Long weekend in Brasov; Altes Land & apples

This will be a short summary of the last 2 weekends. One week ago I went to Brasov. Alex was there on holidays (driving) and I flew on Fri and came back on Mon evening. It was a super nice weekend. The weather was great - around 28C, sunny and warm. We stayed both in Alex's apartment (as you can see on the pic we were "camping" - since we didn't manage to camp together this summer, this was something to compensate ;-) and at Alex's dad's place.



We walked around the city, went to one spot on the hill close to Tampa to see the city from above:





We took care of Alex's dad's animals, chopped wood for grill (guess who cut a finger??) and also had a grill evening with Paul and his girlfriend.
The apples and grapes from Gelu's garden are super yummi!!!













On top of that, we went jogging around Tampa and met one Swedish guy from my ex-plant in Brasov!!! It was a surprise to see a jogging person there who happened to be someone familiar...
I also met Alex's grandpa who invited me (Alex was a driver this evening) for some home made cherry liquor. Mums!


This past weekend we went biking in Altes Land (on the other side of Elbe; sort of behind Airbus plant). I've been planning to do it for a while now and since this weekend we had such a great weather, we decided to go there on Saturday. The trip got delayed by some hours since we had a little unplanned event - namely both of us left the apartment thinking that the other one had house keys... Oh well. Hausmeister doesn't exist on Saturday so we had to call some key-emergency. A guy came after 45min, it took him 5 sec to open the door. Don't ask about the bill...

Anyway, we went to Altes Land and biked around apple fields. So many apples!!!!!! Other fruit too but it is really amazing!!! At the end of the trip I really wanted to have a good apple pie but didn't get one which was so good. I guess someone needs to teach people how to make a good apple pie. Having such good and many apples...





Sat evening we had home made pasta dinner at Sandra's & Hans'. It was great!! At the end we were playing cards and stayed here until 04AM!!! Wow!! Sunday was a bit slow, as you can imagine ;-)

I thought I would manage to have another post in August

I don't get it - how come I cannot get more than 3 posts per month. I mean, of course I understand - if I don't write anything, I won't have it. But still... I think I'm sort of loosing it - to make some updates here. Or there is nothing really to write about. Plus, there is so much that one (or I) is active in: FB, blog, skyping with family and friends, etc etc. It got sort of too much ;-) Another thing is that it is different when you get to new places, new thing happen, new impressions and experiences. But now nothing new has really happened. Daily life. Work. Gym. Meeting some friends. Computer in the evening (but not blogging!). Sleep. Get up. Work. Etc...

This weekend I went however to Hafencity - a new growing area in HH, in the old industry/harbor? part of the city. Nice and fresh. Sort of like the whole Bo01 in Malmö or new Lindholmen buildings in GBG. But ok, in HH there is more infrastructure, cafés, restaurants. Quite nice.
The rest of the weekend - gym, a bit of cleaning, meeting Guillem with Nadia in the playground, painting (ok, yes, that's sort of new or going back to painting again, I think it is my fall-mood getting started).
The weather was almost like in fall. But today it is supposed to be ca 27C and sun!! Wow!

On Fri I'm off to Romania. Back on Mon evening. It's been 1 year since I was there last time. So high time!! :-) Hope the weather will be still nice.
So I can again post some pictures on that blog ;)

Weekend in Gdynia

I just got back home after weekend in Gdynia. Alex and I went to visit my parents. Alex went already on Thu afternoon - with a flight from Dortmund. So he had 1 day alone with my parents. They went in the evening to a Mozart concert in Gdansk, walked in Oliwa Park - which is super nice! And then went to Sopot. So they had a nice evening. I arrived on Fri late afternoon. We went home, had dinner, some good wine and chatted the whole evening. Since Alex walked the whole day in full sun and over 30C in Gdansk, he was quite tired at night - so we just stayed at home.
On Saturday I had an idea of going to Hel (nice expression, isn't it? ;-). For those of you who don't know where/what Hel is - a small fisherman town at the end of penninsula - between the Baltic Sea and Gdansk Bay. A really nice place and what is even nicer, is that there are ships and catamarans between Gdynia and Hel in summer time. So we took a bus to downtown Gdynia and we got stuck in a traffic jam due to some road constructions!!!! Then we ran to this boat and guess what??? We missed it with like 2 minutes!!!! Grrrrrr!!!! And the other trips were sold out!!! Turists all over!!! So we stayed in Gdynia, walked around, had some fika at the beach and enjoyed a great weather. Later on we went to help my dad with some stuff at our summer cottage. Geez!!! I haven't been there for like 10 years or so!! It felt so nostaligc.... suddenly I recalled all the great parties over there. Great memories ;-) The evening we spent between watching the World Championship in Athletics and zapping to Sopot Festival. Nice performance of Oceana girl!! Cool music!!
Today Alex flew quite early from Gdansk back to Dortmund. My flight was later in the afternoon and the trip went somehow very smoothly and fast. From door to door 4 hours (incl. the flight, bus from Lubeck airport, subway in HH and walking home). Not bad, huh?
Warm and nice. Still summer in the air. I love it!

