Tag Archives: swimming

Part 20 – Friendzone: A weekend in Dunedin

We had plans to see other travel / motorcycling friends, Janet and Scott, later this afternoon. By now, they also have three kids so we were invited for a catch up and dinner after naptime at 3.30pm. Which meant, we had almost a whole day to kill first.

So we opted to spend a good chunk of it at our favourite place in Dunedin: Celia’s and Tig’s house. There was time for showers, schoolwork, playtime, food, even more coffee…everthing that happens when 5 adults and 5 kids are in the same place. In the end, Celia came up with the plan to go on a walk at Mt Cargill. It took some time packing snacks, water and whatever the kids needed to go on a walk, but then we were off to a car ride and a walk. The weather was nice, everybody enjoyed to be out and about and the views of Dunedin were quite spectacular. The photos tell most of the story, really.

We were back at Celia’s and Tig’s place just in time to pack up and leave for Janet’s and Scott’s place where we would also spend the night. It was so good to see them again and meet their kids. After a lovely dinner with an astonishing amount of food having been eaten by 4 adults and 5 kids, we got dessert in form of banana bread that their eldest had baked. The two younger of their three girls took quite the liking to the AoE and not long after, they had a make-up party on the top bunk bed.

In the evening, we slipped right back into the good conversations we used to have when all four of us were living in Wellington. Good times were had!

After breakfast the next morning, we said our goodbyes as Janet plans every day very thoroughly, especially the weekends. It reminded me a lot of myself when we’re at home. So many things to do!

For the rest of the Sunday, we got Tig and the two younger kids to join us at St Clair Hot Saltwater pools, while Celia and Charlie went off to train for their big three day hike coming up in April. The pool was very cool, actually pretty warm and it had toys and goggles for the kids to use. Both our kids were IN LOVE with the goggles as they allowed them to dive without the sting in their eyes. So we stayed even longer than our friends, having an extra round of splashing and diving.

Back home at Celia’s and Tig’s, everybody was knackered. A rather quiet evening was had with one more conversation with the adults. I had managed to get through all my pre-prepared lists for the Hocken library in 4 days. Thus, we will leave Dunedin tomorrow after one week here instead of the planned two weeks.

Part 15 – Wanaka, our (last) best hope

The weather this morning matched our mood: It was raining, fog was hanging everywhere. Still, we had a shower and (freshly cleaned up) we had a mission. Today, we would use the charged starter battery for as long as it would run, no stopping, to make it as close to Wanaka as we could get. At least halfway, so that the AA would have to tow us to Wanaka instead of back to Haast.

The first half felt quite tense. It was also hard on the kids, especially Number 3 was worrying a lot. After Haast pass, the tension started to ease…we would definitely be towed to Wanaka now. Also, we left the clouds and the rain at the west coast. Going down along lake Wanaka, the sun was shining. Oh, Wanaka, why are you so pretty?!? I was quite sad that we couldn’t stop at any of the lookouts or walks, it all looked so wonderful in sunshine. We crossed over to Lake Hawea which was equally marvellous.

We got something better though. Timmy lasted us all the way to Wanaka! We even managed to get a powered site at a campground before the battery was completely drained. In the end, trusty Timmy got us the 140km to where we needed to go. As we had to get here in one go, it was only lunch time. It being Sunday meant that we had a whole afternoon in Wanaka to fill with sunshine and fun before any workshops would open up again tomorrow.

That’s what we did. We hung out at the lake, had a splash, relaxed and treated ourselves to a lovely dinner at Kai whaka pai in town.

Monday morning came around. Now we needed a real fix for Timmy. Our hopes sank again. Nobody was able to check out our problem with the motorhome until the middle of next week. By this time, I already needed to be in Dunedin to research. Around 10am, Flo’s luck in talking to any mechanic in a 50km radius was turning. A workshop in Queenstown offered us an appointment on Wednesday! Not nearly what we had hoped for but much better than waiting for another week. That settled things…we would spend another day in Wanaka, today, and then go to Queenstown tomorrow. Two days in Wanaka and two days in Queenstown sounded like a holiday rather than a wait for a mechanic.

