Adrianm
Adrian Mollenhorst Joined: June 24th 2007
Logged in: December 10th 2010
Logged in: December 10th 2010
Travel Blog Posts
Hi Everyone. Anne and I have been mostly working on the house, with a few jaunts around Bulgaria as breaks (Borovetz, Sozopol - The Black Sea Coast, Sofia), but recently I have been training for the Paris Marathon, and when the time came to compete, we decided to take a few weeks out to travel to a couple of our favorite places, as well as a few new ones. The Marathon was great, but there were so many people competing, it felt like there was a Mall of people around me the whole time. I just missed out on my target (3:20) with 3 hours 22 minutes, I was still happy to beat my personal best by 15 minutes. If I can shave 15 minutes off every 6 months, this means I will be beating the ... read more
Hi Everyone! First off let me say that Anne and I are well. We have moved into our new home, and found that our builder is not a builder, and the people he deployed to build our house were unskilled laborors (well, most of them - I think we had one master carpenter, but that's all that I can recognize. The builder has not provided any proof of any skilled workers). Every room has issues, and almost every installed component has been completed poorly. Anne and I will be performing recovery actions for at least the next year. Many of you know this already, so apologies for the duplicated message, but below are some links to a web album and a blog on the troubles. This is what Anne and I have been consumed with over ... read more
I have had some trouble starting this entry. As I write, I watch the goat herders with their flock pass outside my window. I hear my neighbors’ roosters crowing. The sun is shining, yet there is snow on the not so distant Stara Planina ranges. The air is cool, and is mixed with the unmistakable smell of livestock and the sweet smoke of wood burning stoves. The bees are pollinating the beautiful cherry blossoms; I can hear their collective buzz outside my window. We arrived in the small village of Dzhulyunitsa outside Veliko Tarnovo about two weeks ago. This was our temporary destination after leaving Scotland and travelling 2000 miles across Europe with the dogs. Our plan was rigorously thought out and studied - Anne read many blogs to come up with the best solution. Our ... read more
Anne, Uncle David and Yours Truly
What does Bonnie mean anyhow? According to Google, the highest rated definition refers to a benchmark which measures the performance of Unix file system operations. Now I don't know about you, but I don't think the Unix filesystem has been around for as long as the Scottish dialect. This is just one of the many things that would confound me throughout our journey in Scotland. Luckily I have a better half that is more than capable of helping me out in this area whilst at the same time giving me the quizzical look of someone who has just been asked a stupid question. (For those who struggle like me, Bonnie means beautiful, as in "Aye, yir bonnie, aside frae the plook on the neb.". or "Yes, you are beautiful, apart from the pimple on your nose.") ... read more
Glacier National Park
Once again I need to be beaten for slacking off again in terms of Blog updates. Anne and I are still in Fernie, but sadly, today is our last day! Tomorrow we leave for 3 months in Scotland prior to heading to the Balkans. Fernie has been our home for the last 18 months, and whilst we are sad to go, we are excited about our next adventure. We have had a terrific time over the last 3 months since our last post. We took another jaunt into the 'wilderness' with Ian to Glacier National Park. A beautiful place, but alas we were socked in with alot of fog and rain, so we missed many of the vista's. Good times are always had with good friends, so we had a blast. Toronto and Niagara Falls was ... read more
Mt Fernie Hike
Hi to all. It seems like it's been forever since we last made an update. Apologies to all who like to see what we are up to. We have had a lot of lazy summer days here. High temperatures for the last 2 months, but that's all about to change - Summer here lasts only about 2 months before cooler temperatures set in. Anne has continued to slave away at the Salvation Army, and both of us have been hitting the streets and trails with lots of miles to prepare for the Toronto Marathon. Anne will be walking the 1/2 marathon (21 Kilometers) and I have to say, her walking pace is beyond mine. She is quick! We had alot of plans to visit parts of the US this year, but we have been waiting almost ... read more
Snow Shoeing
The last time I posted, Anne and I were happily skiing our asses off, and enjoying Christmas. Wow. That was a long time ago! Now it's Spring, and all the snow has disappeared from town, and is starting to leave the mountains. It's bittersweet, no more skiing, but now I get to start enjoying the beautiful trails again on my runs. Bitumen can get so boring. Also, I'd like to officially state that I now hate shoveling snow. It only takes one season here to thoroughly get that right out of my system. Even with our wonderful neighbor snow-blowing our driveway on the worst days. The closing parts of the ski season had some fun events, including "The Dummy Downhill" which is sort of like the Birdman Rally in Melbourne, but with an intelligent difference being ... read more
Sleigh Ride at Christmas
It's been a while, and apologies to all those that are using the blog to keep across our comings and goings. Truthfully, Anne and I have settled into our new routines nicely, with the pace of Fernie lifestyle exerting it's influence over the speed at which we accomplish activities. It's like our pace is as equally influenced by sub zero temperatures as are water molecules. It's above zero today, (1 degree), which brings me up to about typing speed, hence the blog update... :-) The season has been absolutely awesome. Local's say it's the best since 2000. (The one's that ski that is - the others who have to shovel snow say it's the worst..) We have had some tremendous skiing, and the snow really descended for our friends Marc, Lena and Marcella whilst they were ... read more
Eating Snow
Anne and I have been busy as usual. Well, Anne has been slightly more busy than I. She has been doing heaps of charity works - either with the Salvation Army or wrapping gifts for underprivileged kids. In addition to this, she has also been preparing for the arrival of our very good friends Marc, Lena, and Marcella from Melbourne. They are swinging by for 10 days from their holiday's in the US. Oh, and Anne is also preparing for another of her terrific dinner parties. This time with 28 very close friends :-) What have I been doing? Well. As the title suggests, it's a winter wonderland here right now. As I type, snow is falling hard, with over 2 inches in the last 24 hours. So I have been getting as much value from ... read more
Halloween
Anne and I have been relatively quiet over the last few weeks. Fernie is starting to ice over, although there has only been a single day when there has been any snow on the ground in town, in any great measure. Last week we received a few inches of snow. It happened to be the very day I sat for my BC Driving License. Visitors to Canada have only 6 months in which their foreign drivers license is valid. Owning a car also meant that insurance in invalid if your not legally licensed. So I had 6 months in which to perform the test. 3 months of Summer. I did it on the coldest, and most slippery day of the year. No snow the day before, and rain washed all of the snow away the day ... read more
