ramblingramas

[9th Oct]
We are now in Czech Republic in Olomouc with Michal, a friend of Mama and Papas, and today he showed us a natural cave which you pay to go in and a guide takes you through. It had a path so you didn’t have to climb around. First we walked on the upper level and we could almost touch the stalactites on the ceiling. Then the guide, who spoke no English so wasn’t much use, showed us through onto the second floor down. On the second floor he showed us ‘the carrot’ a stalactite which was 2 metres tall and we learned that the stalagmites and stalactites, grow on average 1mm every 10 years! We walked on through the narrow passages and then we came to something that looked exactly the same as a curtain when it had a light behind it, but it was actually limestone shaped as a curtain. Then we kept walking through the passages and caves and then we walked out the exit into a forest and I found it interesting how such a big cave could be sitting in the woods. We took some great photos of the stalagmites and stalactites, here is an example…

PS: Stalagmites form upwards, stalactites form downward, and stalagnates form when stalagmites and stalactites connect together.

Nilay

On Tuesday we drove from Dresden 6 hours ( including stops) to Visky a village near Litovel which is a town near Olomouc in the Czech Republic. Part of the reason the trip was so long was our “dramatic” stop in Prague.
Before leaving Dresden, Dad had declared his “great” idea of stopping in Prague for Lunch (surprisingly as we seldom plan ahead!). After leaving the motorway and circling the city at least twice looking for a car park, we finally after about an hour found a park approx 20 minutes from Wenceslas square. Given we no longer had the the time for a “nice & relaxed lunch overlooking the square or the river”, we got some lunch in one of the food stalls in the Square. Nilay & I got a half sausage each and mama and papa got potato dumplings with sour cabbage and we had spiral donuts cooked over a BBQ for desert.
After we’d finished our food we headed back to the van in hope that we’d be back before one hour was up suspecting that we’d have to pay another whole hour worth of parking even if you were only a minute over time. Of course we ended up paying for the extra hour as we were about 8 minutes over time !!

Milan

We decided that Dresden would a good place for a “transit stop” for the ~600 mile journey between Hamburg and Olomouc in the Czech Republic. After a long day of driving delayed primarily by road works, we arrived at the campsite which will be remembered for blowing fuses and a wonky table tennis table.
Maria and I had last been in Dresden in 1999 which we had remembered as a picturesque city which was under significant reconstruction and restoration which we now saw had resulted in a dramatic transformation into a modern yet historically preserved city. Most notably is it’s most famous landmark the “Frauen Kirche” (Church of Our Lady) which was almost completely destroyed in WWII. Nilay & I decided that we would like to go the viewing platform on the tower above the dome (made from 12,300 tonnes of sandstone) where we had great views and a perspective of the whole city.

JR

As part of this trip we were thinking that it would be great if we could show the boys the places where their grandparents and great- grandparents had come from. One of those places is Husum in the north of Germany where my maternal grandparents lived and where my mother grew up.

I myself had not been to Husum for over 20 years and was curious to see this town by the North Sea where I had spent time during my childhood when visiting my grandparents.

So yesterday morning we set out early in the morning from Hamburg and drove for 2 hours through the landscape of Schleswig Holstein and North Friesland until we arrived in the street where my grandparents had lived. We spent some time looking at the house from the outside and taking some photographs. I also had a conversation with a very friendly employee of the next door petrol station who said that he had been working there for 20 years and remembered my grandfather well. (the owners of the petrol station now own my grandparents house and are renting it out).

We then walked past the Ostenfelder Bauernhaus, an old farmhouse museum, to the cemetery. After some searching we found my grandparents grave. Various other ancestors from the Schröder side of the family are also buried there. We decided that we would get some flowers and return later to put them on the grave.

After a little walk through the town and across a medieval themed market in the main square we arrived at the Nissenhaus Museum where my grandfather used to work. We spent some time looking at how the people in the coastal areas and on the small north sea islands called “Halligen” have been protecting their fields, houses and livestock against the sea with dykes, especially during storm tides, which have played a major part in Husum’s history. The museum also displayed very beautiful models of really large traditional North Frisian farm houses and windmills.

After returning to the market square we tried various delicacies for lunch, such as a “matjesbrötchen”, a bread roll with herring), “Wildbratwurst”, and cherry beer as well as very nice vanilla waffles.

