Christmas et al

I haven't posted for 9 days, but it seems like 9 weeks. Lots happened since, but let's start at the beginning' On the 20th I left you with plans of both good and bad for the rest of that day. It most certainly was just like that.

Roy, me, Robert and Volker at the Regős

The lunch with Robert and Volker was lovely. I didn't realise that they have never been to the Regős and we all loved the food, the service and the chat. Following that the dentist was not nearly so much fun. She renewed the filling in my two big bottom molars on the left with thankfully not much pain. It cost less than £30, so that bit wasn't too painful either.  However, since then I am afraid I have been bothered by sensitivity and occasionally even pain in it, so I'll have to return after the holidays to have it fixed.  Whether I will return to her or someone else is still debated, with me tending towards trying to find someone else to do it.

Rey and Luke

On the 21st we took off to see the latest Star Wars film and wasn't it a blast? Unfortunately Roy slept through quite a lot of it, as with his dodgy hearing he seems to object to too much noise. I personally loved ever minute of it and, as Alex says, a Star Wars instalment that even quotes Lenin can't be bad! I might go and see it again, as it is said that with the fast and furious (and occasionally very noisy) happenings hide a lot of the witty and quick quips, so a second attempt at catching them all might be on the order of the day. Just in case you are wondering what the Lenin quote was: I think it was the one about the spark that lights the fire.

Our Christmas table (note total lack of decoration!!)

On the 22nd we were invited to a Christmas party at one of our hashy friends, but I had a bit of a toothache again and didn't go.  Shame, as it was pretty close by and would have loved to see the hashy crowd, but such is life!

The Geochristmas Tree

On the 23rd we went and did our Christmas food shopping at the crazy market, which was great.  Roy didn't need any fillet steak as he found a few pieces left in the freezer from earlier on the year, but I bought my big piece of salmon and we did sprouts and salad and lovely potatoes etc., etc. and had a blast. The drinks we had were quite eclectic, as I posted on FB, and included brown ale, malt whisky, port, no wine or champagne, but we were planning to partake of our last remaining bottle of ice wine, which finally didn't get opened.  Perhaps on New Year's Eve??

A family with kids digging in the Christmas geocache box

During the Christmas holidays there is always a special tree, usually in the middle of a forest somewhere, which gets decorated by the geocaching community and underneath it there is a large cache full of presents. I have never been to one of these, but decided to attend it this year. Especially that one of the lovely couples that stayed with us in November for the caching hike wrote and suggested that we should go together. The original Christmas party around the tree happened at midnight on the 23rd, which we didn't attend, but the tree and the box is left out until 12th night, so one could go any time.

Júlia and János

So, after our pleasant Christmas dinner being the main attraction of Christmas Day, we decided to meet up with János and Júlia for a small trek to the Geochristmas tree on Boxing Day. The morning was very foggy, but eventually the sun came out and it ended up a pleasant outing. We parked up and literally a few yards from the car park there was another cache, which is pretty new, so I went and got it first. I needed to do some climbing onto a tower, but managed it. We actually ran into our friends just as we parked up, so they came with me just to show me where the box was, should I have any problems with it. I didn't and that was one cache in the bag 10 minutes after arrival.

One of the spooky views in the mist

After this, even Roy came on the walk to the Geotree, which we found quite easily and it was lovely. Unfortunately the views, that I promised Roy from a promontory nearby were not as good as they could have been, but as the fog was lifting, at least some of it became visible.

We also decided to go for another cache about 10 miles away, which ended up a bit of an adventure, due to the TomTom going barmy again, but eventually that was in the bag as well, we said goodbye to János and Júlia, who are off to New Zealand on 1st February, and agreed to meet up again somewhere after their return.

The three principals of Edwin Drood

During the holidays I also managed to catch The Mystery of Edwin Drood on the BBC, (a repeat from 2012), which I missed then, but which was brilliant. This was a Dickens story not only I didn't know, but have never even heard of. I did look it up later and apparently it was his last, unfinished, book in his old age. The production was to the usual very high BBC standards, the acting superb and I had a good couple of hours watching it.

