We Do Adventure

One swallow does not make a summer but could two be the sign of sunshine to come? The online weather forecasts don't agree at the moment but we live in hope. Whatever the weather it was quite a surprise to see these guys outside the window as I was getting breakfast. Perhaps it is evidence of ageing or a sign of the power of parenting that such things catch my attention. As if to prove either point, this morning's bike ride around the lake was a head turning affair. I am pleased to say I didn't run over three of the largest snails I can remember seeing. Spotting the first, bang in the middle of the trail I was riding, had me stopping to gauge just how big he was: head to tail easily as wide as my fist. Maybe that doesn't sound so impressive to you but it was to me! The wisdom of Wikipedia indicates the bird swimming on the lake could be a sign of summer. The margin for error comes from the vagaries of their distribution map and the accuracy of my identification. Ne...

The sun came out on Saturday. It's not that we haven't seen it for months but this was the first time for months that you could say it was warm, or at least warmish. Running around at uni-hockey training I wasn't the only one to end up in a t-shirt. Since the start of January, after training on Saturdays, Novi Most has been running a social session for a couple of hours. Most of the team will turn up joined by a number of other young people from the area. So far this year the sessions have happened inside – apart from one snowy weekend that saw some impromptu 'ice hockey' happen in the area behind the building. This week the sunshine and warm weather prompted our co-worker to suddenly decide to get all the lads clearing leaves and generally tidying up the yard outside. He is unashamedly keen to have this space ready for the onset of barbecue season! And so an industrious half hour from the boys saw a splendid piece of early spring cleaning accomplished under the ...

Spring has sprung...at least that was the conclusion I had to draw when we turned up at Novi Most's youth centre in Mostar after this morning's uni-hockey practise session in a nearby school. The sun was out and so, it seemed, where most of our regulars. The patch of green (or more often brown) space in front of the Klub building was covered in young people wielding rakes and picking up litter. This was outdoor spring-cleaning in action; even the pavements were getting a wash and sweep! It's at this point I could pose the classic question: do you want the good news or the bad news? Naturally, it's a rhetorical question. So here's the bad news. Thanks to Mostar's strong winds and its inhabitants propensity to litter it will not be long before it looks like this morning never happened. But the good news is it did happen. I wasn't there but I'm certain the clean up was initiated by one of our local workers. Encouraging young people to all muck in with clean...

Spring arrived, at least according to the calendar, at the weekend. The weather here has yet to really wake up to the fact however this morning we were thrown into an unplanned burst of spring cleaning. Our landlord called to say he wanted to collect money for rent and bills today – nothing unusual in that. Then he said people from his insurance company needed to take pictures. That, he assured me, is normal here. I’d never heard of it. We’ll have to trust him they’re not going to appear on some real estate website, advertising the apartment for sale or rent! (This is unlikely as such websites are not particularly common here.) The apartment was in no state to be photographed, at least not by anyone other than a scenes of crime officer, or perhaps environmental health. OK, so I exaggerate but it’s funny the mess you’re happy to live in when you know no-one is looking. I’d been restoring a guitar over the weekend, which made some mess. Various rehearsals and song writing exercises meant...