40 Years of Jan

It seems now we have reached that age when lots of our friends start celebrating their 40th birthdays.

It feels like only yesterday that we were at their 25th parties...

This time it was Jan (Juancho) who was going into the next decade of life. As such, there were festivities planned, and of course lots of dress ups (apparently for the photo booth, but it seems most people were happy wearing the wigs etc for the whole evening).

So, without further ado, a few photos from the evening:

 

For the rest of them, click here.

Old Friends and Other Animals

We managed a catch up with age-old friends Hannah and Diego (along with little'un Matteo) at a pub in Woodstock (no, not that Woodstock).

Whilst we ate some tasty pub lunch, we caught up on all the happenings since we last met, which had been quite a while.

Of course with so much to talk about, we had to continue it whilst walking in the grounds of Blenheim Palace where we saw some of the local field dwellers.

 

What a great way to spend the weekend !

Tapas and Tumbonas

Sometimes one just needs to get away from it all, even if it is for just a few days.

 

The start could have gone a bit better. An accident on the route into London caused a huge traffic jam, the bus ended up managing to find another route in to Victoria where we changed for the next bus (the one after we had booked for) to take us to Stansted.

That was the good thing about organising this holiday to stay a night in the Premier Inn at Stansted Airport. It didn't matter if we arrived late, we would be in the check in queue on time in the morning. And have a good nights rest beforehand too.

If you want to know why this hotel chain can guarantee a good nights sleep, then just ask Olga about their pillows. Yes, they are THAT good. The breakfast is pretty tasty and plentiful too.

So, leaving the cold weather of the UK behind (it was -1 degrees when we woke up), we set off for our home away from home - Valencia.

Having not been back here for ages (must be a couple of years now) we were eager to meet up with our friends and enjoy some of the lovely sunshine whilst relaxing on the beach. Of course the food was also a part I was particularly looking forward to.

On arriving we made our way to Silvia's place, where we were being looked after for the duration of our visit. Soon after dropping down our bags, we set off into town with her, meeting up with Roberto (he was on holiday from Mainz), Luca, and later Jordi.

After sitting down for a beer just behind the Torres de Serrano, we started catching up on what people are now doing, what has happened since we last met and all the other gossip. To accompany the beer we had a couple of tapas, one of which was a not very brava Patatas Bravas. This is one of my pet hates, if you call a dish "brave potatoes", then they should not just have mayonaisse on the side.

We then went on to another local to eat, where I am pleased to say the patatas were brave enough for me. Here the beer flowed, the chatting got louder, until eventually we had to go home (well, they had classes and work the next day - we were on holiday).

The next day we set off with Silvia after breakfast to the beach. The malvarrosa is one of the beaches of Valencia with such easy access by public transport, which is why it's our preferred relaxation spot when we come and visit. The water was just warm enough to walk in, but a bit too nippy to submerge oneself further.

Come lunchtime, and it being Sunday, we of course had to eat the local speciality of paella. And where else better to taste this dish than at the home of Silvia's parents. Homemade at its best!

We then headed off to the port to meet up with Gema, Alejandra and Claudia, Fernando, Valeria and Iker and spent some time catching up whilst watching the kids play.

After all that excitement we returned home to relax a little (and enjoy the novela).

Monday saw us go off to the beach again, to top up the sun, and then we met up with Luca and Gloria for a buffet lunch and of course chitchat. On to desserts, and Juanfran turned up (we hadn't seen him since Javi's wedding). Once Gloria had gone back to teach her students, Olga went for a bit of window shopping whilst the boys stayed behind and had a coffee (del tiempo, naturally).

We then headed off home to relax a little. As it was our last night here, I made sure to go out and meet up one last time with Jordi. We met at Benimaclet and went to a local eatery which we had previously enjoyed last time with Ana and Miquel (who are now in the outbacks of Texas). Of course there was a nice looking barmaid here, which we didn't complain about.

On Tuesday we said our goodbyes to Silvia, and headed off to the beach one last time. Here we met up with Roberto, grabbed some lunch at Pans & Company, and then went back to pick up our bags and head off to the airport.

What a relaxing holiday it was, and great to meet up again with old friends.

To see the rest of the photos, click here.

Fine Frontages and Soaring Towers in Kent

After finally organising a meet-up with Andy from since we studied together in Birmingham, we went down to Canterbury to give him and Titti a visit for Easter.

On our way to the coast we popped in on old time family friend Annie (many years ago, I had cycled from Land's End to John O'Groats in aid of Parkinson's, and she rode along with my mum in the car whilst us boys cycled the 1600 kms across Britain). She had also babysat us many a time back when we were much younger. It was great to see her again after so many years.

Once we arrived at Whitstable, we walked along the seafront where we saw lots of houses with colourful frontages, giving a proper feeling of being by the seaside. We chatted, walked, and had an ice-cream before heading off for dinner at a local fish restaurant.

Due to Olga falling ill on the first evening, she stayed at the house whilst the rest of us went off into Canterbury to visit the cathedral amongst other things. Along the way there were many interesting buildings made from the familiar flint stones seen a lot around here.

The cathedral itself was quite busy, lots of tourists visiting for the Easter break. However, we managed to get around without too much trouble, and see the spectacular views of this impressive building.

The ceiling and stained glass were particularly photogenic.

All in all a good city to visit, and great to meet up with old friends.

For the rest of the photos, take a look here.

West Coast Catch-Up

Delays sometime happen. Especially in IT projects. So hopefully you'll excuse my tardiness in getting the blog entries written for the Jan/Feb trip to the US west coast.

As an enticement, I thought I'd show you this:

I guess you know where I'm talking about.

And then for the other part of the trip we headed inland a bit and saw lots of these:

So, no need to hold your breath for too long now, the updates for this trip are coming very soon (and will be post dated to get some order in this chaos).

Colombian Gold

The British Museum is such a wonderful place. There is so much to see, that despite the numerous visits, I still haven't viewed all of their collections.

This is made even more difficult when they have special exhibitions for a limited time. Some of them are not of much interest to me, but the others require another trip to London (which I don't mind at all) in order to see them before they move on.

This time it was a collection of Colombian Gold, some of it from the Museo de Oro in Bogota, and some of the items from the British Museum's own collection.

This we had to see.

So although photos were difficult to take inside (quite dark) we did thoroughly enjoy the experience.

A few photos from other areas of the museum we saw are below.

Of course we didn't just go to the museum, we also walked past the new (-ish) BBC building.

All Souls Church still stands tall next door:

And of course the obligatory pictures of the Houses of Parliament:

What luck to live so close to such a city !

Carnival Time

Once again we have reached that time of year when certain places around the world dress up and party for days on end.

Having partaken in the Carnivals of Barranquilla (once) as well as Mainz (too many times to count), I thought I would start off by giving you a brief comparison between the two types of carnival, so that you can decide for yourself which one you prefer:

The Weather
Mainz: Usually about 5 degrees Celsius, but ranging from -10 to +10. Invarioubly it snows or rains during these days.

Barranquilla: Around 30 degrees Celsius, ranging from +25 at night to +35 during the day. Occassionally there is a cloud.

The Bands
Mainz:

Barranquilla:

 

The Costumes
Mainz:  

Barranquilla:

The Floats
Mainz:

Barranquilla:

The Dancers
Mainz:

Barranquilla:

The Unusual
Mainz:

Barranquilla: 

 So which one do you prefer?