Yet another busy week (do we have any other type?)

The first major event of last week was what became known as the IKEA day. The bunk beds and new mattresses were indeed delivered in the morning as promised.  The phone call came really early and the guy appeared bang on 7am, or even a bit before. And then we started putting the bunk beds together.  The previous day Roy managed to take apart the settee, so that we could take it out to Bér, therefore the room was fairly empty for the work.

At the beginning

It's coming together

I must admit, I have always said that you need an engineering degree to put IKEA furniture together, but actually, I think what you need is an ability to interpret mysterious diagrams.  Once you mastered that skill, it's dead easy. Slowly but surely the bunk beds materialised and we really liked them. First of all they will serve the grandsons, who are coming to visit us (if all things go well) in October Half Term, secondly they created a great deal of extra place in the room, as they are only 3ft wide and finally they are really good looking pieces of furniture that looks solid, sturdy and attractive.

The end result

We were completely exhausted by the time we finished building them, but we still had another job, namely unpacking the mattresses and putting them on our beds, with our old mattresses going into the bunk beds. Our new mattresses are absolutely brilliant and were well worth the money. They are a bit warm, as they are all foam, but this amazing memory foam really makes them very, very comfortable. Afterwards we cleared up and did all the usual household stuff as well. We also had to go out to shop and to the pharmacy etc., etc. Neither of us needed rocking to sleep that evening.

Thursday was another running around day: to the shops first, then to tidy up around the gallery, where my bedside table had disappeared under all my junk. We also had to be home for the gas meter reader, who definitely came quite early in the afternoon, so good job we made it home in time.

One of the rusting hulks

More modern vandals here

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Then on Friday I had an appointment with Zsófi, my homeopath, who confirmed my suspicion with regards to my Lyme's Disease. The recent tick bites that I had, have probably boosted my borellia level, so I had to start taking lots of stuff for trying to push it back. It is now 6 years that my Lyme's Disease has been asymptomatic and I would like to keep it that way.

Quarry pits - now lakes

Desirable boat for sale - £60

I also went to the hairdressers and she cut my hair off to very short, as it should be for summer.  Mind you, the weather currently is decidedly non-summery, but more about that later. I also had an appointment with a firm that has pursued me by phone a lot and foolishly I agreed to have a "checkup" with them. My initial instinct was to put the phone down and not talk, but this guy was so sweet, which of course I now realise was a ruse.

My friend, Feri, by the flooded tree with the cache

The flooded  bay with the bridge under water

However, in the meantime I searched for them on the net, as it was very suspicious that he wouldn't tell me the firm's name. Fortunately, thinking that I am a stupid old lady, (old - yes, stupid - NO!!) he told me the slogan above the door, so that I could find the place. I put that into Google and up came a tremendous lot of stuff, all warning anyone not to have anything to do with them.  So I didn't go, but the phone has not stopped ringing ever since. Roy pulled the cord out of the wall, but I don't think that is the final solution. Admittedly, we practically never use the landline, so eventually we could cancel it and save some money as well as being bothered by cold callers.

And then on Saturday I decided to go geocaching on Csepel island and much to my joy, Roy decided to come with me and save me the driving. We started with the old Csepel Steel Works, which is pretty much a derelict site now, although some of its enormous grounds have been sold or let to smaller firms. It was a 5 parter, which never pleases either of us, but this time we found it quite interesting.  Roy likes these places where the remnants of old industry are preserved or at least there are old machinery, cranes, engines etc., which he finds fascinating.

The enormous black poplar Feri wants to put a cache to

Feri up his big tree

The next one was also in many parts, but very annoyingly the last one, which had the box was missing. We both dug around for over 20 minutes after which I rang my friend Feri, who lives on the island and we couldn't find it following his instructions either. Feri gave me the password, so that I could log it, but I hope the box gets replaced soon and in a better place. Apparently, it should have been in a large decaying root stock, but the only one we found had nothing in it and there were no more of them around.