Since it had gotten very cold overnight (seriously Wanaka, 27 degrees yesterday and then just 2 degrees at night? What is up with that?), we spent the morning in Puzzle World, walking the gigantic maze and doing the 8 illusion rooms. In the afternoon, the kids spent a lot of time on the playground and we walked to see #ThatWanakaTree.

In the evening, the kids befriended another German kid on the campground’s playground so that we had lovely company and good conversation for a good long while. 🙂

View towards the mountains from our campsite in Haast

Part 14 – Grinding to a … limp

We really enjoyed our time at the freedom camp spot at Cargills’ Road, also this morning. Unfortunately, I left Flo’s jandals at this camp and we are missing them sorely ever since. What is NZ without jandals?

Our destination for today was Hokitika. It’s a laid back small West coast town and I’ve been here a couple of times now. It’s good to hang out at the beach which always has a lot of driftwood and it’s famous for its greenstone galleries. One of the things on my “to do” list was to buy a pounamu pendant for Number 3. So we arrived in Hokitika, had yummy lunch at the Hokitika Sandwich Company and then headed towards Waewae Pounamu. Number 3 picked a hei matau as his shape but the AoE is just a tad too small to pick a pounamu for herself. In the end, Flo bought a beautiful hei matau for the eldest and a sliver of pounamu for the younger one. They both have to wait to be given the pounamu though. Pounamu has to be given or earned and that also extends to kids.

Everybody was knackered after the weight of choosing the right pounamu. So we had beach time to relax. In the later afternoon, we headed out to Hokitika Gorge to walk the loop track. Unfortunately, one of the suspension bridges is under reconstruction so now it is a 45min in and 45min return walk instead of an hour to loop around. We still managed to get to the water access and Flo had a swim in very cold water. Nobody else from our family felt the urge to go in.

The only other thing to do today was finding a camping spot. Another freedom camp at the beach seemed amazing but we didn’t have reception which Flo needs to be able to work at night. So with a heavy heart, we moved on. It was getting late by now so we pulled up at the next doc site and stayed at Lake Ianthe for the night. Luckily, the reception was okay here.

The next day, we took it slow. It had been late yesterday so we took our time in the morning. Our plan was to have lunch in Franz Josef. Shortly before we arrived there, something in our motorhome broke.

The display showed an issue with our alternator and suggested a visit to the workshop asap. Unfortunately, the West Coast of NZ is not known for its abundance of workshops for motorhomes. Feeling very insecure and unhappy, we stopped and had lunch in Franz Josef. Of course, it was Saturday as well. The only mechanic in town was out and about and would be back at 7pm. Luckily, he was reachable via phone. After the phone call, we had a new plan: The mechanic had suggested to do everything normally today but get as far as we could towards Wanaka as our car would probably not start again tomorrow. With that horror scenario in mind, we had a nap at Lake Matheson (it was too windy anyway) and tried to find a different mechanic in Fox Glacier. The lovely mechanic in Fox Glacier said the same thing though so we drove on. We had the same issue as last night, we just couldn’t find a freedom camp or doc site that had enough reception for a stable connection.

In the end, we drove until 7pm (felt like it) and ended up on the Top 10 holiday park in Haast on the last powered site they had available for the night. We rolled onto the site and Timmy…stopped working.

We had completely drained the battery which didn’t recharge anymore while driving. Very sad and unsure of what to do now while we are living in a gigantic brick, we put the shore power into the motorhome. To our surprise, the battery started charging again! Shore power was our new way to charge the starter battery, now that the alternator had stopped working! We have a chance to charge the battery and then get to Wanaka tomorrow! Using Sunday to limp to Wanaka and then pin our hope on one of the mechanics in Wanaka! We have found our silver lining!

…the other wishes she had school work to do *shakes head*

Day 20 – Zagori and Vikos Gorge

Our felt last day was used for Vikos Gorge in an area called Zagori. It’s a mountainous area full of tiny villages and a big canyon. The best place to see the gorge is from Beloi viewpoint which you can only reach after a short hike.

