occurrences

Spain photos

2011-10-05T21:23:00.003+02:00

I know this is really lazy, but here's the photos from our Spain trip... on facebook!

Link to first album

Part 2

The last day of summer in Stockholm?

2011-09-18T13:11:00.012+02:00

On what was probably the last warm sunny day for the year, I went for a day at Rosendals Slott on Djurgården with some netball friends, and played with our new camera!

Don't pick the fruit!

OK, maybe it is autumn...

We curiously followed the signs to the 'onion exhibition'... we now know that the Swedish word for onions also means bulbs!

Another Spain teaser...

2011-09-04T12:52:00.003+02:00

Spain

2011-09-04T12:46:00.004+02:00

Ireland, to be sure

2011-05-10T21:53:00.010+02:00

Dublin on a sunny Saturday morning

John's shirt momentarily threw the philosophy professor who took the guided tour of Trinity College.

Great markets! I'll take two.

Dublin was a very colourful city - literally!

St Stephen's Green

St Someone's something

Nothing like a nap in the sun and a bag of cheese

This is our friend Jane who travelled with us, she's from Melbourne and she plays netball with us in Stockholm!

An afternoon stroll in Dun Laoghaire, the port to the south of Dublin.

A little break in our road trip to enjoy the spoils from our market trip in Dublin

The view from our room in Kinvarra, south of Galway

This is where we stayed in Kinvarra - Yeats was here.

Another lovely pub lunch

In the orchard of the hostel where we stayed

The Cliffs of Moher from the bottom

And from the top

Galway

We stopped at a stately home on the way back to Dublin and strolled through the gardens to the tea room

The citizens of Port Laoise told us we couldn't miss the Rock of Dunamase, so we didn't!

Skiing at Hagaparken

2011-02-27T12:17:00.002+01:00

The Copper Tents in winter!

I don't know how to check if the ice is thick enough to ski on, but I think if there's a guy selling hot dogs in the middle of the bay then it's probably pretty thick.

Winter again!

2011-02-20T21:30:00.001+01:00

OK, this will be a big blog post! We haven't posted anything of our winter, so here it all is! You will notice the transition from the dark gray of November to the current beautiful blue skies and bright sunshine.

Here is the view from the palace one weekend when I was out christmas shopping - textbook dreary, but at least there was snow! This was midday, by the way.

Christmas buffet at Waxholm fort, with Julius and Lidija (and little Gabriel), Edwin, Dominic and Jane.

The boat we took to and from dinner, braving the icebergs.

Our second annual lab gingerbread night. I made a Dala horse.

Before christmas I took a trip to the christmas markets in Sigtuna, a small town north of Stockholm with Sweden's oldest main street.

There were lots of wreaths and pine door mats and of course christmas trees for sale.

The main square and the old wooden church

Traditional Swedish christmas foods include fried herring and sugared almonds (sold separately).

2pm sunset!

Mariatorget in the afternoon, just a block from our house.

Stay off the grass!

After our sojourn in Brisbane we had some visitors - Ben and Kym came for a weekend and we went on a brunch cruise of the archipelago.

Cold feet!

Double iceberg!

Here's some pictures of the nicer northern campus of KI.

Winter colours

Last weekend I went cross country skiing with Ebba and Aroha. It was a balmy -5, and you can finally feel the warmth in the sun!

Hey, I know what that thing is for!

Another skiing expedition today, with Aroha, Doug, Heather and Ebba.

2010-11-11T21:24:00.004+01:00

Autumn in Sweden!

2010-11-11T21:05:00.007+01:00

Sometimes it's hard to choose my favourite season in Sweden! Autumn offered a boat trip and a lovely walk around the grounds of the Drottningholm palace with some netball friends.

Aww, cheesy... (Aroha, Anna, Ebba and I)

A touch frozen..

A cosy candlelit lunch. Actually it wasn't that cosy, it was freezing!

In the 1700s the King built a Swedified Chinese palace for the Queen as a surprise birthday present, as you do.

The first snow of the season!

All topped off with some karaoke!

Summer in Sweden

2010-08-25T20:42:00.006+02:00

One big blog post to cover our summer occurrences in Stockholm.
First up is that most Swedish of events, a Kräftskiva, or crayfish party.

Jakob + kräftor + snaps = Sweden!

Johnny?

Sam and his wife Jinny - apparently the hats are mandatory, as are the drinking songs!

Heinrich, Sebastian and Sam

Another day another beautiful summer sunset, viewed from the lookout 3oo metres north of our apartment. That's the town hall on the right.

The weekend after O ringen we had some itinerant Australian orienteers staying at our place, so we took a boat trip.