En route to cache no.2 on day one

The first lookout tower of the day

Another interesting happening relates to food (again). While queueing for my salmon at the fishmongers in the market, I thought of asking if they had any prawns. Yes, madam, she said and produced a very large bag of frozen prawns for £12. As they were grey, which means that they froze them raw, I thought I would buy them to see if they were any good. Were they any good? Not half!! Finally, after all these years I have found a place which sells prawns which are delicious, worth buying and don't even cost the earth. We had an Asian stir fry with rice and prawns one day of the holidays and stuffed ourselves silly with it. And that was less than half of the bag. Yippeeee, two more occasions await!!

A rather weird urban lookout tower

After our christmassy caching day came my main caching event of the holidays, namely my trip to Edit in Veszprém for a couple of days of hiking and caching. You may recall that she came and stayed with us in Bér while doing some survey of phone/internet cables and posts for her firm and I suggested, that as I have none of the Veszprém caches I might go and do some there, while staying at her place.  She did say that she has done some caching in the past, so was interested to join me.

Edit on top of the tower

The train trip down was amazingly comfortable and fast, although the excessive heat in the compartment made me do a quick strip tease, which amused some. She came and picked me up from the station and we discussed where to go. I have listed about 16 or 17 caches, all but one of the downtown ones and then a few on the outskirts. The forecast was mixed: the first day was mild and sunny(ish), the second unfortunately was supposed to be rainy.

The little wooden bridge by the shrine

She also suggested that we start with a couple of hiking ones right out of Veszprém, as she has been there before and remembers where the caches were. These small hikes had a lot of climb in them, but the views from the top were great. Since there has been an epidemic of lookout tower building in the country, most, even modest mountains, have one on top of them. Thankfully the views were pretty good, although photography ended up a bit blurred, due to distant mist, but I enjoyed those two a great deal.

Interesting sculpture in town

An ancient well in the centre of town

Afterwards we moved into town and started with a multi, which I detest, but I thought we should do at least one. The other one, that we left out, was one of those where you don't know where the parts are until you get to the previous one and this one had the added annoyance of having to do some maths to get the proper coordinates. I DO HATE THESE!!! THEY ANNOY THE HELL OUT OF ME, SO I DECIDED TO MISS THIS ONE OUT.

A Transylvanian gate by one of the theatres

Edit seemed to enjoy caching and we decided that we will register her on the website and she can start doing caching as well as orienteering. It actually turned out that she has registered about a year ago, so once she found her user name and password she could log all our finds herself.

The graceful church of the Loreto Sisters order

The first day we did 2 outside of the town and 5 inside, but the weather did not look very promising for the second day. Unfortunately, in these parts the weather forecast is almost always spot on, so we woke to pouring rain. We still went, as we are hardy souls and a bit of rain wasn't going to frighten us off.  Thankfully, after the first hour or so, the rain subsided and the mist lifted, so it wasn't so bad after all.  Unfortunately, however, the temperature started falling, and with muggins being stupid and leaving the puffy jacket behind (after all the first day it was mild!!), she got rather cold later on.

Interesting frieze on a building

All the caches (6 of them) that we did the second day were in town, but they still included some walking about. Veszprém is a really lovely old town and it has lots of history and especially its topography is fascinating. There is a small river (really only a stream) that goes through it and it is full of spurs, hills and valleys of quite large height and proportions. There are some pretty parks, some of which had funfairs and zoos in them. The zoo is still there, but the funfair is long gone. The views were really pretty from some of the places we went to and the famous viaduct right in the middle of the town was also impressive. The lookout tower epidemic had reached Veszprém too, so we climbed a few. A religious shrine in one of the suburban little forests, however, was pure kitsch, but at least the cache was easy to find.

Medieval church ruins in the centre of Veszprém

The viaduct from below

So the total geocaching count for the holiday week was 16: 3 on 26th when we went to the Geochristmas tree, 7 on the first day and 6 on the second day in Veszprém.. I currently have 1221 cache finds and I think this will now be the final total at the end of 2017. There is another special event with a cache box on New Year's Eve in a village on the outskirts of BP, but by that time we will be in Bér, looking after Anna's guests from Mill Court.

Pretty lake in Veszprém

The castle district of Veszprém

The latest addition to Veszprém's lookout towers

We both wish you all a very happy, healthy and prosperous 2018 with lots of love from Julianna and Roy!!