The third visit was to what is called the "Csepel Riviera", which I have visited once before, but many years ago. This one had 4 parts, but you only had to go to 3, as the last one got very overgrown. The whole area is a summer holiday spot, where way back in the communist days old gravel pits filled up with rainwater and then the population started erecting shacks, to come out to in the summer. They were all squatters, as the land belonged to the state, but they didn't mind then. But with the arrival of capitalism it got a bit more complicated. It is still quite nice and the lakes looked lovely.

Cute little chapel by the river

Flood waters by the chapel

Now it was lunchtime, so we ate something from Lidl and went to visit my friend Feri. I have never been to his house or met his wife before, and both were very nice indeed. After a cup of tea Feri joined us for a few more caches, which was useful, as him being local gave us the approach roads and paths without the risk of getting lost.

The miniature but cute lookout tower

Unfortunately the Danube started flooding that very day, so while the water level was still quite reasonable in the morning, when I checked with the river authorities, by the time we got there, all was covered by water.  The first cache was only 3m away when we were stopped by the floodwaters and had to retreat.  The next one was even worse, as that is on a small island, approach to it being over a dam and the little bridge in the middle of the dam.  Both were quite deeply under water already, so that had to be abandoned too.

One of the many lakes in Zala

The bridge across the lake to the cache

The restaurant in our B&B

Chapel

Terracotta figure at the Mill

Fishing lake

Feri before crossing the dam

Views with storm coming

Karl Marx in Zalaegerszeg

Ho Shi Minh in Zalaegerszeg

Next stop was to an absolutely gorgeous and enormous tree, also close to the Danube, but not yet under water, where Feri wants to put a cache. As moderator I thought the idea would be great, as since I found out that the tree is one of the largest in the country. Whether it is one tree with lots of trunks going in different directions at the bottom, or several trees that grew together over the decades, I couldn't decide, but either way it is a spectacular sight. Obviously I warned him that just because I am enthusiastic, that does not mean that the other moderators will be, but we'll see what happens after he submitted it for moderation.

The next cache was by a lovely old chapel, also near the river, but this one stood on a little hill and was still in the dry.  Three sides around it were already flooded, but the drive to it was still above water. And finally the last one was a strange "lookout tower", from the top of which you could hardly see anything.  Still, it was beautifully restored and photographed well. Also, the cache was put in a brilliantly constructed bird box, which stood on a sturdy pole, cemented into the ground. Five stars for the manufacture of that structure go to the cache owner!!

Sunday was the Monaco Grand Prix, which Lewis won, but in a very exciting manner. There was a danger of rain and at one point there was a Safety Car situation, during which he came in for better tyres.  Unfortunately this was quite early on in the race and those tyres had to last him to the end if he didn't want to lose his first position. This  was very exciting: Lewis was panicking quite early on, saying that the tyres have had it, but his engineer just insisted that he takes care of them, drives steadily and it will be OK. Thank goodness, he was right, although I think Lewis was a total nervous wreck by the end, he had such an awkward job of it right through.

Karesz and Feri at the same place

Monday we departed for a three day jaunt to the South West, to the city of Zalaegerszeg. Recently we don't cache on the way down or on the way home, rather we dash down and back after 3 days and do all our caching once there. This time the Tom Tom took us on an unexpected route, but it was absolutely great, as we managed to clear out most of the caches South of the city, plus catch a moving cache. We saw churches, chateaux, a TV tower, a glorious valley covered in rhododendrons and azaleas, a Calvary and a spring in a lovely park. We also started having caches by large lakes and reservoirs, which was a theme down there. Very pretty, although the weather was getting worse as the days went along, culminating in such downpours that the last day had to be cut short.