Afterwards we drove to a lovely cafe in Kapesovo.

On the way back, we stopped at Kokkorou, an old stone bridge to take more photos.

Tomorrow is our last day in Greece and we won’t even get a full night’s sleep as we will have to queue for the ferry at 4am. To make it easier on us, we opted for a campground close to Igoumenitsa and returned to our first Greek campground, Sofas beach, for our last night.

Day 14 – Holidaying

Early morning on the ställplats was quite pretty. Number 3 and I even got a shower in and then Flo and I got to pack the tent without interruption as the kids watched the entertainment programme. Nah, life starts early on a farm so the tractor was already out and about but the first horse was led in the riding area under the watchful eyes of all the kids staying today.

It was good to get moving even though it was such a lovely place. No shade meant that it quickly got too hot for me. Both kids were tired out and fell asleep as soon as they were in the car seats. Haverud with its aqueduct was the first destination for today and a good drive away from where we stayed. About 45min into the drive, we stopped at a supermarket for a quick grab of things to eat during lunch today. By the time Flo was back, it was time to look for a good place already.

We tried to find a rest area with a view over the lake but failed and ended up in one of those giant campgrounds instead. Realizing our error, we retreated and stopped at a forest parking spot. The area was full of hiking trails so there was some space and a garbage bin for this break.

Number 3 was even quick enough with his lunch that he was allowed to explore the forest a little before we went back.

The Haverud aqueduct was another hour away. Getting there was a bit of an adventure as Google brought us to the wrong side of the canal first and then, there were many “Drive careful, bike race” signs along the way. We made it to the parking lot before the bulk of bicyclists arrived though. Flo would probably be the better person to write about the engineering of it all but you only bet what I gathered: There’s an actual aqueduct as in an iron bridge for water from one lake to the next one, further down. It is part of a contraption with four (!) locks which are all automated by now but used to be manual mechanical locks. The cool thing is: You can walk over the aqueduct and along the canal and locks for a bit. Which is exactly what we did. The Agent was not amused that I wouldn’t let her walk while Number 3 was running and jumping around. I was just way too scared that she wouldn’t listen and accidentally fall into the canal. That’s just me though. 🙂

Number 3 was lobbying for having coffee time (or a second lunch really) right next to the canal. We had bought treats at the supermarket earlier though and they were waiting for us in the car. Plus, the campground was just another 30 minutes away and Flo and I were looking forward to arriving at a camp early for once. So, request denied. Onward, we pushed.

The last maybe 8km to the campground were much fun for Flo and the kids, not so much for me. Whoever engineered this road would have been better suited for designing roller coasters. Up and down, left and right…I felt thoroughly shaken, not stirred (Flo: Nono, for real. Like, 0G perfect parabpolic kind of hops and 2G turns – I had so much fun!).

The destination was worth it. We arrived to a serene lake with a trampoline in the water, grassy areas to camp and two lovely picnic bench-table-combinations right next to the playground. The reception was closed until 4pm (we’d later find out that the owner had to walk his dogs) so we had coffee at the benches. Afterwards, Flo checked us in and we set up at the hillside, overlooking the lake. At this point, Flo and I had agreed on staying here for two nights to just chill and relax…and well, enjoy our holidays. Number 3 and Flo went swimming for a bit. The Agent seemed keen at first but changed her mind as soon as her feet were in the water. Instead, she just wanted to walk alongside the lake as close to the water as possible but not IN it. No swimming for me then. It still seemed really cold so I didn’t mind too much.

Flo even cooked dinner before two tired kids went to bed. As soon as the sun disappeared behind the hill it got chilly, so we only blogged a little before retiring to the tent ourselves.

Day 12 – The flavour of Sweden is Pear

I was happy with the campsite for one night even if it got cold in the evening and thus also in the morning. During breakfast, Number 3 was adamant that he wanted to go swimming in the lake. Flo and I both didn’t take him seriously as it was really quite too cold to consider swimming. We decided to take advantage of the facilities and all shower before we leave. As an out, Flo offered that Number 3 could undress at the tent and then see if it would be too cold to go swimming. Our child undressed and declared that it was not too cold. He wanted his togs and floaties now, please. Flabbergasted, we gave them to him and he seriously went swimming in the lake. My jaw dropped. I mean, he swam as well as a 3 year old does: Lots of running around and splashing and stuff but he was IN the water.