Geocaching, travelling, dentist and a Jewish cemetery

When I last posted we were still in town, but after the Andrew Tyson concert, which was good, but not exceptional, we returned to the village on Wednesday morning. I had to chase my replacement Barclaycard, which didn't arrive. As it happened, they sent it back in October, but as they didn't notify me of this fact, I only started chasing it when I realised that it must have got lost.It is a real pain that its replacement date always falls near the Christmas rush and while they did send it in October, when you would imagine it arriving long before the Christmas post snarls up everything, when it disappears, like it did this time, the replacement does get held up in the Christmas post. Good job I have another card, or I would be totally lost.

Andrew Tyson

Needless to say the weather turned really awful as soon as arrived in the village, so I was really worried about my jaunt to Nyíregyháza on Saturday, in case it either got cancelled or even if it went ahead, that we would be totally soaked.  Eventually, that is exactly what happened. However, I still enjoyed it, even though the travel was arduous as well. You can't possibly get to Nyíregyháza within a reasonable time from the village, so I had to get back into town on the bus on Friday evening, take the train there and back on Saturday and then travel on the bus back to the village on Sunday morning.

The Nyíregyháza bunch

As I said, it was still well worth it, in spite of the awful weather and all that travelling. The small group that arrived before me and which consisted of both locals and out of towners, was really nice and good company. We managed to repair quite a few damaged and missing caches and did some good geocaching in between. My adjusted target of 1200 caches for the year was reached and I went home a well soaked, but happy bunny. Needless to say the weather cheered up immediately afterwards and had been bright ever since.  Still, the temperatures have dropped considerably since, so I don't really know which I would prefer, mild but rainy or bright but freezing? Probably the latter, if I am honest.

The Nyíregyháza arboretum

Back in the village we did some gardening (cutting back of roses), I did some more transcription of the Bér and Szirák registers, some washing and also some worrying about something daft that I did the week before last and which turned out to be a bit of a saga. One of my new-found caching friends, Feri, promised to bring up a moving cache with him when we geocached together recently, but forgot it. Arising from this came some hassle, which is too complicated to explain, but suffice to say I ended up having to drive into Hatvan on Monday to fetch it off him and then having to place it somewhere.

A lovely old Slovak house near Nyíregyháza

That should have been quite straightforward, except this box is an electronic one where the password is in a pendrive which needs Java to run it to get the PW out and the new one in. I had so much trouble doing this that I ended up in tears.  Finally it was OK, but I will never do anything like this again.  The main cause of the stress was Feri's failure to keep to his promises which included, (amongst many others), an offer of doing it for me or at least sit down with me and showing me how.

 A rain and windswept lake near Nyíregyháza

Needless to say, that after thes tress of the Java download not working I actually worked out how to do it and now I really know it, so should I ever come across this box again, I should be OK. What I will never do again, however, is trust Feri in anything that included being bright, trustworthy and dependable. Otherwise he is quite a nice fellow, but not a strong enough character to be trusted.

A rain and windswept bit of forest near Nyíregyháza

So finally, yesterday we came back into town, en route placing the box and having a lovely lunch in a restaurant that we fell out of love with in recent years, but tried again due to being very hungry while passing it. It was a good decision, as it was back to its old ways, so we should frequent it again, I think.

The town where we placed the moving cache is called Aszód. We had a little walkabout there and saw some nice buildings and generally a friendly little town. However, the vandals have got to here as well unfortunately. A lovely early XXth century mausoleum in the Jewish cemetery (a hobby of Roy's) was in a terrible state, it was sad to see the desecration. Still, we always love seeing remnants of history, even if the present day does not honour them.

Thomas Trotter

I went to a lovely concert last night, which was given by the boys' choir of St. John's College, Cambridge and Thomas Trotter, an excellent organist. I hummed along with the carols at the end and got into a positively Christmas spirit.

The Boy's Choir of St. John"s, Cambridge

Today is going to be part lovely and part not so.  Shortly we are off to lunch with Robert and Volker in one of our favourite city restaurants, (this is the good bit), followed by the not so good bit of the dentist for me. The tooth they wanted to extract is still surviving, so we cancelled that, but the other one below it still gives me gip, so that is going to be filled again today. With advancing years I am getting more and more cowardly in the dentist's chair. Still, it's got ot be done, so off we'll go. I hope Roy comes with me for moral support, considering I alwyas go with him when he goes.