Roy, me and two bronze statues outside the Skanzen

A house in the Skanzen

At the end of the first day we frantically searched for a petrol station and uncharacteristically found an extremely cheap one, when we were ready to pay anything, just to fill up the nearly empty petrol tank. You see, Murphy occasionally works in your favour!! The Bed & Breakfast was really nice and as they had a restaurant, we had dinner there on both nights. Finding it was not easy, though, as the Tom Tom told me that 112 does not exist and it can only take us to no. 19. I thought, fine, we'll find it after that. When it told us that we have arrived at our destination, I looked out, and the number there was 70. WTF?? We had to get to the top of the hill, before it turned up, but we liked the look of it.  The staff and the owner were lovely too, and it was very reasonable. Two nights B&B for 2 cost less than £60 and 2 dinners for 2 with beers and tip in their restaurant set us back about £35. All of it under £100, I think that's very good value.

Due to the absolutely foul weather we ended up with 19 caches, which wasn't bad, considering that only a few minutes out in the open got us (me mostly) look like drowned rats. The caches included more lakes and chapels, occasionally a mill or a chateau. On Day 2, our friends Feri (from Csepel) and Karesz have arrived by train and spent the day with us. You may recall this happened totally by accident in Szombathely 3 or 4 months ago and is now looking as if it will become a habit.

Another cute little church

With them we did all the downtown caches in Zalaegerszeg, a big clock, a 5 parter multi that instead of the historical downtown, it showed you some old relics, like statues of Karl Marx and Ho Shi Minh. We also had caches by an old 19th century square in the historical centre, as well as a Skanzen on the outskirts. I loved it, although the bad weather took the edge off.  We left the town after eating our sandwiches in Lidl's car park and started walking in rain.

Oil well

At the end of the day we put the two boys back on their train, went back to the B&B, had a hot shower, clean and dry clothes, logged all the finds, had dinner and then fell into bed like felled trees. I am sure it would have been much more fun without the rain, but we still enjoyed it.  The guys are keen to cache with us and should do so again in the future.

The third and last day was planned to take in 6 caches to the North of the city, after which you are on the right route back home, but the weather got even worse and we scrapped it after 3. However, those three were very interesting and had an added dimension. When on the phone to Mariann the day before, she mentioned that some cachers she is very good friends with and whom I also know, although not as well as she does, heard that I was in town and were most upset that we didn't call. So on Wednesday we called and loved their house and their company. They even treated us to lunch and cups of tea and, of course, we had a base at which to go to the loo and where we could get out of our sodden clothes. Roy was better than me, because he steadfastly refused to move outside the car, but I gave a good impression of a drowned rat, even more than the day before.

Would you believe it? Another lake again!!

TV tower

Ica and I went to a spring, where the cache was missing. Prior to that Roy and I went to yet another reservoir which is a fishing lake and has one bit which is for swimming and which must be really gorgeous in a real summer. The cache was hidden in a way that I had no idea how to find it, but Ica finally explained and gave me the password, so I didn't have to go back out into the rain for it.  Very kind of her and it was much appreciated.

The final cache was up a steep little hill, one of many in those parts, near a sweet little chapel. After this we took our friends home and journeyed on. We got home by 6pm, after at least 90 minutes of the journey was spent in jams within Budapest. The following morning we stuffed most parts of the settee we no longer want in town, into the car, then went to Tesco to do some food shopping and arrived before midday in Bér.

Gorgeous bush in the Azalea Valley

Today the weather seems a lot better, although it is still so cold that the central heating (well two of the radiators) is still on. Paperwork, mowing and vegging out is the program, until we have to go back into town again.

Horse chestnut blossom

A couple of hellishly busy weeks yet again

It's been nearly a fortnight since I last posted anything and not only that, but in all that time I have never thought of the blog once.  The combined effect of getting old and too much to do, have resulted in me forgetting everything. Even those things I write down. Ahhhhh!!

Fantastic flora everywhere around Veszprém

A couple of days after I last posted I travelled down to Veszprém, as planned. Thankfully Edit managed to get her car back just that morning, so the visit was on. I couldn't find a convenient train without having to change, so opted for a bus journey instead. Roy came with me to the bus station and went home on the tram no.1. The journey was extremely comfortable and uneventful, as I was spending it either on the net on my phone, or reading my book.