Of course a visit to Husum would not be complete without a stroll down to the Harbour and the seaside. So after wondering around the Harbour area and looking at the souvenir shops and the fleamarket which took place there we returned to our van via the cemetery (where we planted pink and white heather). We then drove down to the seaside and wandered along the dyke before returning back to Hamburg where we stayed one last night with Gabi.

Maria

Our visit to Hamburg (officially known as the title above) included a trip to its harbour, (2nd largest port in Europe). It’s scale makes clear that what seemed to be a very large 20ft container with our contents (now safely in NZ) is a small speck on one of many container ships spotted in the harbour.
Hamburg also has relevance for me as the base of BP Lubricants German operation. Whilst our stay did not include a visit to the “office” my former Marine Lubes colleagues will known the significance of the letters MSC spotted on one of the ships coming into the harbour as we sat for lunch at a “beach” cafe.
The highlight of our short stay however was visiting Gabi, Andreas and their children Theo & Wilko. Gabi spent time in NZ studying with Maria, became good friends, and was bridesmaid at our wedding, whom we hadn’t seen since Milan was 3 months old. It was great to catch up with Gabi & meet her family in their nice warm and spacious home (key criteria for luxury when you’re otherwise staying in a campervan!)

JR

On Wedneday we went out into the centre of Berlin to see a friend of our mum and dads called Claudia. She is a fashion designer and had her own stall in a market in Winterfeld Platz, which is a place in Berlin. She recommended a museum called Spektrum, so we decided to go there and see what its like. It was a huge museum and had a science museum next to it which had a big model of an airplane hanging from it. Spektrum was packed with hands-on science displays and and there were lots of things to do and look at like at the Launchpad at the science museum in London.
After the museum we decided to go to a building called Panorama Punkt (panorama point). We went there because we wanted to get a good view of Berlin from above. It was 24 floors high, and had the fastest lift in Europe which we used to get up. It went 8.5 meters per second and we went 90.6 meters high. We got a great 360 degrees view of Berlin and saw many of the places we had visited previously.

The day had been great but a bit chilly weather but was lots of fun.

NR

PS: (by JR) The Winterfeld Platz Markt also had fantastic chicken Shwarmas in a place called Habibi’s & we also met an interesting man who was selling pillows made from “Dinkel Spreu” (some sort of spelt straw). Nilay was lucky enough to be given a free small pillow which now goes everywhere with him.

We first started learning how to do poi at the One World Festival back in England where one of the workshops was learning circus skills. One of the main attractions in this workshop was poi so Nilay and I tried it out. It turned out to be great and we insisted that we got a pair so we made our own poi out of socks with tennis balls in their heels trapped in by knots with a string tied to the end.
These were great to practise with but not so good for a “real” performance, which we want to do at our leaving party in Emmendingen in Germany.
In Berlin we researched where we could buy poi, and we found a great little circus shop in Charlottenburg. On Tuesday we went there and Nilay and I could both choose a nice new pair of poi with silk scarves attached. We are going to use them for performances.

Milan

Yesterday – it was post marathon Monday – the 4 of us and Jayesh’s cousin Amisha who has been spending a few days with us, participated in a guided walking tour of Berlin.
Our very knowledgable guide Michael took us around all the main sites from the Hackscher Markt via Museum Island to Checkpoint Charlie, the remaining bits of the Berlin Wall, to the car park which was the site of Hitler’s bunker and the Brandenburg Gate and many more. For 4 hours we learned and listened and walked while admiring this amazing city, its history and the ways it is coming to terms with its history. At the end of the walk we admired a pink sky as the sun was setting to the west of the Brandenburg Gate.
We were most impressed with our english guide’s extensive knowledge of all things historic or political reaching from Berlin in the ice age to the present days.

Maria

Taken & edited by Nilay

8 years after my first attempt in Dublin and my third attempt after London in 2008, I achieved my personal goal of a sub 4 hr marathon, wiping almost 20 mins off my previous PB. The conditions in Berlin yesterday were perfect, confirmed by the new world record of 2:03.23 achieved by Wilson Kipsang of Kenya.
I raised £1000 for the mental health charity Mind and in addition it was done true “Forrest Gump” style! (The haircut is booked for Wed and the general consensus seems to be that the beard also needs to go!)
Not sure if it was the “brutal” training programme, the fresh air we been having living out of a campervan, or the chicken satay the night before, (whilst not threatening any record setting times), its great to have broken my own personal physical and mental barrier. – Impossible is nothing!

JR