Tag Archives: holidays

Hungary and the end of summer

This year during our usual visit to Hungary, we spent a few days at Lake Balaton. Although the weather was not really the most amazing (even though I was not too sad about not having the 37°C degrees which dominated the weather a week before and after our visit), we had a few nice hikes around Mount Badacsony and the Peninsula of Tihany. It is a pity though that the water was just a bit too cold for swimming.

Then we also had a few days just walking around Budapest, looking for nice places to eat (and playing FIFA on the PS with my brother on the evenings). Very relaxed, no rush, nothing special.

Summer in Belgium was over from one day to the other, and after all the heavy cycling and possibly not sleeping enough I got a bad cold and had to miss riding La Ronde Picarde as a result… Luckily we still managed to go and support Liesje’s upcoming gluten-free bakery on a local market (by buying stuff and eating it – and by taking pretty pictures of course).

I started my Dutch lessons again (Level 4, so somewhere in the middle of intermediate), and this time it is only once a week (18:15-21:40), so I will not feel like spending all my evenings there like when it was 3 times a week. We are off to Boston now, but here is a sunset from last week for you to enjoy in the meantime. Tot later!

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Holidays in Copenhagen, conference in Aarhus

Five years after the hugely successful Third Kepler Asteroseismology Workshop, the annual KASC meeting (or to be precise, the KASC8/TASC1 Workshop) was held in Aarhus once again. Before going to the conference, we had taken a few days off to visit Copenhagen. We had very nice weather (especially compared to what I had had to endure later in Aarhus), and a nice airbnb apartment (if you don’t count the lack of dark curtains in the bedroom, which can be a bit annoying around the summer solstice in Denmark) not too far from the centrum. Most of our time was spent walking around in the city, especially on the 2nd day which we finished with more than 36000 steps, so we could spend all the money we saved by not using public transportation on nice food here and there (Luna’s Diner for breakfast, PapirØen for all the different kinds of street food, and Bertels Salon for the best cheesecakes). At the end, I think Clio liked the Tivoli Gardens the most, while I really loved Grundtvig’s Church.

Then while Clio flew home, I took the train to Aarhus. It was a long ride, but comfortable, and there was also free wifi, so I guess I have no reason to complain. Then in Aarhus I had the most cozy and clean airbnb apartment ever for less money than what the most crappy hotel (which I have already tried 5 years ago) would have been, and only a 5 minute walk away from the conference venue. The meeting itself was good as usual, and I again got the opportunity to present my (and my collaborators’) results in a 15 minute talk (‘Scanning the seismic barcode of SPB stars – Asteroseismic fingerprints of rotation and mixing in the slowly pulsating B stars viewed from space’), which went also fine. Due to the horrible weather, I did not attend the excursion (to climb one of the highest ‘mountains’ in Denmark), but as soon as the sun came out (and the temperature climbed to 14°C) I went for a 10k run. The conference dinner was served in The Old Town, a nice open-air museum of old Danish buildings.

Since the coffee breaks were filled with cakes, I gained a bit of weight (almost 2 kilograms to be precise), but with all the cycling (and running), this should not be a long-lasting issue. For even more pictures, click here.

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All the things from September until January

After coming home from Italy, the PlayStation 4 took over the spot of my old and beloved PlayStation 3 in the living room (but we sold it for good money, so now someone else is still happy with it), and I enjoyed quite a few evenings playing with FIFA 15. (I also got Destiny for free, but I lost interest in that extremely quickly…) Since then, I won everything with Liverpool, playing maybe even better than they actually did last spring. And although I am a Liverpool supporter since something like 1998 (back then I really liked Owen on the World Cup, and as I figured he played for Liverpool, I chose them), this past season made me even pay for an official membership :) Then Suarez bit out a piece of our heart and left, but luckily the team is back in winning form after a miserable autumn by now, so all is good. I especially like Coutinho these days, but the team is filled with young talents, so the future seems bright. Anyway, probably none of you is interested in this, so…

In October I went to La Palma to be the support astronomer of our Master students at the Mercator Telescope. It’s not only a teaching duty for me, but something I really like to do. I have now 89 nights behind my back at this telescope, so I am sure I can say I am a Mercator-expert! Being at the telescope also meant playing a lot of Kerbal Space Program (if I had more time I would totally write another review of this game), and watching the LEGO movie again. (Everything is awesome!!!)