Lake Balaton from the top of a quarry and our first cache

The two days of geocaching with Edit was really enjoyable.  For the first time ever I planned just the right number of caches and we did them all. It is so good going with a local, as she seemed to know all the best ways to approach all the caches. We did 8 on the Saturday and 6 on the Sunday, followed by yet another uneventful bus journey home.

Muggins in front of the last cave of the weekend

Our caches included an amazing old castle ruin up a very steep hillside, approach to which was through a jungle of forest with a dodgy stream crossing. We saw many churches, mills, chapels, quarries, cemeteries, and had gone through the last remaining cache in Veszprém itself, which was up some rocky and steep forest slap bang in the centre of town. We travelled further afield again, picking up two very interesting caves to finish with. Next time she has to come to Bér and we will go to the ones I haven't yet got in Nógrád and possibly up the Mátra as well.

Drama improvisation at Rosa's garden party

Recently we met a lovely young couple who live in Bér and Rosa, the female half of which, had come and called on us as she was told we were there by an old friend of ours, Zsuzsa Schabedly, whom I have not seen or heard of in at least a couple of decades.They invited us to lunch, which was delicious and we also had some people from their party last Friday in Bunkhouse overnight. She is half English, half Hungarian, stunningly good looking, clever, arty and very nice to be with.  Her boyfriend Barnabás is also delightful, it is so nice to make new and young friends at our time of life.

Gorgeous flowers in Rosa's garden

I managed a good visit to the nurse on Thursday in Bér, as we returned to the village on Monday. She is the old one, Eszter, who was on maternity leave, but now is back. She is just as nice as Krisztina was, so at least we are lucky with nurses, if not so much with doctors. I got all my medicines for the next three months and they have fetched them for us from the pharmacy too. Privileges of age, you see.

The young people on Friday weren't any bother and their party, of which we attended about a couple of hours, was lovely. Finally, on Saturday, we returned to town, but not before Roy managed to deal with all the jobs he had to do in the village.  Mostly the mowing, which got done, and which was the main job. He managed to mend the strimmer, so he could trim the edges, then do the tricky bits with the petrol mower and the straight bits with the tractor.

Roy busy mowing

En route into town we visited IKEA and spent a small fortune on a set of bunk beds (for the grandchildren in October), and 4 lovely memory foam mattresses for us (2 in Bér and 2 in town). The beauty of this bit of shopping at IKEA was that since we have bought anything so large that we had to have it delivered, they have sorted the delivery part. You no longer have to queue up at some grumpy delivery guy's desk yourself, it is done all on the computer when you are doing the buying. In fact, this was definitely the easiest time we have spent this much money anywhere lately. (Except perhaps the Mexican holiday, which cost a lot more and was done in no time on the net.) 

Our garden that often gets called a park

On Saturday evening I had a concert in the Music Academy with my friends Vera and Gábor. On the podium there was Amadinda, an absolutely gorgeous percussion ensemble, which was celebrating its 35th birthday. They played mostly their own compositions, which were a revelation to me. We all had a lovely evening. The second half was shared with Muzsikás, a folk group, whose skills are high enough for classical music and are much appreciated by the likes of Amadinda.

Some of the  32 cachers that joined us on the uninhabited island

And then came yesterday's exhausting, but brilliant day. We went to get a cache on an uninhabited island by boat. My friend, Marianne, organised the shindig and while there were a few hiccups, it was  on the whole great. 32 people attended and did the trip across the river in a motor boat. Afterwards Marianne and a caching family, plus Gabi and I went hiking in the mountains North of town and picked up several interesting caches in the process. The highlight, other than the boat trip, was a long hiking trail named after Spartacus where we saw magnificent views across wooded mountains and all the way down to the river in the distance. We also managed to catch a moving cache, so I added 6 caches to my total, which is now getting quite close to the milestone of 2000.

