Off to Prague...

We couldn’t sleep in on August 16 as we needed to get to the station early to grab some breakfast before catching our train to Prague. We saw some lovely scenery along the journey.

After a tram ride and short walk, we arrived at Hotel Cube, a new hotel with incredibly good rates. 

We were impressed with our large room, which made it easy for Jimmy to do a little bit of work. We dropped off our bags and hit the town. 

Our hotel was only a few blocks to the river, where we spotted this little muskrat.

The Vltava River is the longest river in the Czech Republic. This was a popular area for pedal boats.

 

Highs and Lows of 16th Year - Part 2...

We are happy that once again our list of highs is much longer than our list of lows. Much of this list again focuses around traveling since we all managed to have some adventures this year:

• Jimmy/Melissa/Veronica Travel: Ardennes - the Zombie Hash expanded to a weekend event and included running through an incredible abandoned sanitarium
• Jimmy/Melissa Travel: Ardennes - attended the BMPH3 Replacement Christmas Party Weekend with fun trails and an amazing party DJed by Opee; Berlin - Cold War bunker tour; meeting up with Bjarne; Prague - great seeing hash friends from around the world for the first time during the pandemic; hike around Cesky Raj; Svijany Brewery tour; hashing across Charles Bridge in red dress; patternoster (coolest and most dangerous) elevator; rooftop terraces; Vienna - celebrating Melissa’s 58th birthday
• Jimmy Travel: London - meeting up with Brett; Borough Market; hashing near Camden
• Melissa Travel: US - two productive weeks of helping Ann after losing Dad; spending time with sisters and Dad’s best friends; afternoon with Darlene and Mike
• Veronica/Ashlynn Travel: California - cocktails with Grandma; driving lessons with Brett; seeing Auntie Eden, Auntie Leigh, Monique and Sarah; getting to know Cousin Nick; exploring San Francisco; Exeter - being together for Christmas, especially important so soon after Ashlynn’s breakup; fashion photoshoot; Dartmoor and other Devon hikes; spontaneous New Year’s celebration with Exeter neighbors; Glasgow - COP26 Green Zone; life drawing session; lockdown embroidery projects
• Veronica Travel: Arizona - staying with Rachel, a childhood friend from North Carolina, in Tempe; hiking in the mountains; California - spending time with Brett’s family in San Diego; meeting Siena, and scuba diving and tidepooling with her; seeing places Mommy and Daddy went when they lived in San Diego including hashing with San Diego H3; 4th of July on the Bay (felt very pre-COVID); amazing epic road trip with four camping trips in the Sierras; wild swimming in Alpine lakes; daytrip to Mexico; meeting Brett’s friends at Nick and Meghan’s wedding; Exeter - spending weekend at Dreda’s farm and meeting Veronica, the cow; hikes on the South West Coast Path, camping in Devon; Scotland - visiting Edinburgh and seeing Sam; hiking with David and meeting Tamsin; meeting Ashlynn’s friends
• Ashlynn Travel: Germany - Berlin and Luneburg with Soso; celebrating 21st birthday with Soso and her flatmates; Namibia - spending so much time out on the water and with Heaviside dolphins and lots of humpback whales; morning runs with Antonia; so many flamingos; witnessing a NGO detangle seals from plastic; being involved in a successful humpback stranding; most amazing hike up Spitzkoppe; rooftop tent camping with Antonia; game drives in Etosha National Park; spending time with lions at sunset; watering hole at night; UK - surprising Sophie for her 21st birthday in London; daytrips and hikes in Edinburgh with friends; Edinburgh Fringe
• VACCINES!
• Dance parties: virtual, of course, and international; being together for King’s Night; extra special because Jimmy, Ashlynn and Veronica all DJed
• Bootjuh: new floor, taking Kati out with us; discovering new canals; good social-distanced fun with friends
• Airfryer: not a waste of money after all
• Jimmy/Melissa: Christmas dinner with Sally and John; New Year’s Eve with Carlin, Kent and Mark; Beery Christmas Advent Calendar; Untapped app; transforming into beer snobs; 28th wedding anniversary dinner in Naarden with Ashlynn and Carlin; photographing Celine and Richard’s wedding; helping with demolition at Reinhardt and Inga’s new house
• Jimmy: happy to run a trail marathon with no pain; super happy to be involved with WorldStartUp / Impact City with Climate Action Center; finally found his tribe; launching Harrier Central; haring Eurohash Ballbreaker in Prague which was both the best run and worst run at different moments; best co-haring team on Eurohash Trail 11; leading half of the pack by accident onto private property
• Melissa: long walks with Terri, Carlin and Sally; awesome urban art walks in Rotterdam and Utrecht; grand opening of Art Depot; cool exhibits at Kunsthal; becoming Customer Service and Brand Manager for Harrier Central
• Jimmy/Veronica: visiting Keukenhof Gardens with limited crowds; playing with Hasselblad
• Veronica: volunteering at Floating Farm and Invisible Foods; self-portraiture; writing Coves to Cliffs blog; starting Impact Communications, a consultancy firm; not having to move back alone to the US in the middle of the pandemic; being in love and living together; scrapbooking and creating first zine (self-published magazine); learning how to make film contact prints; wild swimming; panto rehearsals
• Ashlynn: COVID-19 lockdown with Clifton House flatmates—like a family; good times with Bilge; Citron, the racing bike; running in Glasgow; Kelvingrove snow; River Kelvin; Subcity Radio community; live music gigs in Glasgow; bartending and hanging out with friends from BAaD; field trips; cool dissections; new flat with Ellie; being an adult, living an adult life; going to the pub; studying at the Learning Hub; solo hikes; Guy Fawkes Day with friends at Necropolis; nice cinema dates; getting accepted to University of Glasgow’s Thailand Expedition in June 2022; community dinners with Char; hosting Sophie for one week and Soso for two weeks; DJing the Freshers Fair
• Visitors: Steve and Tim, our only intercontinental visitors, each for two nights after Eurohash; Carlin stayed with us for close to one month while waiting for her UK visa

Happy New Year! Stay Safe!

