So I’m not doing very well at keeping this blog up to date regularly and for that I apologise. Here in random order are photos from the last four months, if I get a chance to add more text I will do.
Due to a short stay time Gabriel and I had to play a game of pool in the daytime and why not? As with everything Kuhn he took it rather seriously!
Taking a party of visitors, Canadians, Brits and Serbs around the Partisan hospital and all of them refusing to cooperate with the camera!
I’ve never know a group of people take so many selfies! I took it as my duty therefore to mess them up as much as an aging punk is able. Funnily enough they seemed to find it funny! But I bet I get cropped or photo shopped out of the tour diary! This was taken outside the Paris house we stayed in.
These were a revelation and also very amusing. For those who don’t know the rest of the world tends to call crisps chips and so these are quite confusing but also tasty!
The tour took us to an incredible variety of different venues with differing standards of food and accomodation (thanx to tour organiser Lil – front right !) and this night in Hoorn, outside Amsterdam was one of the best meals we had amongst many very good ones.
Imogen recovers from another day/night of alcohol abuse by dosing in the hammock under the big pear tree with a beer to hand.
My sister’s youngest who is now as tall as me if not taller proved that he could occasionally be useful and climbed the walnut tree to do some pruning of dead branches. Thanx Loz!
As usual I offered to show my Czech comrades around the local Partisan monuments and here they are on the top of Petrova Gora cameras in hand!
On eof the fun things about the Petrova Gora monument is how each time I visit there is something different about it, including ways in being locked or closed off which previously were open. This time we had to resort to a method of entry not needed for a few years or more, climbing up to the first floor window!
I love it when guests take choosing their mugs seriously.
Almost brothers in arms! Sid n Nancy what a pair?
After being away for a month my paths were in dire need of re strimming!
My niece and her mates mess about in the Mrežnica river just outside of Duga Resa!
Imogen show the correct way to cut up a birthday cake for an undeserving old uncle! It was a very nice cake, thanx Twitch!
After a month apart, we rendevoused in the botanical gardens of Prague and as you can see she was overjoyed to see me again.
This is the band (plus one boyfriend/roadie/translator) Tomar Control from Lima Peru whom I had the pleasure of driving around Europe for 3 weeks in July. It was quite an interesting and fun experience.
The romance of being on tour rarely includes the reality of the drivers lot. Here for instance I am stuck in an admittedly very scenic Swiss traffic jam whilst the rest of the van is asleep. Fun it isn’t!
After three weeks of non-stop driving my hammock was a really welcome sensation.
The fancy looking newly tarted up (refurbished) Kino Edison in Karlovac.
Can you believe some folk (friends) turned up to stay and slept in their van rather than my comfy beds!! Still it is a very nicely kitted out van!
My apple trees in the early twilight
Scrambled tofu and mushrooms for breakfast .
Sanja does a little dance to try to trick Luke the unlucky cat into the cat carrier.
The back garden of Petra’s mum”s place show how different the gardens are on the Croatian coast from the ones around here. It’s rocky and dry but full of fig and olive trees and every bit of soil is used to grwo something in.
This was the most expensive food I have paid for here in Croatia, almost as expensive as fancy places in London. But boy it was good. Le Botanist in Zadar, try it out if you can afford it.
I love this cat, probably because she is such a wonderful weirdo!
Si made my day by explaining to Rosa that the real purpose for Rose hip buds was for obnoxious youngsters to break them open and then rub the contents down their “mates” neck which is guaranteed to itch badly! I was beginning to worry it was only I who did that!
Simon (old mate from London) treks through my woods with Sid intow miaowing and wowling like a real wuss of a puss!
Half way through making enough burek to keep my guests happy for two if not three days! It turned out Si was still eating them 5 days later!
Given how easy it is for the locals around here to start fighting each other it wouldn’t surprise me if the next war is over who has the rights to Nicky Tesla’s image, name or t-shirt concession! Anyway Karlovac has a fancy new Tesla museum which I must check out at a more appropriate time than when I took this photo.
The really good local news is that Karlovac has afunctioning cinema once more. Kino Edison was one of the first cinemas in Europe but has been empty for decades. Now thanx to the good old Eu it’s been renovated and is a rather swish cinema and art centre.I cycled into town to see Doghouse and was knackered but happy on arriving home late that night after a night out at the flics!
Dad’s room in the guest house has a new rug.
I gave up looking for this potato peeler many months ago and bought a new one so I was amused to dig it up all shiny and in good condition from the compost bin approximately a year after “losing” it! Gotta check the peelings before I put them in the bin!
Royalty, a lion in his prime.
I almost picked this book up without noticing him! I think changing to a black and white colour was too much even for him!
When I grow up I hope to have a cooker with this many rings and space. Somehow I don’t think I’ll get away with trying to sneak out of my Dad’s place with this under my jacket!
There’s not a lot to commend Ilminster but this mug is a good start despite the image the two handles are very stylish. This I might get away with tucked under my jacket!
Dad agreed a little walk down to town, a coffee and cake at The Street cafe and back woould be a good challenge and if succesful good exercise. If he failed and didn’t make it then, well I’d get the blame not him!
By the time Dad had strimmer framed his way around Ilminster the long way in order to call in on his latest squeeze it was dark and I was knackered!
My old man cast’s his eye over a new book I brought for him.
This liitle fella, and he was quite small, was wondering around the cat house doing weird circular defensive movements, and quite scary he looked too!
Nancy decided the parasol provided the ideal spot out of the wind an dwas lucky I didn’t pick it up without noticing her tail before doing so!
Sid heads off down the path on one of our walks down the hill.
And wherever Sid goes Nancy is sure to check it out straight after. Though this being Nancy he managed to fall off the compost bin fence and into the wet soil!
This morning, 12th of Novemeber I discovered that the local wild boar are digging up the land increasingly closer to the house an dmessing up my pathways in doing so! Thankfully they didn’t mess with the Magnolia or any of the trees, so far! What to do?
More boar diggings, on the main path from the house to the Wisteria bench!
Sid came to oversee my compost bagging and filling the ‘bins’ back up with cut grass, looks like he approved but I’ve not seen the officail report as yet.
Sid took advantage of my removing the skirting board (?) under the kitchen cupboards so I could clean under them to hunt for mice and the like.
Back to my usual pace at home after the busy busy time in the UK.