Afterwards, he was rather blue-faced and we were off to a hot shower. The sun came out and packing went smoothly. We even managed to booking a time for laundry at 9am, complete with drying our clothes in the dryer and dryer cupboard (very Swedish). Keeping in mind our adventures this morning, we left at an okay time at 12.30pm. At the reception, we decided that we’d skip lunch. The Agent was asleep in the car already, Number 3 also looked very sleepy and we had an hour to drive to Nora. Thus, Flo came back with a bag of crisps which substituted our meal. Off we went.

Nora turned out to be a charming little town. We stopped right at the ice cream parlour, woke the kids and had ice cream. Nora Glass has three flavours per day. Today it was pear, hazelnut and vanilla. Number 3 opted for hazelnut with sprinkles; he looked very happy with his choice and didn’t want to waste ANY of his sprinkles. Flo and I shared a large cone which automatically comes with a scoop of all three flavours. We each chose a topping: Flo went for crushed hazelnuts and I chose chocolate sprinkles. 😀 The Agent helped us finish our ice cream with some gusto. This was the decidedly better of our two Swedish ice cream experiences, for sure.

Afterwards, we wandered through the streets, got to the lake where we strolled along docks to stumble upon…trains! Number 3 was so excited that he did a little happy dance. 😀

It was time to get back into the car to continue driving to Örebro. This was the only town with a castle that we’d visit this trip. As we realized in Malmö, we were more for the outdoors in these holidays so we skipped all of the old castles and ruins along the way. Örebro Slottet would only be looked at from afar, as you can only go inside with a guided tour.

We arrived and plugged into the charger, then walked half way around the castle. It started pouring. Meh. Luckily, the cafe that I had picked was right there. We stepped into Hälls Konditori, sat down on the couch and plushy chairs and had cake. Originally, the plan had been to share some Princess Cake with Number 3…alas, Princess Cake was already out when we arrived. So we all had cake in the same style but with different flavour combinations from the original. Number 3 went for blueberry and chocolate, I had raspberry and white chocolate and Flo pear and dark chocolate. It was…way too much! After all our fika treats made out of yeast dough, like kanelbullar and the like, real cake with lots of cream just seemed way too sweet and rich. Number 3 couldn’t finish his. I ate mine but couldn’t finfish his and Flo struggled as well. It was long enough of a break that the sun was back out when we left, though.

Back into the car and onto the last stretch for today: We wanted to reach Tiveden National park. Flo had picked a campsite almost in the National park which read like a lovely place. The drive (in sunshine) was very nice and the forests around here looked lovely.

We sat up, unfortunately we had to stay with the campervans as there was just no level area for us to park on at the tent spot. Still, it was quiet and Flo and I managed to sneak off to the bar in the evening to blog and have a drink. I was also looking forward to the morning. We decided to cook this night instead of eating out in the restaurant to feel justified in having the breakfast buffet in the morning instead. I love breakfasts. 😀

Day 12 – Go with the flow

Since we left home with only a couple of days notice, we keep on deciding on our route while we go. We’d probably do the same if we’d had more time, to be honest, but it still feels a little more ad hoc this time.

Our morning was lovely. We had fresh bread rolls from the campground. Number 3 finished a whole one with yummy cherry jam we had bought in Piuro on our first day in Italy. Our intial plan said to only say here at Punta D’Oro for one night, but we really wanted to spend a day here so it was nonchalantly abandoned. Looking at maps and places to go we realized we weren’t actually that keen to camp at Lake Garda next. Maybe we might be a little lake-d out after another day here at lago d’Iseo. So, we decided to stay here and enjoy what we have, head a little south tomorrow to be close to Parma which we want to see on Wednesday, do a little tour of the cities we still want to see and then loop back to Lake Garda on our way out of Italy. We’ll see how much of this plan survives in the future but for now this looks good.