The south coast of Södermalm, 500m from our house. We went swimming and had a picnic just along from here.

Still haven't managed to go on our balloon flight!

A cocktail party at Ebba's place with the netball girls

The Stockholm International netball tournament - we hosted teams from Denmark, Switzerland and Belgium, all the powerhouse netball nations - for 2 days of games and fun. My team, one of 3 playing for Sweden, came 3rd but Denmark took the chocolate gold medals!

Heja Sverige!

Playing against the giant Danish team...

My friend Kate who I used to play with in Brisbane for the IMB team was in the Copenhagen team!

While I was playing netball John and Steve were camping and fishing on an actual sandy beach! In Stockholm!

Kerstin's garden

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A very swedish barbeque salmon lunch in my Swedish teacher's beautiful garden.

Netball in Malta - heja sverige!

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Go in! Go in! Our match against Ireland, we lost substantially but at least we got 4 goals!!

The mixed team played Ireland too, and won!

Gzira harbour from the roof of our hotel.

Sophie and Aroha taking a dip - a nice cool down between matches.

Gaby and Ebba - Swedes in the sun, their preferred environment.

Best buses ever.

Little Maltese Netty girls asking for our autographs! Adorable! And incredibly amusing!

Playing for the mixed team - look at me go!

Maltese architecture. Strangely... English? They had English phone booths and post boxes too.

Picnic at Rosendals

2010-05-23T11:55:00.002+02:00

Yesterday was a lovely summer day in Stockholm - 25 degrees! We had a picnic in the apple orchard at Rosendals Slott, on Djurgården. Spring has sprung, you can smell the pollen in the air and hear John sneezing!

Spring in Stockholm... almost?

2010-04-04T12:20:00.003+02:00

Kiruna

2010-03-24T19:33:00.008+01:00

A beautiful sunset over the icy river - and a nice clear sky, will we see the northern lights?

A well-deserved fire after all that playing in the snow!

The aurora! Not at its most spectacular, but a pretty green light rolling across the sky for 5 or 10 minutes. If we'd had a tripod you might have been able to see it better in the picture, but you get the idea!

A morning walk in the wilderness is not complete without a quick check of the cricket scores!

Where was that path again?

Time to head home! Puppy says: ''it's much too hot today!''

Downtown Kiruna, very pretty.

The ice hotel!

The whole thing is at a constand minus 5, so it's as chilly as it looks!

All of the ice is cut from the river Älv behind the ice hotel, which has a beautiful colour and clarity due to the high oxygen content and the motion of the river. If you look carefully you can find some plants from the river here and there. They use a third of it and sell the rest, including to the other ice hotels around the world.

The rooms are each designed by a different artist, from all around the world, who also builds the room. The designs are voted for online each year.

The Ice church, where you can get married or even christen your poor shivering child!

Scariest room! It was called 'The Dollhouse'

This room was called 'Spooning'

John was very excited to see that it's only 89 days left till the princess' wedding!

Kiruna

2010-03-24T19:09:00.004+01:00

We went out cross country skiing on some antique Swedish army skis, along and sometimes on top of a very pretty river which is just starting to melt. Some of the creaking coming from the ice was a little bit disconcerting!

Kiruna trip March 2010

2010-03-24T19:01:00.002+01:00

On a beautiful spring day in the arctic circle we set out on dog sleds and snowmobiles for the camp where we would spend the night.

When we arrived at the Sami-style camp we got to chop some wood to keep us warm - no central heating here!

Saltsjöbaden

2010-02-07T11:59:00.002+01:00

Last Sunday we went for a train trip out to Saltsjöbaden, a spa on a big frozen lake on the outskirts of Stockholm. It was cold!

2010-01-26T22:07:00.000+01:00

Back to Sweden!

2010-01-24T12:17:00.002+01:00

The End! Back to Sweden, and chillier pursuits.

Kanchanaburi

2010-01-24T11:57:00.009+01:00

The view from Hellfire Pass.

The morning light on the immense dam outside Kanchanaburi.

We walked up the 7 tiers of the beautiful Erawan Falls, complete with sneaky monkeys, biting fish, and a few well-earned and refreshing swims.

Beware a monkey steal your belonging!

It's too hot today...

Our next trip was to the Elephant Camp run by an indigenous Karen tribe. We got to ride on elephants, swim with them in the river and scrub behind their ears, use them to chase local dogs, and in Jacqueline's case, her majout made her an excellent hat from atop her elephant! But first we got some slightly sloppy and highly suctioned elephant kisses:

Giant gecko! He had a very imposing, deep gecko squeak!