Friday grill

Oh amazing weather this weekend in HH!!!! Yesterday we had BBQ in a little park in Eimsbuttel. The whole day the temp. was above 30C and the evening was great!!! Sooooo warm!!
We had some good sausages, veggies, HALOUMI cheese (I found it in Germany!!!!); rose and white wine, etc. Water melon as a dessert. Yummi!!!
Today it was a bit hard day; headache and slow pace.... ;-)

Holidays Swe/Norway

Last Wed I got back from my vacations. I had fantastic 12 days in Sweden and Norway. I flew to Kiruna, met Tania's friend Anna, got a rented car and waited for Tania and her friend Lisa who were supposed to be back from the climbing a glacier course.
Anyway, due to the fact that I had a very short time to change planes in CPH, my bagpack didn't make it to Kiruna!!!! So we had to stay over night there (instead of heading towards Lofoten). The good thing - the girls were more than happy to take shower and refresh a bit. The day after - trip to the airport, picking up my bagpack (sleeping mat didn't make it!!!), meeting some other friends who just came from Göteborg (!), grocery shopping and finally taking off towards Lofoten. Short stop at some friend's place in Abisko, getting maps, tips what to visit etc.



The first night we spent at a beach near Korsnes. In the morning - super fast "bath" in the sea. It was so cold that we had to go out after 2 min in order not to "loose" our feet.... But nice!!!

First hiking trip up the mountains after breakfast. Beautiful.

Fika and then going to take a ferry from Skutvik to Svolvaer. Lofoten here we come!!!

We slept at some quiet places, far away from people. Oatmeal with blueberry soup for breakfast was delicious. Landscapes unforgettable!!!


Here a small village Å:




It was light the whole 24hrs. The sun went down but around 2 it was already up again. A bit hard to sleep in a tent...
From Egkum:


We skipped the whales. Too far to drive.
Instead we enjoyed tons of blueberries and "hjortron" (I think cloudberry in Engl.). Amazing!!!!

We had a really great week, full of adventures. Especially paddling sea kayaks; having a great weather on the way to some islands, then it turned to be a storm. Tough trip back but we made it!!!



Afterwards taking a night train from Kiruna to Göteborg. Then 3 days there. So nice!!!

Now work and counting days until my next holidays at the end of Sept.... ;-)

Birthday

Originally the idea was to have a grill or picnic in the park... But since it rained a bit on Fri, during the day, we had a small party at home. The evening was perfect!! Most of the time we were at the balcony. Thank you all for a really great time!!! Your company, presents, flowers, cake :-)

Chilled out weekend

It feels bad to update this blog only during weekends. I should probably be more politically or culturally active but I really have no time during the weekdays...
Last week there was Balett-week in HH. I REALLY wanted to go and see some of the performance but the only one I could get the tickets for, had only poor-visibility seats left. Monica and I decided to skip it and then after checking the website we noticed that we could buy the tickets for some Russian Balett for September. So we did it!!! Yuppi!!!

As some of you know I'm planning to visit Filip in China at the end of September. But again, there is a "project" - visa. Both Alex and I tried to call the Chinese consulate at least 15 times but without any success.. So after sending them email I got to know their opening times. I wrote this kind of "giving the right" letter and asked Alex to go and leave my visa application on Friday. And guess what?! After checking the date of my departure they concluded: Come back in August. WHAT?!?! Oh well, I guess I will try to fix it again in 10 days or so.

The whole weekend was relaxed and nice. I wanted to go the Miniature World - a city made of miniatures - people who saw it said it was great! But we somehow didn't make it... We were in Schanze and discovered a new restaurant, actually owned by a famous German cook. I think the service still needs improvements; the same when it comes to food. But it is a cool place. And their chocolate cake and apple pie are great!!

Today Alex left around 12, and I went with Sandra, Hans and their friend Claudia to St. Pauli for a "fischbrötchen". Mums!!! It was a very nice place, Brucken 10; interior design done by a famous HH-artist. Check it out:






Afterwards we walked a bit around St.Pauli - went to see the shop of this artist who decorated Brucke 10.

Sandra really wanted to have the chocolate cake from the place we went to yesterday. So we did that. And the apple pie was also yummi!!!



A very nice day. Finished now with a lot of rain :(