Clouds gathered in different formations all day

And it gave us a whole day at Punta D’Oro to relax. Number 3 wanted to go swimming but when we tried in the late morning, the water was too cold for him and the Agent of Entropy. We had a lovely midday nap after our warm shower, took advantage of the coffee place on the campground and (mostly Flo) chatted up our neighbours on the campsite. Lots of people were interested in the EV or our roof tent plus our immediate neighbours were Germans on parental leave as well.

The day ended for Flo and me when the kids were in bed and we had a last espresso and some cookies sitting on the retaining wall looking out over the lake.

I tried to make some tea … the Agent was scheming

Day 9 – That summer feeling

We call every day where we don’t move camp a rest day on our trips. Most of them end up being everything but. So if you imagine a quiet afternoon with a good book on the beach … not quite us. We move at a brisk pace, especially for a family of four. So we always have 5 more things to do on a rest day, because you know: We got time, right? That is on top of everything that made us stay in the first place.

Both kids enjoyed having the place to themselves

I tried to be smart though and venture a bit into multitasking. So after our breakfast, we packed a few essentials and moved to the lakeshore. I was able to finish up the two blog posts in our back-log while Number 3 (and, to the extent that we let her, the Agent, too) enjoyed the lake. We were the first ones out and had the lake all to ourselves. Small mistakes were made, but overall this was a great success. In hindsight, we just should have told Number 3 to take off his clothes all at once rather than waiting for him to get first his pants and then the undies wet. He had a blast, though, and even made new friends with the 5 and 8 year olds kids of the campers two lots down from us.

This is why we went on this trip. We get to spend so much time with our little ones – who are ever so slowly turning into remarkable little characters. Many times a day, I get this flush of emotion when realising just how much I love them and how blessed we are to get to knowing them.

We somehow managed to squeeze another load of washing into our lunchtime window, although naptime was a bit of a challenge, probably because of the heat. Oh, and Number 3’s digger addictions. There was a sit-on toy digger on the camp’s playground and he found it. Getting him off that playground took a serious bit of convincing.

So naptime dragged on a bit, organically transitioned into coffee time – all the while, promises about things we can do started piling up for Number 3. For the first time on this trip, we decided to split up. I am not much of a water nut, so Nina and the big brother decided to go for another (real) swim, while I took the Agent of Entropy out for a shopping run. I had added “cooking risotto from scratch” to get rid of our remaining fresh zucchini to the long list of to-dos for the day. Oh, and it was finally time for ice in our icebox – the butter demanded so, or at least that was my excuse.

A brief stroll along the lake later, it was now 4.50 pm, we all joined up again. Number 3 had turned slightly blue from an hour in the water while I was a bit hot from my walk in the sun. We equalized things by a minute or two of cuddle time 😀

I got to work on the risotto – and it was around that time that things turned south a bit. Our hero up to this point lied to his Mum about me having approved it and walked away from his sous-chef duties to play with the damn digger again, all on his own. When dinner was ready, tantrum ensued and he outright refused to join in the meal. Slightly soured by that turn of events, I maybe were not the most patient dad at bed time – and it had maybe 35°C in the tent – so that took almost exactly until it was time for us to hop in the car, start up discord and play our regular Friday night game.

Rest day, eh?

Side note:

– to avoid another disappointing take off, I religiously forced the car into “drive” mode every few hours to force it to charge the 12v battery. That works fine while it is charging the main or when the charger is disconnected, but leads to weird behaviour when the main is at 100% but the charger not disconnected. It seems like some software optimisation is still required. We’ll find out if all that at least had the desired effect, tomorrow –

A good morning starts with an encounter with a garbage truck 🙂

Day 308 – Opportunities

Using some time after breakfast for blogging

What a blissful night! The bed was really fantastic. Our hosts had to leave for work early, but kindly allowed us to sleep in and take the time we needed. When I got up, I had a text telling me that they even left some breakfast outside for us. Thank you so much!