In the beginning of November we spent a long weekend in Spa, but not in the spa. We went hiking (Day 1 and Day 2) during the day through the beautiful forest and the swampy grasslands of the Fens, and then went for nice dinners (sushi, burgers, and local specialities) in the city on the evenings. It was a great weekend. And even though I accidentally booked the tickets to Interstellar also for the very same weekend, we got to see it at another time. And another one. What a great movie! Not much later we had a delicious brunch in Leuven at Zoff (which was still a present for my PhD). Then already almost in the middle of November we went to Villers-la-Ville to visit the ruin abbey, and since it was something like 20°C, we had a nice time walking around and taking pictures.

In December – as usual – we went to Budapest. We finally managed to check out the restored Várkert Bazár, we had a very nice thunderstorm-lit dinner in Zona (and lots of kürtőskalács), and also spent some lazy days (filled with presents and eating) at my parents’.

Then from the moment we arrived back to Belgium till the very end of January (except for New Year’s Eve, which we spent watching movies, and eating great Asian food and equally good unhealthy snacks), most of our evenings and weekends were devoted to Dragon Age: Inquisition. It was the PS4 game I bought especially because I thought Clio would maybe like watching it, while I was not even sure I would like it, but then, from the first moments until the end credits 95 hours later, we could barely stop playing with it (even Clio started her own story, but then she said watching it was better). It was the game of the year for me (and for other people too), no doubt. I even have a few videos on YouTube about killing the dragons! It was so good, that I almost forgot that we had also completed 50% of Far Cry 4 before that. But the other half is still waiting for me to finish…

In the meantime I also kept going to my Dutch classes, since even though I don’t really like spending my evenings there, it is very useful. On Level 3 I got 84%, and I can talk with Clio quite well in Dutch. (Her Hungarian is also getting better and better, especially given how much more difficult that is. She is surprisingly good!)

The post will be updated with pictures in 48 hours.

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An afternoon in Pisa

Since we had so much time in Florence, we decided that one day we would hop on the train after lunch and visit a nearby city. Clio would have preferred Sienna, I was more leaning towards Pisa (:D), and at the end the weather forecast seemed to be better towards that direction, so we went for the latter. I am sure Sienna would have been also very nice, but I really liked Pisa. There was so much more to it than the leaning tower.

First of all, it was really nice that the Piazza del Duomo was green and spacious. Then the Cathedral itself was surprisingly much nicer from the inside than the one in Florence. The Baptistery here on the other hand was really not so interesting from the inside. In contrast, slightly hidden behind the famous buildings you could get into the Camposanto Monumentale, which only showed its beauty after passing through the entrance. The hallways and the symmetric architecture places this clearly on top of my Pisa sightseeing list. Highly recommended!

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Florence

So, let’s get back to our late summer holidays… After our scenic days in Rome, we took the train to Florence. It was a very nice high-speed ride, just a bit more than one and a half hours, and our (really cool) Airbnb apartment was waiting for us only 10 minutes from the station itself. We arrived on the late afternoon of the 12th of September, and since we only left on the 17th, we had four full days to discover the city and its surroundings.

Florence was much calmer than Rome. There were still a lot of tourists, but while in the capital we were in (almost) constant danger of being ran over by a car or a Vespa, the safety and tranquility of pedestrian streets was a very welcome change here. We had great Italian food (pizza for me, pasta for Clio) and ice cream every day, and we could take the sightseeing much easier since the city is much smaller. This way we had also quite some time to play Catan. Since the city is basically an open air exhibition itself, we did not go inside any actual museum (e.g., the Uffizi Gallery or the Palazzo Pitti), except for the Museo Galileo, which we both really enjoyed. We even saw the original lens from the telescope of Galilei.

Of course there were things we really could not skip, so we went inside the Duomo and the Baptistery, and the latter was really amazing. The mosaic ceiling is simply mind blowing, definitely my favourite sight of the city. Then on second place I have the view from the hills over the Arno towards the Duomo, for which we climbed up even twice, the second time especially for me to be able to take a picture in the blue hour too. I think it was worth it.

Some other memories from the city: the market, all the streets dominated by the view of the dome, and all the palazzos with their characteristic facades and roofs. Ah, and the fancy, old-school, brass doorbells :) We had a really great time there! On one of the four days we took the train to Pisa, but that I will leave for a separate post…

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