From Sinterklaas to Reunions, Kaffeesiederball & More

Back in London after being a long time in Austria feels good again. Although I miss the view of the mountains, I’m happy to be back. Let me start at the beginning of December where we finished our last blog. It's not a long blog in reading perspective but I'm gonna throw a lot of photos at you, enjoy!

I stayed a few days in Robin and Armin’s new house. They’ve done a fabulous job. The whole house has been stripped and built up again, basically only the walls were still standing. Robin is quite busy with her puppy Daisy. She’s growing every day and getting a big dog! Daisy is from Rumania and they don’t know what kind of mixed breed she is and therefore they don’t know what size dog she’s going to be. But she has a kind character. They have done a DNA test and it is mix of a Karaktschan, a Dutch Sheepdog and a Boxer.

I arrived at Don Papa on the 8th of December, and the house was covered in snow. Just beautiful. I focused more on the inside with cleaning the house, prepping all the bedrooms and decorating the house for Christmas.

I loved the me time during these 9 days. I made long walks with Ayo, mostly in Bad Kleinkirchheim along the cross country track.

On December 17th there was a lot of snow overnight and it was still snowing when I left in the morning to Klagenfurt to pick up Rob and Noa. What we didn’t know this would be the last snow for many weeks. The whole Alps were dealing with a high-pressure or low-pressure front with abnormal temperatures. This wasn’t so much the case in Bad Kleinkirchheim, it was most of the time just below zero or a little bit above it. Cold enough to let the snow canons do their job, so we could ski without any problem. Rob and Noa arrived together from Stansted airport with Ryan air and flew to Klagenfurt, which is 50 minutes drive from our house. #Badkleinkirchheim #winteristhebesttimeoftheyear #familytime

Jack, Ailsa, and doggie Zara arrived a few days later. Hugo arrived on the 22nd and had a bit of a flu, luckily not Corona. Noa went on Wednesday to Vienna by train to pick up her best friend from Canada, Claire Cameron. Claire left Calgary with temperatures of minus 40C!! Noa and Claire spent two days in Vienna, visiting Christmas markets and ice skating at the Rathaus and strolling around this beautiful city. On Friday they arrived at Don Papa. Jack went skiing with Rob and me, we had a very relaxed morning as at this time of the season there are not many people were on the slopes. We also had our first neighbourhood grillparty at Andrej drinking gluhwein, eating sausages and good Austrian music. We are the new joiners in the neighbourhood. All others are there already for many years.

Robin invited Jack and Ailsa with Zara to her house so that they also could see Daisy. They left Friday afternoon and came back on Saturday. They had a great time together. Saturday was Christmas eve, and this is important for our Austrian son-in-law and his family to celebrate together.

We planned this year to celebrate Sinterklaas on first Christmas day, it can be any day, but with all the busy schedules of the children nowadays, we chose this day. Overall we managed to have the whole family together this year for a full day! And we made the most out of it. 5pm we started our annual Sinterklaas celebrations and at midnight we were unpacked. I cannot describe what this night means to us. It’s the best party of the year. Every year it’s getting crazier and crazier, incredibly funny “surprises” and witty poems. We had Hugo ‘know it all’ playing memory against all of us. All of us got a Christmas Onesie in which we also went skiing. We played beerpong, and Vivienne and Rob are really poor in it. We also did the Olympic games and much more fun surprises. After midnight we all cleaned up together before we went to bed. #Sinterklaasfeest #makingmemories

Sunday was Jack and Ailsa’s last day, on Monday they would leave again. We went out for dinner at our favourite restaurant in Bad Kleinkirchheim, it’s called Adriana, it’s a steakhouse. It is also the inspiration for the name of our house ‘Don Papa’. Of course every evening we played “Boeren Bridge” a game from Rob’s childhood when his family all went skiing in the Black Forest.