Mariann serving little cakes

Finally, we rested up today, not doing much, except going to the cinema to watch a harrowing documentary about the 2015 refugee crisis. Rosa, our lovely new friend, was one of the assistant producers of this film, and we had an interesting time. I even popped in to Roy's favourite pub on the way home and had a mojito.

The boat returning with happy cachers

Tomorrow we have to be in between 7am and 11am, as they are supposed to be delivering the beds and mattresses. Let us hope that goes off as expected and then we can set about putting the bunk beds together. I am looking forward to the new mattresses, as our backs are getting so bad that we definitely need them.

One of the views from the Spartacus trail

I'll try not to leave 2 weeks between posts in future, but I can't promise.  Life is still hectic, but that's how we like it.

A concert and a lot of geocaching

Last Wednesday's concert was brilliant. Kristóf Baráti and Barnabás Kelemen were superb. They played some interesting pieces, most of which were new to me. Added joy was that Hulk and Haggis were also there, after my phone conversation the week before mentioned the concert to Haggis and then miraculously she managed to get 2 tickets at the last minute. They were sitting on the podium, which explains the late purchase as the organisers must have decided to offer seats on the podium at the last moment.

Barnabás Kelemen and Kristóf Baráti

Thursday was spent getting ready for my departure on Friday, packing and preparing the cache lists for the weekend.  As it happens, I found out later that Mariann forgot to send me most of the lists, but at least I had Day 1. On Friday I met Mariann and Gabi at Keleti Station and we departed on time in a clean and reasonably fast train in a Southerly direction. We arrived bang on time, the girls have departed with a friend in her car and I hung around waiting for the bus. We got to the hotel about the same time, only to find that Gyuri and Évike have already arrived about 15 minutes before us.

Guess who's up a tree getting the first cache?

We managed to leave by 2pm or soon after and a day of interesting, and still sunny, geocaching started. The first cache was up a tree and apparently I have promised the girls that I would climb up there for it.  Gyuri gave me an initial push, but afterwards I was on my own up high in the branches. It was fun and I got the cache for all of us.

Medieval church no. 1

The next few caches were mostly in nice villages by lovely old medieval churches, after which came one in a forest.  Unfortunately, Gyuri was already in a strop over something or other, and when in that mood he listens to no-one. He drove past a left turn, so I ended up having to wade through 10 metres of jungle before getting to the nice bit of the forest to the cache. I did find it eventually, but if only he listened at the crossing and turned right, I would have had no such problems. Scratches and bumps were my punishment for his stubborn stupidity.  Unfortunately, this set the tone for the entire weekend, which deteriorated as time went on and tiredness set in, but more of that later. The cache was actually quite cleverly hidden and was surrounded by a field of lily of the valley.

Lily of the valley

The next cache was down a deep valley, (about 100m vertically down) just above a spring in a deep ravine. Gyuri stayed up in the car, so Mariann, Gabi and I went down for it.  The GPS signal was very weak, so we spent some time looking for it. Finally, it was I that spotted it up a steep slope and got it for all of us (again). The walk back up was a bit strenuous, but we survived it.

Mariann and Gabi climbing back up from the spring

Next was a forest school, where teachers take classes for hiking trips, zoology projects and just general fun. The one we went to see also had an aerial walkway and other interesting places for adventure. The next cache was near a medieval church which was decommissioned by the church and has been used as a smokehouse for a long time. Now it is closed, but the outside was really pretty and you could tell how old it was.

The smokehouse that used to be a church

Friday night we had dinner at the hotel, which was in a room decorated in Art Nouveau style and the food wasn't bad either. In the evening we were all pretty tired, but logging our finds and, in my case,  uploading photos and extending the logging texts took until nearly midnight.  The following morning we got up fairly early, had breakfast and then departed for the Geocaching Festival and Competition in Ófalu in the heart of the Eastern Mecsek.

