I'm dreaming of a white christmas...

 

This is Luxembourg city this week.  It's even whiter than last week.  Not a big deal for some of you, but a huge deal for this town.

We decided we had to change the words of the song 'I'm dreaming of a white christmas, just like the ones we used to know..'  because of course this is still new to us!     So now we're singing 'I'm dreaming of a white christmas, just like the ones in the movies ....'

Our landlord tells us that Luxembourg hasn't seen this much snow in 30 years.  And they are certainly not equipped to deal with it, even the main shopping street in the city is piled high with snow and as you can see, even good for a sleigh or two!   And there is not a snow shovel left on sale in the city - so Phil has been borrowing our landlord's to clear the foot path in front and just enough to get the car in and out of our garage for essential trips out.

If you are up with the news you will know that travel in Europe has been severely affected by all the white stuff, so we are very glad to be staying at home this year.

We wish you all a Joyeux Noel!

the big freeze

 Last week we had what they call 'the big freeze'.   Basically, that means it gets cold enough for long enough that the ground starts to freeze and ponds etc along with it.  And it was cold, averaging about -5 degrees all week.  And those ducks are still swimming about in the parts of ponds that aren't frozen.

This week it has been warmer, but on wednesday we got the biggest snowfall in Luxembourg for 20 years, resulting in a 'snow day' to Phil's great delight, as they cancelled school yesterday!   So we decided to go for a walk and kick (and throw) some snow about, and enjoy the beauty of an almost monochromatic winter palette:

So what do people do in weather like this in Luxembourg?   They go to the Christmas market and eat and drink and shop.  Looking at these photos, I noticed how the festiveness of the Christmas markets helps to explain the pleasure of colour and light when there is none anywhere else.  

white out

We just had our first white Christmas - well almost. Does the weekend before count? In our books it was near enough.

We woke at 5am on the 19th Dec to find 2cm of snow around our apartment; As we headed across Belgium toward the coast it became alot heavier. Driving in the snow (and ice!) without AWD and good tyres, is, shall we say, a tad stressful. It was also cold, as our car registered a low of minus 13 C outside. We met chaos in Calais (below), with mountains of backed up traffic in an eerie sea of white and grey. But after a mere four hour delay, while we waited for the tunnel to re-open, we made it to England.

Christmas week for us was a lovely time of catching up with old friends and family, meeting new people, Phil making funky snowmen, a few more hairy moments driving through snow on the M4, being 'iced in' in Holt, Whiltshire, which seemed to avoid the snow in surrounding parts, and long walks with Uncle's dogs in the country side where moats and even the mud was frozen.

Christmas day was a reprieve as the sun shone through to melt the ice on the driveway and we had a grand time eating roast turkey and trimmings including heaps of roast parsnips from Farmer John across the lane. Need I mention my fondness of parsnips?

Boxing day included a fun game of boules on the village green and Morris dancers, which (as I realised last night while watching Black-Adder re-runs) is a very old tradition from coal mining days. For the uninitiated this means dancers with bells on: men dancing impressively with big sticks and hankies hanging out of their pockets, women dancing more graciously while waving their hankies, all with lots of good music.

The last leg of our break included the obligatory sight-seeing in London. Highlights were the Tower of London, big blingy diamonds, the incredible mosaics in St Paul's Cathedral, enjoying a host of amazing paintings at the Courtald and National Galleries, and John Harrison's revolutionary marine chronometers at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich . The richness of history, culture and art was almost overwhelming at times.

Suffocating is a word that came to me often in London - people everywhere, and at times unbearably so. Imagine a huge crowd four people deep trying to look at Van Gogh's Sunflowers, or a 45minute queue to get into the latest exhibition on dinosaurs at the natural history museum... (we had to queue just to get into the museum!). Fortunately, Phil was only interested in looking at rocks and crystals, of which there were many. We hope to go back when the crowds aren't quite as thick - after all, we actually do want to look at those sunflowers!

Happy new year from us!