Slowly it started to get quiet at Don Papa again. Only Robin and Armin and Hugo were there. Robin left before New Year’s Eve to keep Daisy calm at her own house, after that she came back. We celebrated New Years Eve with some of our neighbours, where we had a great view over the valley to see all fireworks. Noa and Claire had already left before New Year’s Eve, they went to see friends of Claire in Copenhagen. And on January 1 Hugo also left to be back at work the following day.

After all good things comes an end and so after a very relaxing time at Don Papa Rob flew straight back to London and I flew the next day to the Netherlands with Ayo. We cannot fly to London with Ayo, this is impossible. Therefore, I have to take a train (Thallys) to Brussel Midi and from there a train to Lille. Rob rented a car in England at Gatwick. He got an injury on his left shoulder which was getting worse and he did not realise until he got in the car that the gearbox is on the left side. So, it was a challenge driving, but he drove to the coast, slept there and the next morning he took the euro tunnel train and picked me up in Lille. From there we headed back to the tunnel and drove to Gatwick airport to deliver the car at the car rental. Unfortunately, then we’re not home yet, so two trains into the city and we were home, twelve hours journey only because of little Ayo! When we were home Noa was there with our friends Shelley and Gary from Cornwall. The next day was going to be my birthday (January 15th ) and we had a little Munich reunion. We went to Bloomsbury Flight Club with Paula and Tony, Rachel and Ian and Noa and Gary Shelley and Neil. Neil’s wife was in the US. We had so much fun at the flight Club, it’s playing darts in a different way. We were with ten people and the machine makes couples of two and then there are different games like; snake, killer, and some more. We had some refreshments on the side too, it’s all in a pub setting. We definitely go back there. After playing darts for 1,5 hour we decided to have dinner in China Town. We managed to get a large round table and finished my birthday here with great food. It was here that the ladies and I discovered that it wasn’t only my birthday but also Neil’s!! We had no idea! Apparently, he’d told Rob, but Rob again thought we all knew. Anyway we had a fantastic day. So wonderful to see everyone again after quite a few years. #lovereunions #Bloomsburyflightclub

Monday January 16th we went to see ABBA the voyage, a brilliant show with AnnaFrid, Benny, Björn and Agneta, as avatars in 3D! They are in front of you on stage, just like they were 40/45 years ago! I can recommend this show! #ABBAthevoyage #ABBAisalife #Ilovegoingtotheaters.

On Friday the 20th Karin Jarvis my friend from Warsaw came to see me in London. It’s been 4 years since we’ve seen each other. Back in the days in Vienna, Karen was literally next to me in the car when the oncologist called me with bad news. We had much to talk about after not seeing each other for 4 years. At the end of the day, she took the train back home.

We also experieced the Chinese New Year celebrations with parade through China Town. It's after China the biggest parade in the world. What disturbed me a little was the fact that there were lots of British people participating in it and only a few Chinese/Asian people. But the weather was gorgeous and we had a great Sunday morning. Ayo was an attraction on his own. Many people took photos of him in his rucksack. #Chinesenewyearcelebrationslondon #Chinesenewyear

On January 24th Rob had a surgery on his left shoulder. Since two month he was in a lot of pain, could hardly sleep and something needed to be done. It was an arthroscopic surgery, he could leave the same day. The doctor sewed the supraspinatus tendon on the bone, there was a tear in it. It was surgery with a nerve block so he felt very clumsy since his left arm was totally numb for the next 12 hours. Now he needs to recover and goes to physiotherapy twice a week. #hospitalsarenofun #highonsurgerydrugs

A week later I took a train to Shoeburyness (Southend-on-Sea) to see Lindsey, another friend from Warsaw years. She lives almost on the beach! She designed and built 5 terraced houses and lives in one of them, the best I think, at the corner with a stunning view over the sea! They have a dog called Buddy, he’s basically Ayo but 10 times bigger. They have the same attitude, some dogs they like and some they don’t like. We started with a nice walk on the beach. It was low tide; you could see the boats on their sides. We made a long walk through the village, I love it there! The dogs liked each other from the very beginning, that was great. I was looking for a dog sitter as the lady we had booked cancelled two weeks before we would travel. I was devastated, so I asked Lindsey for help. It just fitted in her busy schedule of travelling left and right. So, the week after on a Wednesday I brought Ayo to Lindsey and John and Ollie. It was a bit tricky getting to her since as usual the trains were partly on strike, but luckily not mine, so it all worked out well. I received a lot if little films and photos, Ayo looked relaxed and very happy with his new family and of course Buddy!

