Holiday
Archived posts from this Category
Wednesday, 10th March 2010
Posted by Judith on 12 Mar 2010 | Tagged as: Holiday, Skiing
We’ve finally managed to get a forecast for 8 days of consecutive sunshine, so we’re off on holiday. Hooray!
We headed up to the Cerdanya valley to go skiing at Puigmal, for which we have a free pass. One of the things the blog is useful for is to check our opinion on places we’ve been to before, but unfortunately our previous visits to Puigmal precede starting the blog two years ago. Our memory of the place has obviously been somewhat addled with time, as we probably would not have come again had we remembered it correctly, or looked at a piste map before we set off. It’s a big resort and one of the highest in the French Pyrenees, but it only has two chair lifts. To get to the top of the resort (2700m) you have to take one chair lift and three long button lifts, so it takes about half an hour to work your way up there, but only a short time to get down. We forced ourselves to go as high as we could, but the last lift was closed, so we missed out on the best views.
My aversion to button lifts isn’t only due to the time it takes, but having had two operations on both my knees and having little cartilage left, they actually cause a lot of discomfort and it severely shortens our skiing day. We skied most of the day on the runs that were accessible by chair lift or short button lift, but then finished at 3.40pm to save some energy and knee strain for our free ski pass in Andorra tomorrow.
Sunday, 21st February 2010
Posted by Geoff on 21 Feb 2010 | Tagged as: Holiday, Trying, but failing, to fly
Geoff writes: a bit windy and cloudy today. I did go out, but too windy to fly. However, the forecast for the rest of the week is good – with one forecast giving it 21C on Friday, though that seems a bit optimistic. But we’d better get in some more skiing soon, just in case….
Judith writes: We spent the morning playing with Maya, did a bit of shopping for potato bread and cheddar cheese and then my mum and I did a matinee performance of the ‘frog nobody wanted’ on the puppet theater my mum made for Maya. It’s an impressive tapestry with marionettes and movable animal faces pocking out of the landscape. The dialogue was a bit improvised, but with a bit more rehearsing, I think we could become quite passable at it.
Then off to Dublin and the flight home…
Saturday, 20th February 2010
Posted by Geoff on 20 Feb 2010 | Tagged as: Flying, Holiday
Geoff writes: warm, sunny, nice cumulus – driving to the site I was already writing the blog entry in my head, about the epic day it had been, flyable everywhere, great XCs. Except…. once I could see the mountains just past Olot, they were covered in the duvet cloud – where it spills over and rolls down a bit, very distinctive. This is absolutely guaranteed to mean that Santa Brigida will not be on, not even launchable. Being a bit stupid, I managed to convince myself the duvet was dissipating, so carried on. And, of course, at Santa Brigida it was strong and NW, and not flyable. I thought about trying Berga, but couldn’t get hold of anyone there to check the conditions, and it is a long drive from Santa Brigida. So I hung around for a couple of hours, as more people gradually turned up. I asked each one what they thought about Belmunt, if it would work, but no-one had any idea. In previous years we’ve rarely been to Belmunt, because it meant a long and tedious drive over the mountains. But now that they have very kindly driven a tunnel through the mountains, it’s much closer. So eventually, I decided to give it a go.
As I got to the other side of the mountains, I could see four or five PGs flying. I went straight up – stopping only to pick up two women paraglider pilots who had just landed. It had, apparently, been good all day. I drove up pretty fast, got set up and launched, and had a reasonable flight – never much above launch, but good soaring for a while. It is an exceptionally good site (though not top landable), and I’m certain had I been there earlier, it would have been easy to go XC.
I got a ride back up from Johnny (who had also been at Santa Brigida, with John, who had his first flight at Belmunt), and picked up the van. In the end, a good day out, and in future we will always go there if we see the duvet cloud.
Judith writes: My niece Maya was sick all night, so she, my brother-in-law and sick father stayed at home while the women went on a jaunt to Cork. Another Irish town I have never been to…
We shopped, ate and then Joanna took us to a church where you can do campanology (church bell ringing). We blundered our way through Oh, Susanna, The Blue Bells of Scotland and Doe A Deer, before we cracked it and ended with a bit of an ABBA medley. I believe house prices in the area are very cheap!
Despite it having been a sunny day when we set out, we were caught in an impressive snow storm on the way home. Snowflakes the size of my fist (well Maya’s really).
Friday, 19th February 2010
Posted by Judith on 20 Feb 2010 | Tagged as: Holiday
Today was a planes, trains and automobiles day. I travelled to Ireland, leaving home at 11.45am. The plane was late starting, so I missed my connection in Dublin. Rather than waiting for the coach for an hour and a half and then having to sit on it for four and a half hours, I took a bus into Dublin to get a train to Limerick. Despite having been an Irish citizen and passport holder all my life, I have never, ever been to Dublin. It’s nice. I think I’ll go back one day.