The Jewish cemetery in Aszód

The Schossberger Mausoleum

The moving cache is hiding in that bit of forest behind the bench

Have a lovely Christmas everybody and speak to you soon!

TOOTHACHE, concerts, opera and geocaching

I haven't posted for a while, mostly due to still struggling with the cold/flu of previous weeks and excrutiating toothache. Latter started about 3 days after I last posted and the worst of it was gone the following Thursday. I have chewed my way through my entire stock of Paracetamol and had to buy some more in the pharmacy in the next village.

Gyuri on one of the rock walls by a cache

Even during the days before the toothache I couldn't do much in the by then much improved weather, due to the cold lingering and then the toothache starting. I couldn't sleep and sometimes I couldn't think due to the pain. I was wondering whether this was just the virus or my two most painful teeth would have been hurting anyway.  Since then I found out that the chief culprit was the virus and miraculously all the pain went on the Thursday.  Until then life was a bit traumatic.

Our friends Nata and Colin had also caught the lurgy, so our lunch with them got cancelled and we could put off returning to town until Tuesday, hoping that with all that Paracetamol travel would be more bearable.  I also managed to get through to my dentist and got an appointment for Wednesday. Interestingly enough the pain was slowly subsiding and I assumed it was due to taking all those painkilling pills, Wednesday started very well. We had a few commissions and then went to the dental X-ray place, had it done and later we attended the dentist.

The Danube

That was very interesting: she didn't even look inside my mouth, but perused the X-ray and pronounced that my upper big molar will either have to have root canal treatment or come out.  I voted for the latter straight away, when she told me that she wouldn't do that herself at her surgery, but would send me to the nearby hospital to her son's surgery. So we went, but had to wait so long that we ran away. The atmosphere in those hospitals is enough to put the willies in anyone. Tankfully the pain was quite bearable by then, so I went back to my dentist and asked to have time to think it over as this rush was making me feel anxious and finally fixed an appointment for the following Monday for the extraction.

A cut-off inlet by the Danube

Shelter on a study trail

Of course, there were complications, due to my heart and blood pressure medicines, so we agreed that I would contact my cardiologist for advice prior to the extraction. And then came the miracle: on Thursday morning I woke up, stretched for the Paracetamol on my bedside table and then stopped.  The tooth wasn't hurting any more. Other than the usual tendency of teeth mending themselves as soon as you have to go to the dentist, this, I believed, proved that most of the pain was caused by the cold/flu and once that subsided, so did the toothache.  Obviously, it wasn't accidental that the cold/flu attacked those two teeth worst, they must have problems and will have to be seen to sometime, but not just before Christmas!!!

Evgeny Koroliov

There were a series of concerts and an opera in the pipeline, where I was worried that I would sleep through most of them, due to very little sleep with the toothache.  As it happens, I actually lasted pretty well on most of them and enjoyed one of them especially. Evgeny Koroliov played all 48 of J. S. Bach's Goldberg Variations without an interval and we were all gobsmacked by his skill and artistry. That was fantastic.  At that stage the tooth was still hurting at least a bit, but I forgot about it completely, the music was so magical.

PInchas Zukerman

I also heard Pinchas Zukerman playing Beethoven, Mozart  and Schubert with the Camerata Salzburg on another night, which was not only brilliant, but a joy as it has been a long time since I heard a violinist play. This year it is almost entire piano and very few, if any, performances of violin music in my subscription concerts. The Humperdinck opera Hansel and Graetel was good, but not my cup of tea, so I left half way through. I don't normally do this, but it really didn't grab me and I thought I would be better off asleep getting ready for the following morning.

A watertower in Dunaújváros

You might ask why? What was so special about the following morning.  Well, you may recall that in my last post I was worrying about my plans for geocaching and hiking, that might get cancelled due to my incapacity.  Well, I have recovered, although not entirely, but sufficiently from the cold/flu and with the toothache gone as well, I decided to go ahead with all of it.  This amounted to 4 continuous days of geocaching, with the last day being a 10km hike as well as caching.