Highs and Lows of 16th Year - Part 1...

It’s hard to believe that we’ve lived in the Netherlands for 16 years as of November 22! Once again, the four of us weren’t together. Nor could we follow our tradition of eating at La Lanterna in Scheveningen where we ate on our first night all those years ago, because restaurants nationwide were closed by the time Ashlynn arrived home for the holidays. Instead we made the list of our highs and lows over the last year while eating a homemade Italian meal on December 22. As usual, here are our lows first:

• Not getting to see Grandpa one more time; losing Grandpa and extended family
• Continued hassles of COVID: Ashlynn getting COVID and having to self-isolate for two weeks; Americans being blocked from entering the Netherlands caused extra visa stress and expense; Veronica’s graduation ceremony for her master’s degree and Frozen, The Musical in London being cancelled; Ashlynn’s field trips being cut short
• Travelling during COVID: missing spending Christmas together; constantly changing mask and testing rules as well as costs; Namibia going RED leading to Ashlynn's return flight to be cancelled and Melissa having to spend two days trying to get her home; too complicated to visit Ashlynn in Glasgow or Veronica while she was living in a lovenest with Brett in Exeter; no family trip to Prague; stress of getting US vaccinations accepted into Dutch CoronaPass app
• January 6 domestic terrorist attack on the US Capitol: witnessing potential fall of American democracy
• Incompetency of British government
• Jimmy: high level of drama with major customer but too much commitment to walk away; computer dying; broken Hasselblad with costly repair; breaking finger while working on Bootjuh’s floor
• Melissa: not being able to visit Gillian; Carlin moving away
• Veronica: crashing drone; injured wrist; lack of respect (and response) from PhD programs and job applications; overwhelming climate anxiety; having to spend two weeks in Exeter flat alone; ending up in a long-distance relationship; missing aerial class; unpublished work due to “busy” academics; scary encounter with cows while camping
• Ashlynn: first (and hopefully last) heartbreak; breaking up one day after quarantine ended and then having an exam the next day; insomnia; Bilge drama; realizing the world is shit and science industry is disappointing; continuing problems with head: headaches and disassociation; dating useless men
• Melissa/Jimmy: hash weekends in Belgium and Slovenia being postponed yet again; major drama with Amsterdam H3; German train strike; grim dorm in Prague for Eurohash
• Veronica/Ashlynn: dreaded Dartmoor hike with an iPhone and running shoe lost

Spotted in Vienna...

After a nap back at the hotel, we took a long walk across town to get to the restaurant I’d booked for dinner. Along the way, we came across the Russian Orthodox St. Nicholas Cathedral, built in 1899...

…and some interesting window displays...

…including the lovable alien Alf, a comedy TV show from 1986 to 1990...

…and these crazy fancy walking sticks.

We stopped for a cocktail at a rooftop bar with these lovely views...

…and a selfie spot outside the elevator.

We popped into this church around the corner from the restaurant...

…but never made it inside the impressive St. George's Cathedral, built in 1166.

Is this fellow fixing his hair?

On a much more serious note, the Plague Column was built in 1694 as a memorial for the Great Plague of 1679. 

Like Veronica back in 2010, Jimmy had to try some Wiener Wasser (Vienna water). 

 

Age of the Rainbow...

Swiss artist Ugo Rondinone created an outdoor exhibit displayed at Belvedere Gardens called Your Age and My Age and the Age of the Rainbow. This 70-meter long structure consisted of 100s of images of rainbows painted on plywood by children between the ages of 6 and 12. According to the artist, the rainbow is the bridge between everyone and everything.

 

Belvedere, My Dear...

After dropping off our luggage, it was time to venture out for some lunch at a nearby restaurant I found on Happy Cow. Just up the block from our hotel was this colorful building. 

I can’t remember what we ate for lunch, but know that we loved the traditional sachertorte, a chocolate cake invented in Vienna in 1832.

Our next stop was just across the street: Belvedere Gardens.

The Upper Belvedere was completed in 1723 as the summer residence of Prince Eugene of Savoy. Today it is the Belvedere Museum, housing the greatest collection of Austrian art, which unfortunately we didn’t have time to visit.

There were lots of intricate statues, but I think they were mostly made of cement instead of marble. 

The skies became very dramatic and we skittered back to our hotel to sit out some rain. 
 

Off to Vienna...

On August 13, we were back at Spoedtest in Leiden to get COVID-19 antigen tests for our summer travels.

The following evening we headed to Amsterdam Centraal to catch the new overnight train service to Vienna.

It was naïve of us to have thought that a new train service would mean that the trains themselves would be new as this train was likely built in the 50s. 

Travelling during the pandemic was stressful, but we benefitted from the fact that our overpriced train tickets guaranteed that we wouldn’t have to share our compartment, that normally would have slept six.

Probably not a surprise that we brought wine with us; nor would it be a surprise that we had more than just this strange test tube full of wine. Apparently our train stopped in the middle of the night for a few hours since we arrived in Vienna three hours late. 

Since it was my birthday, I splurged on a room at Hotel Daniel, a hip hotel with a sailboat perched on the rooftop. 

In addition to the giant message to be optimistic above the entrance, this sign was on the door: No Bad Temper, No Spies, and Ties? Why Not Try Without.

We were pleasantly surprised when we were offered free Prosecco for my birthday while we waited for our room to be readied. 

I surprised Jimmy with a room with a hammock seat (with a very funny note about not to do anything wild in it)…

…and panorama views.