Beautiful mosaic work in the dining room

There we met up with Judit, who was joining us for the day and soon we started to visit our lot of caches listed by Mariann and of which I was not given a copy. En route to the village I managed to take hasty notes of her list, so at least I had the coordinates and the merest of descriptions. Most of our caches on the Saturday were either up in the Mecsek hills and forests or in villages in valleys between the different peaks.

Lookout tower above Ófalu

The first two of the day were close to the Festival's base in Ófalu. In one direction there was one about the trout lakes up from the village, in the other direction we climbed to a lookout tower which provided a good view of the entire village down in the valley. After that we got back into the car and moved to see an old abandoned chateau, followed by a visit to some stages of the cross, topped out by a cute little chapel, both in the same village. Eventually I realised, when I tried to log two of the caches that day, that I have already found them 2 years before. The reason why I didn't remember them was that back then both caches were approached by not the same route and looked very different due to that.

A giant pine tree with the cross and one of the stages

The next cache hid itself underneath a concrete and steel built viaduct, which carried Route 6 across a wide valley.  Apparently that bridge still has the widest span of any concrete road bridge in the country. Unfortunately the rubbish dump that we found near the cache did not endear the place to us, but that is nothing unusual in the countryside nowadays.

Under the viaduct

By this time we were all so tired that tempers were getting short and I had to go on strike for a while, lest I say something I shouldn't. Gyuri's funny moods we have all become accustomed to, but what surprised me was that Mariann was a bit wound up too. She is normally quite laid back and does not rise to anything, but I think even her nerves were rather frayed that day. I have to say that she is being a bit stubborn over her PTSD, (unwilling to go and see a specialist), which I am absolutely convinced she is still suffering from as a result of her car crash in November.

Gorgeous iris in a church yard

The latter part of the day took us to a disused, but beautifully cleaned up, quarry where they installed a strange statue of an ancient chieftain, then we went high up into the hills and visited big locators, towers, abandoned quarries and a spring, all on or near mountain tops.

Hetény, the Chieftain

En route back to the hotel we still managed to visit yet another medieval church, a lake, several memorials to the mining industry and another memorial, this time to martyrs of a miners' strike who were shot by the military during a strike back in the 1930's. We managed to get back to Pécs in time to meet up with Évike, but due to Gyuri having to take Judit back to Ófalu and thus being rather late to dinner, Mariann, Gabi and I went to eat long before the other two.

Mining memorial in Komló

Medieval church no.3

They knew a place, which had Middle Eastern food and had a name like Tehran. Obviously, we thought they were Iranians, but the friendliest guy, who chatted to us a lot, was from Algiers. They were really sweet and the food was delicious and extremely cheap. I even had a nice big mug of tea, while the girls had beers. The plan for the following day was all of us getting going in the car in an Easterly direction, doing some caching en route, then followed by the three of us being dropped at a station to go home by train and Gyuri with Évike driving home to Békéscsaba.

We all had some doubts whether this plan was realistic at all, due to Gyuri and Évike bringing so much stuff that there would have been no way of squeezing everybody and everything into a not too large car, like Gyuri's. As it happens, the weather solved our dilemma as it got very cold, windy and rainy on Sunday, so we all decamped home, us by train, and the other two by car.

Vasas spring

At home I collapsed and am still a bit zombified. Still, I since then finished all my logging and uploading of photos, answered loads of e-mails and today went out with Ian and Ros to lunch. They came up with our post and we had a really good chinwag, followed by lunch at the Dobrumba. As expected they loved the food and we had such a good time together and all of us talked non-stop for at least 3 hours.

Mariann and Gabi having Persian food

Algerian guy in the Iranian Restaurant

Tomorrow I will have to do some typing up of yet another cache list, this time for Veszprém and its environs, where I am due to go this weekend. There are some question marks over the weekend, as Edit's car had broken down and she is not sure if she'll get it back by the weekend, but I can take the Duster, if necessary, or we can postpone it, we'll see what happens.

Hope to post after that and at this note I love you and leave you as it is nearing midnight and I want to go to bed.