The train was packed (Friday and everyone is going home), so I stood all the way to Limerick Junction (2 hours), changed and was picked up by my sister. It was a lot easier when Ryanair still flew to Shannon!
23rd – 26th December 2009
Posted by Judith on 25 Dec 2009 | Tagged as: Holiday
We’re doing Christmas. Have a nice time everyone!
Tuesday, 15th December 2009
Posted by Judith on 16 Dec 2009 | Tagged as: Holiday
We were dreading waking up to more rain, but the morning dawned sunny. We toyed with the idea of driving back up to Erice to see what we missed, but our plane was leaving at 12.30pm and once we had a clear view of it, we could see that it was clagged in with a big cloud enveloping it.
The Rough Guide wasn’t very complimentary about Trapani, but the town has obviously changed a lot since it was published, because we really liked the place. Far from crumbling and run down, it had nicely restored palazzi, wide streets and lots of pedestrian areas, as well as sea on both sides of the old town. We wandered around soaking up the sun, sights and sea air until it was time to leave.
At the airport we got our final view of Erice – still in cloud. It started raining just was we taxied down the runway. Back home it was grey and the Pyrenees have a dusting of snow again.
Monday, 14th December 2009
Posted by Judith on 16 Dec 2009 | Tagged as: Holiday
The reason we wanted to come to Agrigento was to see the Valley of the Temples. A huge archeological site, which has barely been excavated. It is now a UNESCO world heritage site and contains the remains of what would have been the largest Greek temple ever built anywhere, had it been completed. We started our tour in the museum and if we had lingered to see all the exhibits in detail it would have taken all day. We looked at as much as was feasible and then moved out to the site. Amazing temples which have been rebuilt, columns shaped as men and a lot more. By lunch time it was time to try to fit in something else. We had wanted to go to the Roman Villa at Piazza Amerina, but there just wasn’t time, so we drove back towards Trapani to see Erice. It was a fairly boring drive made interesting only by the speed Geoff drove to get there in daylight and the vagaries of the local drivers. During the two hour drive the sky got blacker and blacker, but it only started to rain as we got up to Erice.
Erice is a medieval town perched on top of a 800m high rock which rises above Trapani. There’s nothing new in the village, other than the pylons which lead up to it. The streets are sometimes so narrow you have to walk single file. It is also apparently the cleanest town in the whole of Sicily.
Although we hate rain, we got out of the car and got our cagoules on and walked into the town via one of the city wall gates. All roads are cobbled in a pattern of squares, and these were designed for summer use. When it’s wet they become so slippy they’re treacherous – even with my flying/walking boots. We hadn’t got anywhere near the pretty castles and the famous folly when the rain got harder and we sheltered in a cafe for a bit. When we got to the other edge of the town (and to the stunning views of the bay to the north) it was nearly dark, but we could make out the sea, mountains and the street lights of the villages far below. In daylight it would have been amazing. We walked round to the first castle and spotted the strange little folly below. It was too dark for photos, and Geoff turned round and said “wow, look at the orographic cloud coming in!”. Hey presto, two minutes later we were enveloped by cloud. We could hardly see 10m ahead, never mind views, follies or castles. And then the rain really started. We negotiated our way back to the car, tottering down the slippy streets as if we were two old folk trying not to step on the lines in the pavement. Occasionally the fog was illuminated by a flash of lightening and clap of thunder which made us jump. We were soaked. I haven’t seen rain like this since I last went to Barcelona with Wayne.
The drive down the mountain was exciting. We snaked our way down hairpin bends that were so sharp it was tricky getting round them in a Fiat Panda with a great turning circle; while the wipers were on max setting; we could barely see ahead in the fog and above us the storm raged. All this was no problem at all – it was the anticipation of some mad Sicilian driver overtaking us on one of the bends while chatting on his mobile phone that was disconcerting.
We got to Trapani, where some of the roads were partially flooded. Thanks to the sat nav, we finally found the street where our hotel should have been, but guess what… no hotel. I got out of the car to ask someone, and by the time I had shown them the reservation and walked the 30m up a hidden alley to the B&B, it was paper mache. We waited in vain for the rain to stop and then got back into our wet coats and boots (urgh!) and looked for a restaurant. Like in Spain, most of them seemed to have their rest day on a Monday. We walked some way from the B&B and found nothing open. I knew there were places near the sea, but we hadn’t brought the guidebook in case it got too wet and we didn’t know where we were. In the end we ate microwave pasta at a greasy spoon three doors down from the B&B. What we reaslised the next day was that we were 100m from the main drag along the sea, which full of places to eat. We’d just missed it in the dark and rain!