Feri with our first cache found together

Thursday I joined my friend Gyuri and we went all over town doing multis and a few more South of town. Friday was spent with Mariann, who had a list of caches that she wanted to visit and as I only had about 3 of those, I agreed. On Saturday my friend Feri came up to town for a meeting on Friday and then on Saturday we visited a good few caches West of town, beyond the hills. Finally, Sunday was spent doing a 10km hike in the Buda hills with Zsuzsi and Jutka and in spite of the not too warm weather, it was great.  Total tally of caches was 25 over the 4 days and a many good friends for company were much enjoyed by me.

A row of wine cellars

Today I spent most of the day in bed, trying to recuperate. I haven't even been outside, even though I have my prescriptions that will have to be got, but there is no hurry, next week will do if I don't feel like it. Tomorrow evening I have another lovely concert to attend, this time by the British pianist Andrew Tyson and then, if all goes well, we'll be heading back to Bér. I hope I will be able to post in time next week!!

The lovely old runied church in Zsámbék

Reading, opera, country life and illness

Last week the weather was really depressing. My arms were getting better, but my mood wasn't. It felt like it was night all day. Thick clouds, drizzle, no wind and just misery all round. There was still no point trying to fire up the pottery stove, although at least the temperatures were above zero, so we were quite nice and warm just running the central heating.

I did some more MACSE transcription, watched a fair amount of television and waited for the weather to get better. I was also heavily into the Nick Hunt book I mentioned in the last post  which got more and more enjoyable as I read chapter after enjoyable chapter. I like his outlook, his style and his attitudes and when he got to Hungary, I could almost 100% agree with his observations, judgements and analysis.

Alfredo and Violetta

On Saturday I caught the 10 o'clock bus to town as I had a performance of La Traviata at the Erkel Theatre in the evening. Ian and Ros have also arrived, so I arranged for a lunch with them, during which I could collect my phone cable and had a brilliant time with them. They are such good company always.

Temporary carpenter on ladder

After lunch I did a lot of shopping for things we ran out of in the village and even managed to have a short nap prior to the opera. The performance was one of the best this season so  far and we have all enjoyed it tremendously. This subscription ticket is the only one now that gathers all four of us: Bozsa, me, Kati and Andor, the other two are just for two, one I go to with Kati, the other with Bozsa. It was nice to see them, especially Kati, who ended up on her own the previous week, due to my funny turn.

My favourite tree on the other side of the valley

On Sunday I caught the 7:20 bus home and was indoors by 9:30. The only problem from then on was that both my sore right shoulder and a new pain in my left thumb joint produced a great deal of pain and it even stopped me sleeping for a couple of nights. My arthritis is really bad this autumn and I was struggling with a lot of pain. The only good event on Sunday was the last Grand Prix of the season, which was actually a bit boring, but still it was nice to see them whizzing round at Yas Marina. Bottas won, as it is a circuit where it is difficult to overtake and he led from pole all the way round. Lewis was second, so he increased his lead over Vettel, who came second overall, with Bottas third.

Roses nearly in December

Thankfully the very painful shoulder and hand started getting better on Monday, although they are still sore a bit and I have to be careful with my movements not to bang them on anything. The weather started imrpoving a bit too, with the sun coming out towards the end of the weekend and definitely on Monday and Tuesday.  Tuesday, unfortunately, produced a plank at the back of the barn, which decided to drop to the ground and with a combined age of 145 we found ourselves climbing ladders to put it back. We fixed it temporarily, so it should survive the winter, but it will have to be fixed professionally next spring.

Roses nearly in December

I even managed to photograph some roses, which is amazing as some nights are now below zero and there wasn't much sunshine in the last few weeks. The herb garden is now looking quite dead, although the thyme and the parsley are still profuse.

Roy mole hunting

And finally, I apologise, but I have to close on yet another bit of bad news this week: I am ill again. Now that I was getting my mobility back with the shoulder and thumb improving, I managed to catch yet another bad cold, probably on public transport in town on Saturday/Sunday, so it is back to bed, hot lemon and boxes of tissues for me again.  Really annoying, as I was planning outings and hikes for December with a variety of friends, which are now under a big question mark.  God, I hate getting old and I also hate catching every lurgy that passes.

Sunset at the end of the garden

Our winter fuel

On that pleasant comment I must close now. Let's hope I'm in a better frame of mind next week!!