Here's some pictures from the gardens of the resort we stayed at.

And on our last night in Bangkok, we went out for dinner and drinks at a nice rooftop bar.

Thailand!

2010-01-24T01:48:00.000+01:00

From London we flew to Bangkok to meet Jacqueline and the sunshine! We spent New Years Eve in Krabi, here's John and Jacqueline getting some tasty snacks at the night market.

Big Cave! Apparently some movie was filmed there. What a story...

Cruising around in the mangroves on a long-tail boat.

There were some beautiful kingfishers in the mangroves. They had bright blue under their wings.

The giant crab got us! The only thing I don't understand is why it left that guy alone.

From Krabi we took the ferry out to Koh Lanta, one of the quieter islands south of Koh Phi Phi. We stayed in a nice two bedroom bungalow 100 metres from the beach for 5 nights of relaxation and fun. There will actually be some more photos of this stage once we get the film developed from our underwater camera, but who even knows how to get film developed anymore?

This is our beach, it was amazing! The water was the perfect temperature, it wasn't crowded at all, and there were nice little restaurants and bars all along the beach.

Yummy cocktails in coconuts! We sat at one of the beach bars each night and played scrabble or cards and watched the sunset.

Mangrove monkeys! We fed them some delicious pineapples.

This was the motor of the long-tail boat that took us out to go sea-kayaking.

A storm brewing...

After our lazy days at the beach we headed back north for some lazy days in the jungle! We went to Kanchanaburi and stayed in lovely cottages on the hill beside the River Kwai with Ben and Kym.

Eating delicious coconut sticky rice on our way to the waterfalls.

We walked along the Hellfire Pass section of the Burma-Thai railway.

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Christmas dinner!

The houses of parliament at a rather chilly 4pm sunset on boxing day.

Another afternoon walk, along the Thames.

Christmas 2009 London

2010-01-22T19:15:00.003+01:00

What seems like more than 4 weeks ago, we enjoyed christmas in London with Ed, Claire and Juliette. It was a little bit of a white christmas, although luckily not as white and -30 degree-ish as it was in Stockholm!

First up are some photos from our first day in town, when Johnny and I wandered around and did some last minute present shopping.

Burlington House, home of the Linnean, Royal Academy of Arts, Geological, Royal Astronomical and Chemical societies. And a pile of shiny balls.

The Long Water in Hyde Park, frozen.

Strolling through Kensington Gardens

Albert checking out his hall.

2009-10-25T11:26:00.000+01:00

Laure outside her new workplace at EMBL

Their Guggenheim-inspired new building.

Sunset over Heidelberg

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Scary arm!

Me, Tobias, Robert, Laure and Andrew

Heidelberg!

2009-10-25T10:55:00.003+01:00

Another interesting ye olde clock.

Heidelberg Schloss.

I like her hat!

2009-10-15T21:58:00.001+02:00

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2009-10-15T21:45:00.002+02:00

Canals, bikes and autumn leaves!

Pete, Miriam and John outside the Rijksmuseum, eating their breakfast of champions - chupa cups!

2009-10-03T19:58:00.002+02:00

And lastly we went to visit John's cousin Ollie and his girlfriend Tori in their lovely cottage outside Tiverton. This is their garden and pet butterfly.

We went for a nice wander down some country lanes and through the woods.

2009-10-03T18:41:00.002+02:00

We went to Torre Cider, the local Cider farm, for a nice glass of cider in the afternoon sun. Since it's now 3 degrees in Stockholm that sounds pretty good to me!

Also, we bought some delicious condiments - a caramelised onion chutney, and a pear and peach jam.

Was this on my birthday? I think it was. As you can see, John gave me the gift of dignity.

2009-10-03T18:38:00.002+02:00

A fantastic view, and look at that group shot! Thanks to my awesome photoshop skills there are three smiling faces!

This is me in my stylish new coat, courtesy of my birthday money from Monny - thanks Monny!

2009-10-03T18:36:00.001+02:00

This is somewhere that the Locks went before I arrived. Wotchet? Is this Wotchet?

2009-10-03T18:32:00.002+02:00

We went for a day trip to Lenmouth, with some very pretty coastline, and minigolf. What a combo!

2009-10-03T17:55:00.003+02:00

The narrow winding roads of the village required some patience and good reversing skills.

The local pub, and look! Sunshine!

I've learned so much about parenting from watching Ed and Claire with Juliette. Did you know you can feed babies yoghurt off a toothbrush in the carpark while waiting for the pub to open?

