Merry, merry!

 

Merry Christmas everybody!

Discovering Poland in autumn

Another season went past. Time really sped up since we came back to Poland. We didn't have much time for travelling and exploring, we did start a new hobby though. You guessed it - running! It was more of a reason choice - to be fit enough for Mont Blanc we need to train hard and running seems to do the best job for us in this respect. But what started as a well-considered decision, ended up as an inner drive and almost vocation. I wish I had started running back in France - there are so many possibilities for trail running there. Anyway, Szczecin is not bad too. Some of the photos were taken during our running sessions (sorry for poor quality). Have a look - Poland is beautiful too.

Christmas Market in Szczecin

We've seen plenty of Christmas Markets, in Switzero-France they were taking place basically every day a month before Christmas. But the one in Szczecin is special for me. It was that day in 2012 when we learnt that Radek got a position at CERN. We visited the Christmas Market, full of questions and excitement in our heads. That was 3 years ago - a heck of a time. Now we are back in Szczecin, with Wojtek, who loved the Christmas Market even more than we did. Only 3 years and such a change.

Stuttgart

I was hesitating whether to put these photos on the blog or not, but in the end decided to share them. I travelled to Stuttgart professionally and had an evening to stroll down the downtown. Mobile phone quality doesn't really give justice to the reality but it gives you a gist.
Although normally I don't like visiting cities, German cities have something that enchant me. But it's only the German ones.

Journey into the past

What to do on a soggy day in a city with a toddler? Well, there are a couple of possibilities, today we're testing one of them. We visited The Museum of Technology and Transport in Szczecin. This lovely museum has been put together in an old depot which only adds the charm to it. You can really travel into the past - most of those rarities I can't remember. But I know them from movies and legend stories so it was educational even for me. I don't look back with emotion to the old times so for me it was only educational, but I imagine that for elderly people it might be quite a touch of tenderness to see all of that.

Orienteering event in Puszcza Bukowa

My desire to be in the bosom of nature didn't stop with us coming back to Poland. Sure, this has been a hectic time for us with the move and me starting working full-time, but these are the days like this one that keep me going. Our friends Magda and Michał are frequent contestants of orienteering events and I always wanted to join them on a trail. So yet another "to-do" thing to be crossed out :) Theoretically it was only a 10 km route, however you needed to double it to get to the starting point and came back to the car. So all in all we closed this soggy but rain-free day with ~22 km.

 

The start was at the Lion's Mouth fire place in Bukowa Forest. I really intend to get to know this forest better. It's close to us, vast and beautiful. And the names of the places are so funny. I have to say, the organizers did a great job. There was a fire place, maps, 10 orienteering points to be found and lovely prizes for everybody who attended. I was very excited to be taking part in this event.

 

Group photo credit: Arek Arecki

The route was very pleasant and the points were really easy to find. We struggled only once (which actually cost us the place on the podium but I'll come to this later). I had so much fun on the trail, it was pure pleasure to me. Have a look at the photos from the contest.

Radek and I finished fourth. The first two places were taken by runners and we lost by seconds with a third couple. Radek was pouting a bit because we decided to run the very last part and I slowed him down with my turtle pace. And I didn't let him leave me :) Well, you decided what's better - winning a podium place or being a decent husband :)

We will sure be back the next year!