Last night I got a message from a good friend about a job currently on offer in Frankfurt. After having missed the opportunity to fix up my application papers in Oman while staying with Lina, I thought I would leave any job hunting until we reach my dad’s place in Würzburg. This one really was too good to let slip, I had to admit. That meant I would have to call them at some point today to get some more details. Then, I probably would need a day dedicated to writing the cover letter, wrapping up a German style CV and gathering all the required documents from their various storage places.

Isn’t Tiny cute? She pretended to sleep but kept an eye on us while we packed

After a brief discussion with Nina, we decided that a nice campground on the Turkish Mediterranean coast would be just the perfect place to do so, provided Nina would be allowed to buy her next book. 😉 So we packed our bike, said goodbye to “Villa Naz” and headed towards Kaş.

We were hoping to find a place somewhere along the way, or if not to go to the campground we heard about in Kaş. Of the attractions along the way, the only one marked as a must by Nina was the sunken Lycian city of Simena. Although this was best accessed via Üçağız, only 35 km from Kaş, so we could also do it as a day trip from there.

Beautiful coast

None of the other bits along the road really tickled our fancy that day, apart from the scenery on the coastal road section. But these were taken in anyway. We had our lunch picnic in the woods near the road after first failing to find a nice beach and then refusing to pay 40 lira to get to the one we saw from the road.

So we rolled on, with the mood getting a bit better along the coast, but my mind constantly drifting towards the job offer. What to write, what to say, how not to bumble like the fool when trying to sound professional in German (remember, no practice for four years). When we came to the turn off to Üçağız, we gave it a pass and pushed on to the campground. It was late enough that I would need to call Germany soon before they would go home for the day.

The view from our tent

The campground offered a pretty cool location. Lucky for us, not too much is going on right now. The arrangements of the camp spots has a lot in common with the locally famous sardine dishes … but it was only maybe 15% full. The host is also a bit quirky, refusing to let us get our bike down to the spot. So we had to strip the bike at the entrance without shade and have him taxi all our gear down in a cartoonish electric trike.

We finished setting up the tent and I had my call. Afterwards, I only was more excited for the job. Needs must, tomorrow I would need to set my application straight. So excited!

During dinner, cats appeared looking very hopeful

Dinner was another sad fail, on both the main and the dessert part, unfortunately. We went to a fish restaurant recommended by the Lonely Planet. The place managed to go down to abysmal quality and raise their prices in the short time since our edition came out. Quite the feat. The fries were half raw and dripping and the anchovies soggy and bland. To make up for it, Nina felt like having a waffle. We both nearly choked, though when we heard that it would cost 15 lira, for a single half-cooked waffle with way too much cheap Nutella knock-off slabbed on top of it. Welcome back to tourist land …

We did jump into the sea at out campground, which made for a pretty lovely end for a very mixed day.

: Using some time after breakfast for blogging

: Isn’t Tiny cute? She pretended to sleep but kept an eye on us while we packed

: Nothing to see here; dinos coming through

: Amazing windy road right at the coast line

: One of the many, many bays along the road. Most have beaches however

: Looking along the coastal road

: A section near the road had a wall for some reason

: Beautiful coast

: One stretch of road leading inland

: The road leading towards Kaş

: The view from our tent

: Waves breaking on the rocks

: Back from a swim

: Looking towards the small town of Kaş

: Our tent in prime location 🙂

: During dinner, cats appeared looking very hopeful

Day 263 – Last weekend at “home”

Demo shot – we did not bring the camera when we had a swim 😉

We already collected two real homes each. Maybe we should not be too liberal with adding new ones, but Michael and Lina were such amazing hosts and we felt so comfortable here, it is hard to call it by a different name. Come Sunday, it will be time to leave once more (the Omani weekend is Friday and Saturday).

Regarding today, there was really nothing on our agenda. Gladly, we are all the kind of people who can enjoy a cozy day at home. Thus the day was gently going by with us watching videos, listening to music and a whole lot of good conversation.

We did break the rut once in the afternoon for a splash in the both enormous and refreshing pool of Lina and Michael’s condo complex. Simple times!

Chaos roaming the world

random pieces of life of Nina and Florian