Rob was that week around February 1st in Edinburgh. He flew from there and I flew from London City Airport to Amsterdam Thursday morning. The next day we flew to Vienna where we had the Wiener Kaffeesiederball at the Hofburg palace. We stayed with our friends from Lagos in this tiny hotel at the Mariahilferstrasse. Marc and Marly couldn’t make it so we asked Michiel and Annemiek (living in Vienna) to join us. We were with Sil (partime in Lagos) and Dana (Netherlands), Patrick(Lagos) and Anastasyia(Baku) and Dennis and Mathilde (Denmark). It was so great to see everyone again. The ball was as always very special, beautiful setting, many halls with different kind of music and we were allowed at the Gösser venue. Here we saw some ex-colleagues of Rob, it was lovely to see them. We also went down to the basement where the disco area is. Dancing on YMCA makes your arms always rise and your feet move!

The next day Sil &Dana who drove from the Netherlands left with Rob to Graz where our car is parked at Robin’s office. The rest took the train to St Veit where Sil and Rob picked us up around 6pm. It all worked out well! The house was cold, but we lit the fireplace and soon after a few wines and Don Papa’s everyone was warm. Sil and Dana were the chef and sous chef in the kitchen. We had great dinners. The next morning Sil, Dana, Dennis and I went for some skiing, that was great, but a strong wind made it really cold. At home the others were preparing the hot tub, this takes hours before it’s warm. It’s water from the little stream in our garden and when the tub it full you start warming it up with wood. The two finance directors, Nastyia and Rob, were working as usual! At night we played a lot of music and sang along! Nastyia and Patrick recently got married in Baku but their real wedding will be in September in Zanzibar. Sil is master of ceremony and Thil will wed the couple on the beach. They want to have music from the 90-ties, so we scrolled through our phones to find as many as we could with of course a few Dutch golden oldies! Time flew by, Tuesday morning Robin brought Nastyia and Patrick to the train station. Robin and her dog Daisy arrived the night before. Tuesday evening Sil and Dana also left. We had one day with Dennis and Thil and Robin.

Friday Rob and I drove to Graz, put our suitcase in a hotel near the Central station and then quickly went to Robin and Armin’s house in Bad Gleichenberg. Rob hadn’t seen the house finished, so this was a great opportunity to see it. In the evening we went out for dinner in Slovenia, this is 15/20 minutes from their home. After dinner we looked at the time and realized we could maybe fetch the 20:50 train to Graz. Armin had a few beers, so Robin drove and Armin was guiding her through the curved roads in the area. The navigation said we would arrive 20:53 three minutes late, Robin had to accelerate more! Robin then said I’m allowed 60 here, Armin would say, go 80! When it was 100km/hr he then we say go 120! We managed to be there just on time, we had to wait for two minutes on the platform! An hour later we were in our bed at the hotel. Here we discover that the duvet was extremely short, even for me, it came to Rob’s belly button. The next day we flew to Amsterdam, and we drove with Jack to Piet and Willy, Rob’s parents and afterwards we had an exposition of Dave Lankau at Absolute Motors in Ridderkerk. He’s an amazing artist and made many paintings but also dubbed a car with his signature. #DAMAinart #DAMAin

Sunday, we flew back, after arrival Rob went left, into the city and I went right, women are always right ;-) to fetch Ayo at Shoeburyness. Luckily, he still recognized me, but he gave a very happy and relaxed impression. He had a fabulous stay at Lindsey and John’s and the children Anna and Ollie. We are so grateful he could be there for 10days. #wonderfulfriends #bestdogsitters

Stay safe everyone!