is 228.

The return trip was just as perfect as the trip up. Snow, rain and sleet couldn't stop us getting back to Brighton by 1.15pm. Lovely weekend!!

Music, Brighton and Elian

The last few days prior to our departure to Brighton was spent with music, shopping and packing. On Monday I had a fantastic concert which was well worth going to in the big concert hall that looks like an upside down ship. Also on Monday we went to fetch my clubcard for the baths and visited the Record Office again. The one reallly fascinating document was my grandparents' marriage contract, which definitely makes me think that bourgeois marriage is not so much about love, but property. Also, that if the Americans think they have invented the prenuptual agreement, they are wrong. By about a hundred years!! On Tuesday I went to the baths to try out my new card, found there were quite a few things wrong with it, but enjoyed the waters all the same. I amazingly managed to find one of the bath's managers in his office to let him have my observations on some of their practices and he not only politely listened, but promised to see to my complaints. We'll see!! After making sure that both Sheila and Elian had some presents we departed on Wednesday. The trip was absolutely uneventful, which was good news.

Little Elian (see him sitting on one of his presents!)is still an absolute wonder. Ear to ear grin, cute, friendly and very, very lovable. Thursday we stayed in waiting for Ruth to bring our post. She finally arrived at about 5pm. Today we took Elian for his music group where lots of cute little children were singing, playing all sorts of instruments and just having fun. He loved it, took it all in and even participated now and again. Afterwards we all went to Rose Cottage, one of our old haunts, where you can get quality food and very good beer. He behaved perfectly, even though the pub was not particularly baby friendly and didn't even have a high chair. We babysat both last night and tonight, the first being no bother, the second a bit more. Clever little so and so knows how to force grown ups to let him stay up late!!

Tomorrow we are off to Bristol, further photographs to follow next week.

More snow, birds, opera and a concert

Last Sunday Meaghan did her Half Marathon in -16 Celsius and while her time was longer than expected, she wasn't last. Personally, I wouldn't fancy running 21km in clement weather, never mind in the depth of winter. Little monster had a lovely time running around with Daddy and Granpa wearing a cute, but weird hat.

Roy managed to get one of the locals to cut some more wood for us, help with the clearing of snow and generally be handy with bringing down cut wood, which I don't think Roy should do any more. He also started bringing bits of pottery for sale, some of which were actually quite nice. Poverty in the village is widespread, so I try to buy most things offered for sale, although I will haggle because they treat you with contempt if you don't. The lovely birdies keep coming and the stock of seed is getting quite low. The food offered is now threefold: 1. sunflower seeds; 2. balls of suet with seeds in; 3. big chunk of speck fat. There are days when both bowls plus balls plus fat are virtually mobbed by dozens of birds all at once. The goldfinches are still very argumentative and chase the other birds, but on the whole they are well fed.

As we were going down to the village by bus again, we couldn't do a big shopping and just carried a small amount of food we got in town. As we usually have much more food around than we realise, we decided to test this theory and it worked. We actually managed to feed ourselves with the small amount of food carried in, plus shopping at the mobile greengrocers and mobile bakers plus the freezer. Latter had endless amounts of meat and other stuff that was getting too old and needed eating anyway. One day, Roy realised that he still had some Cheddar, plus the last half jar of home made pickled onions, a bit of Branston pickle and the last dregs of my salad with the recently bought white bread, so he had a Plowman's Lunch which he gobbled up like he hadn't eaten for days. I had a Greek salad without olives as we have run out of those, but I am sure the lack of olives does not qualify me for shouting about deprivation!

The big pottery stove worked like magic this time. Never before was it so easy to light and got to maximum heat so quickly as it did this week. It may have had something to do with the wind or the temperature or whatever, but it got very warm very quickly. Me being the resident pyromaniac, I never find dealing with the fire a chore, no matter how much I have to work with it. This week, unfortunately, I burnt myself a few times, which I don't normally do. Still, it is still a lovely item of furniture, good to look at and lovely to cuddle up to.

As we were preparing to leave I was getting a bit worried about our birdies. There was a lot of snow forecast again, so I asked one of my neighbours to feed them while we were away. I hope they will not forget. I also put out another 6 suet balls, so I hope they will not starve. Thursday was a bit busy: after the bus trip in to town we went to the Record Office to watch the presentation of awards to representatives of the two winners of "Best Research Place" as voted on by members of the Family History Research Society. It was that very Record Office we like so much that won the internal category and the familysearch.org website won the foreign category. We met a delightful Dane, who is regional director for the Mormons who made a very good speech.

In the evening I went to see a performance of Il Trovatore which I must admit I think I last saw in my childhood. It was an extremely good, full blooded bit of Verdi with love, hate, revenge, murder and gypsies in abundance. The best performances were from the women, Leonora and Azucena, but the guys weren't bad either. On Friday the sun has come out, so we went shopping. We did a lot of walking and managed to buy something nice for Sheila for her birthday and a lot of presents for the little Brighton monster who is now more than 7 months old. We do have a lovely toy shop, full of wooden toys, just round the corner so the tally after we spent some time (and money) in there was a rocking horse, several puzzles and a choo choo train. At night I went to a really lovely concert in the Italian Institute, listening to Mendessohn, Franck, Haydn and Schumann. It was absolutely glorious. Not only the orchestra was first class, but the conductor's lovely, enthusiastic persona filled you with the same enjoyment that he seemed to have on the podium. Today I stayed in expecting a call from Toronto, but obviously they were busy. Perhaps tomorrow!