Switzerland

We spent four days last week in Switzerland – walking, climbing and generally enjoying some nice spring weather. Three of the nights were spent in Vevey, situated on the lake about an hour from Geneva and the last night was in Geneva itself.

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Amsterdam

We spent most of Easter in Leuven and were invited to lunch on Easter Sunday in a nearby village. It was good to meet some more people from the church, although so many little kids were together in one place that it has probably set back our own reproducing by a few more years…

On Monday morning we caught an early train to Amsterdam for a few days. The weather was pretty cold and wet for most of our stay, but we visited a few museums as well as the Keukenhof flower gardens about 45 mins outside of the city. It is a bit early in spring but some of the flowers were already coming along nicely. It will be pretty spectacular in a few weeks, and on a sunny day. Otherwise, we spent a lot of time wandering the city and trying out various cafes.

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Spring, you are very welcome…

We’ve had two weeks of glorious weather, so much so that I’ve almost forgotten how cold it got two weeks ago. Our pasty limbs (mine more so than Rodney’s, he always seems to have a faint tan) are seeing the light for the first time in about six months. The squirrels are active, the surrounding countryside is filled with lambs, calves and foals and I couldn’t be happier!

We’ve taken advantage of the weather with cycles, runs and tough sessions of sitting around outside at cafes. So has the rest of Leuven. The first day of good weather, almost two weeks ago, saw people crowding the park so much that it looked like a concert venue, every seat occupied at every cafe in the Old Market and half hour wait times at the two gelato shops in town. These people really get excited when the sun comes out!

Unfortunately, in all of our excitement to get outside we haven’t taken any photos. You’ll just have to accept our word that everything looks great.

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Two weeks below zero

Yesterday was a great day – the first day in over two weeks that the temperature got above zero. It also rained, and melted all of the snow that had stayed around for more than a week.

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Recent happenings

There have been no single blog-worthy events lately, so it’s been a while. Just wanted to let everyone know that all is well, we are still loving Leuven etc.

Hearing of the unbearable temperatures in Perth lately, I should really apologise for the weather we are having here. It’s pretty cold – opening the window a few minutes ago felt like sticking my head into a freezer. A few days this week we have a maximum of -5 degrees. I feel a little ripped off that there isn’t a blanket of snow outside to justify feeling cold, but the weather has been mostly clear. We did have light snow on Monday though, and it’s cold enough that most of it hasn’t melted yet.

Rodney has been working quite hard over the last few weeks. I’ve picked up a couple of extra English students and still volunteer at the library so am getting quite busy myself.

A fortnight ago, we went to Brussels and visited the Magritte museum and a Belgian comic strip museum. Comics are very popular here, there are quite a few different ones and they’ve exported Tintin and The Smurfs to the rest of the world.

We also recently saw a Flemish movie about strike action in Flanders in the 70s, and were pleased to be able to follow the plot despite not having subtitles. Most of the jokes went over our heads though. Strikes are about as popular here as the comic strips – a national strike last Monday brought the total to at least three since we’ve been here. It’s definitely an interesting place to be from a political perspective.

Rodney had a bit of a disappointment when his hockey team drove an hour and a half into Wallonia for a make-up hockey game, only to find that the game time had changed and had to be cancelled. After more than six weeks’ break now, he’s itching to try out the new hockey shoes he bought before Christmas.

But as you can see he’s not suffering too much.

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New Year in Slovakia

Two days after Christmas, bellies still full, we waved goodbye to Ania’s family and caught the train to Warsaw. The four hour trip passed fairly quickly, and we spent the rest of the day walking around the city. We wandered through a winter market in one of the old squares, and spent some time at the Copernicus Centre, a science musuem.

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Christmas in Bydgoszcz, Poland

We spent our Christmas in Bydgoszcz, Poland, hosted by the lovely family of a Polish friend who is studying here in Leuven. It wasn’t a white Christmas, but instead was warm, cheerful, delicious and relaxing.

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Quick trip to England

The week after we got back from Rome, Rodney went to the Swanley office (in Kent, I’ll let him write about Swanley) of his company for some meetings. I had a busy few days here in Leuven with giving English lessons, volunteering at the library and Dutch pronunciation classes then joined him later in the week.

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Roma

Another round of Dutch classes over, we headed to Rome for five days for a change of scene (and to forget all of the language we’d learned).

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It’s getting cold…

I went cycling with my friend Sara this morning. She brought her fancy camera along and is a much better photographer than me, so I thought I’d share some of her pictures.

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