2009-10-03T17:17:00.002+02:00

Feeding the birds (well, predominately the JuJuBird)

2009-10-03T17:03:00.003+02:00

This is the lovely house that we all shared in Roadwater. It was Housey! It had a huge garden with two (two!) brooks, and a little bridge perfect for Pooh sticks.

JuJu and her Grumpy

2009-08-19T19:25:00.002+02:00

Hand puppet fun!

Froggy gets a nice big smooch!

2009-08-19T19:18:00.002+02:00

Blowing bubbles in the park - awesome for all ages, especially those aged 26 and above! Juju really couldn't have cared less.

Camping in Wales.

Ju playing peek-a-boo with a transparent object and some breakfast residue.

2009-08-19T19:10:00.002+02:00

He had a range of different genres, it was really impressive, especially since it was all assembled in 3 days. He must have had quite a budget, and I think he had a lot of fun with it.

2009-08-19T08:21:00.002+02:00

On Sunday morning we took a walk up a mountain/large hill (the Sugarloaf) in Wales, complete with sheepies and crazy-eyed horses. It was a great way to spend a Sunday morning, especially since it was followed by a nice pub lunch in the village.

2009-08-19T08:15:00.002+02:00

On the weekend we visited Ed, Claire and Juliette in Bristol. Fun! On Saturday we checked out the Bristol museum, currently hosting an exhibit by Banksy. It was fantastic, lots of very clever ideas and even cleverer commentary by thousands of people, as there was a 2.5hr line to get in.

2009-08-13T07:45:00.005+02:00

Last night I was playing with some old photos and a book I was given by the lab about photoshop. Fun! Anyway, thought I might as well show off some of the results. Here's some pictures from when Jacqui and I went to Slovenia last year.

2009-06-21T11:49:00.000+02:00

18th March is Turkish Naval Victory day

2009-06-21T11:44:00.002+02:00

The view from the Nek

The Aegean Sea from Lone Pine

Lone Pine

Boats on the Dardanelles at Canakkale

2009-06-21T11:40:00.000+02:00

ANZAC cove

The Sphynx

ANZAC cove again

2009-06-21T11:23:00.002+02:00

One more of the palace...

Then we went on a cruise on the Bosphorus. Johnny is drinking Turkish tea, now I just have to get him to drink English tea...

One of the Sultans old palaces, later owned by Ataturk, now a 5 star hotel

The Bosphorus, looking north to the Black Sea

2009-06-21T11:05:00.003+02:00

The Topkapi palace, where the Ottoman Sultans lived. We did a tour of the harem.

They used natural light beautifully, but weren't too worried about matching the tiles!

Then we had dinner in a 1500 year old roman cistern, which used to be an mechanics room, somewhat of a waste of those beautiful ceilings.

2009-06-21T10:58:00.002+02:00

The Hagia Sophia by night

Inside Hagia Sophia

The Blue Mosque from Hagia Sophia: it's a dome-off

Johnny, I can't see!

That's a big dome, well done 5th century dudes!

2009-06-21T10:56:00.000+02:00

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A walk around pretty St Ives wouldn't be complete without someone getting copiously dumped on by a seagull...

2009-05-07T08:09:00.001+02:00

The Minack Theatre, carved into the cliff by a crazy old aristocrat lady over the past century. We listened to a male voice choir and had lunch looking out over the cliffs.

2009-05-06T20:41:00.002+02:00

Sunset over the beach (no, really)

Flying a kite over our tent (well, I tied the string to my chair and let the howling wind do the rest)

Tim and John contemplating going snorkeling - the sea was angry that day, my friends. Not to mention quite chilly, hence the winter wetsuits and hesitation.

John's vision was that this would look like we were about to get trapped in a giant spiderweb, but both our acting abilities and the clearly tiny size of the spiderweb may have let him down...

2009-05-06T20:27:00.002+02:00

Lands End, Cornwall - breezy but picturesque.

2009-05-06T20:24:00.001+02:00

Johnny looking at the old boats moored along Södermalm.

The mailboxes for the residents of the boats.

2009-05-06T20:23:00.001+02:00

More Valborg festivities - John, Katie, Steve and Andrew, and Lidija, Julius and Chris.

2009-05-06T20:16:00.002+02:00

On the first of May we went to see one of the Walpurgis/Valborg bonfires. This was on Riddarholmen, a small island adjacent to Gamla Stan, just to the north of where we now live. The bonfires are held to welcome spring, and date back to pagan times when they had more to do with witches than just getting drunk and looking at a big fire. At least it wasn't snowing, as it did at our first Valborg party two years ago.

2009-05-06T20:12:00.003+02:00

On the first sunny weekend of spring we went for a cycle 3 islands over to Ekerö, home of Drottningholm palace. That's John and Andrew ¨Paddy the Kiwi¨Paterson. The boat was photographed from one of the bridges between islands.

