It’s been quite long time since I blogged about anything. There’s no particular reason for that, really. I’ve just not felt like blogging whenever I’ve considered doing so.
Nevertheless, an update seemed in order, so here goes.
The recent family trip to see oma and opa went well. Sarah was in Providence quite a bit longer than I was; I basically showed up, hung out for a couple of days and then Fenella (my step-sister) and her family showed up. We drove up to rural Maine the next day and spent five days on what I thought would be a llama farm, where we would supposedly do some llama trekking.
Well, there were llamas there, but they never left their pen. What we spent most of our time doing was taking out huskie teams for training runs, which involved hooked up six to twelve animal dog teams to the front of ATVs and then racing off down the unpaved roads around the farm, keeping the reins just taught enough that the dogs are pulling for all they’re worth, without running them into the ground.
When we weren’t racing the dogs, we were playing with puppies, hiking in the surrounding countryside or eating hearty, organic meals back at the farm’s lodge. The food was stupendous; in fact, the whole experience was very memorable and made a big impression on all of us.
The Telemark Inn farm is out in the middle of nowhere. Our mobile phones all gave up the ghost about an hour before we arrived, so that should give you an idea of how rural that part of Maine is. The wilderness lodge, as it’s called, is on the edge of the White Mountain National Forest. The nearest town is Bethel. The only electricity comes from a generator on-site.
How nice it was to divorce ourselves from our technology-dominated lives and get out into nature for several days. This is not a trip I would ever have picked out to make, so my thanks go to Fenella for discovering it and recognising its potential. It didn’t take long before all of the adults were pondering the wisdom of their daily lives, when one could be living in the wide open spaces of the countryside, truly rural countryside. Still, if one thing became clear during our time on the farm, it’s that it takes an inordinate amount of work to run a place like that. The people who run it are extremely dedicated souls.
Speaking of which, I must thank Steve and Leo for allowing us to share their lives for the better part of a week. Steve’s quite a character, and regaled us with many captivating tales of his past and what it’s like to run a huskie farm in rural Maine.
Leo, Steve’s girlfriend, is the cornerstone of the farm, tending the horses and llamas, running the huskies, feeding all of the animals, doing groceries and somehow still finding the time to prepare an endless array of tasty organic meals. She grew up in New Mexico and the influence is clear in her delicious cooking. I haven’t eaten that well since I left Google (and I’m not joking).
After Maine, it was back to Providence for a couple of days; unseasonably warm days, as it turned out. I took receipt of my new T60 laptop and proceeded to install it.
Back in The Netherlands, it was raining. Well, it would be, wouldn’t it? Autumn has arrived.
There’s not a lot else to tell, to be honest.
We built our first fire in our living-room fireplace this evening. We’d bought some logs and a fire-screen earlier in the day. It’s quite remarkable how cosy this made our home feel. I’m going to get some more logs next week and build lots of fires for our upcoming series of guests.
Roman and Carine (and Elina and newborn Rachel) arrive on Wednesday from Zürich. Sarah and I are both really looking forward to spending time together with them.
A few days later, Geoff arrives with his new wife (actually, they arrive separately from different countries, but the story’s too long to tell). He was going to be attending a wedding in Hamburg, but somehow his acceptance of the invitation wasn’t acknowledged, so now he’s coming to visit us and go on a belated honeymoon.
Another old Google colleague, Brian, turns up on Tuesday for the annual Amsterdam burger. Believe it or not, this is the second time that he has flown from San Francisco for the sole purpose of sharing a hamburger with Geoff and me. Geoff, too, must be lauded for his dedicattion to our old traditions. It won’t be a legendary Clarke’s Burger, but the company is more important than the food.
It will be great to see old friends again. Apart from that, it’s business as usual: getting work done on the house and finding odds and sods with which to furnish it.
My feet are itchy, though. The urge to travel again is becoming ever stronger and I think we’re going to have to do another trip in the near future. Scandinavia beckons, but I’d also like to get back to Iceland again some time this winter. Well, we’ll have to see what happens. We still don’t even have the photos from our last trip on-line yet.