Moving the Clunns

It was awesome. Just awesome.

We had sunny days, we had snowy days, we had three metres of snow on the slopes.

I got some pics for you, but first I have to tell you about what happened yesterday.

I have to tell you first, that my parents have an ancient Mercedes, which they love dearly. It's a battleship of a car, comfy, reliable, with all that polished wood inside and it easily swallows five people plus luggage without complaint.

Four years ago, on the way back from Tania's very first skiing vacation, we had had some problems starting in the morning, but put it down to the cold and the car not having moved in a week's time. We reached Regensburg (beautiful town by the way) and in a tunnel (!) the car suddenly started smoking!! My father and I had to push it out of the tunnel and wait for the ADAC, the German Motorist's Club, kind of the equivalent to AAA in the USA. It was a minor thing, but with waiting and finding out what was happening it cost us four or five hours which my mother, Tania and I spent in a nearby pub.

This year, my husband asked: "So this is the tunnel?" when we were driving through the very place. We confirmed and told the whole story again.

About 15 minutes later, we heard a whistling noise and thought it was the radio. After changing the station, the noise only grew louder. Then the speedometer went to zero and stayed there. The whistling grew laouder and louder, now accompanied by a roaring noise and violent shaking of the whole car.

Then a clunking sound and even more violent shaking. We were extremely lucky that there was a parking area right there. We made it onto the rest area when the motor died completely and we just made it onto a parking spot by gently rolling.

My father is a mechanical engineer and tried to figure out what the hell had happened. He has a general idea, but he could do nothing on an icy cold rest area of the Autobahn without his full array of tools. Something is seriously wrong and through all the shaking the exhaust broke off as well. Looks like some major repairs are in order or even a new car.

The ADAC sent us a tow truck which took us to the next ADAC station, where we got a free rental car. My parent's car will arrive in Berlin within the week. But even though they were really fast and efficient, all the organizing and repacking cost us three hours and we arrived in Berlin in the middle of the night. And we had an early flight to London this morning!

Anyhow, on to happier thoughts:




View from our room.




Winter wonderland




Our favourite mountain restaurant




Tania, hungry.



Kaiserschmarren, delicious.




Idyllic village of Kleinarl




*iz ded*

Tomorrow is my last work day before going on vacation.

We were originally planning to fly directly to Salzburg, but as it is half term, everybody thinks this is a great idea, hence air ticket prices as if I wanted to go to New Zealand.

So we are flying one day early to Berlin and then we'll drive down to Austria together with my parents, which is nice, too. I always enjoyed seeing the countryside while driving through. I have to make them stop at the chapel where the song "Silent Night" originated and take some pics. Somehow we never made it in the last years.

I've been looking forward to this skiing vacation since, well, since the last skiing vacation. I just love it.

It will be Tania's fourth time skiing and Lordofclunn's first! I have an inkling that this will be either fun like hell or absolutely horrible for the poor guy. He's still not used to low temperatures...

Our holiday flat has a sauna and I think he will be taking advantage of that!

Anyhow, this also means I won't be online for the next week or so. But I will try to do some writing in a notebook. A Dramione Bunny that looked a bit angsty at first, has taken a different turn yesterday and - when I look closely - it might even be a bit fluffy. :)