2009-02-16T11:16:00.000+01:00

The view from our new apartment

Nah, just kidding. But this is only 4 mins walk from where we live.

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Yes, it was exactly as cold as it looks.

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An icy walk on Sunday afternoon.

2009-02-16T11:07:00.000+01:00

Riddarholm from Sodermalm at sunset.

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2009-02-15T20:45:00.004+01:00

Our new apartment!

2008-10-16T03:59:00.001+02:00

Tigger, taking a moment of hard-earned respite from her duties.

2008-10-04T05:46:00.002+02:00

In August I went on a sneaky trip to Slovenia when I should have been finishing my experiments before I left Stockholm. We had perfect weather the whole time (apart from a memorable flight in from Munich on a small plane in a violent storm with a rather unique hangover) and the country is truly beautiful. This is Lake Bled.

2008-08-01T13:22:00.002+02:00

This one's for mum, she totally freaked out about these sod-roofed cottages when she was in scandinavia.

2008-08-01T12:56:00.002+02:00

I stayed with these guys for the week: L-R: Ineka, Ingemar, Sofia, Malin, Staffan, and I. We had a short lived ban on English in the cottage, but nonetheless I think my Swedish improved a lot, even if a lot of the advances came in the swearing department thanks to Malin... She may look like butter wouldn't melt in her mouth, but she swears like a trooper.
However, 4 months back in Australia should well and truly cure me of what little ability I have to hold a conversation.

2008-08-01T12:50:00.002+02:00

The ants go marching... Stage 4 started at the top of the ski hill, and if you were prepared to queue for an hour you could get the chairlift, but if you were cutting it a bit fine then you had a 40 minute walk up the hill. By this stage of the competition I preferred to risk missing my start and get the lift, which luckily only took 35mins to get on, so I had plenty of time to laugh at the suckers staggering up the hill, which was a lot steeper than it looks here. And if you walked then you missed out on a birds eye view into the showers, which were thoughtfully placed below the lift. Swedes really aren't bothered by extremely public nudity, and hey, good on them.

2008-08-01T12:47:00.002+02:00

The start times (lucky they translated Startlistor into English).

And the results - did I win? Ah, whatever, it's too hard to find my class, let alone my name.

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There were a lot of little kids walking around with their parents' mobile numbers taped to the backs of their shirts.

2008-07-27T14:17:00.001+02:00

Another assembly area, another Where's Wally page on which to find our club's tiny flag. Tullinge was the biggest club there, but it was still a nightmare trying to spot 200 people out of over 21 000.

2008-07-27T14:14:00.000+02:00

Another spectacular Swedish summer sunset.

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The finish and assembly area on day two - quite similar to day one except for the sunshine. I slipped from 164th to 175th (out of 312) but enjoyed the event much more.

And here we have the universal sight of a bunch of orienteering kids building a dam and getting really filthy.

2008-07-27T13:39:00.004+02:00

Day one and two used the start site for the Vasaloppet cross country ski race. This is the rather unkind 360 metre finish chute, including a somewhat frightening (and occasionally wrist snapping) bridge. With 21000+ competitors, and thousands more spectators, the atmosphere was amazing.

2008-07-27T13:29:00.004+02:00

Arrival in Sälen on Saturday night with our welcome rainbow.

Pretty wildflowers

2008-06-20T22:46:00.000+02:00

That's me and my sister. She's a bit sideways, but importantly she is shorter than me in this picture.

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Lapping up the brief period of sunshine; me, John, Kym, Ben, Miriam and Pete.

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We all find our own ways to entertain ourselves during a slow session. That's a strawberry.

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Right. Good call.

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Finally!

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On the Saturday we got tickets to the third day of the second test between England and New Zealand at Trent Bridge.
This is Andrew and John making the best of the 2 hour wait for play to start in the light drizzle. Brave little soldiers...

2008-06-20T22:28:00.000+02:00

I'm sure Johnny will want to post some more pictures from our trip to the tunnel near Waterloo station which is currently hosting an exhibition of graffiti, or street art, or whatever the kids are calling it these days, but I like this one.

2008-04-06T17:36:00.000+02:00

Blue, much?

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There was even a brief swim for the boys, but the screaming and swearing was enough of a deterrent that the girls didn't bother to join them.

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We found a small private beach to hang out at for the day, it was rather nice.

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John found a volleyball, which somehow remained in our possession despite some risky games of catch.

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One of these goats is not like the others...

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Whilst the beaches were beautiful, the water was a little cool.