Easter weekend, us girls

 Since the boys were away in the Netherlands, Rhiannon and I went into London and had a little mini adventure. It was only about 24 hours long, but it was still great. We started by having lunch at The Ivy Asia near St Paul's Cathedral (which was amazing!), then went to the Van Gogh exhibit and then walked to our hotel on the banks of the Thames.

We had a strange but nice room and we settled in before going for dinner at Wagamama on the other side of the river by the Tate Modern. 

The next morning (Easter Sunday!) we went for a rooftop brunch which was quite entertaining, then rode the bus to the Columbia Street Flower Market, which was busy due to the Sun and the fact that it is only open on Sunday mornings!

We got home in the late afternoon and reunited with Annie (who had been over at Camp Denslow Party Palace) and spent the rest of the weekend in low energy restful mode.

Boys on tour

The Forest Row Football team has gone for a weekend football tournament in the Netherlands. Rhodri and Gordon drove a big bus full of boys all the way from Sussex. 

This is the place that they stayed in - these really cool little bungalows.

The team played really well throughout the weekend, but then they lost in the final to a team from Belgium. But the whole experience was really great for everyone and they got home safely!

Learning to drive

We've been taking Rhi to a business park near Maresfield since the businesses are closed over the weekend and it makes for a great practice driving area.

Provisional license

While our girl is home, she has decided to learn how to drive so she applied for a provisional learner's license.  She is pretty excited about it.  Look out, Sussex!

Mothering Sunday

Today was Mothering Sunday (Mother's Day) and we had a lovely day. We went for brunch at Wolfox in Brighton, then I had a Thai massage. I feel so blessed to have such a loving and thoughtful family.

Rugby boys

Tonight Tryfan and some of his teammates had a match down in Brighton.  These 15 year olds are looking so tough but also cute.

Snow!

 We woke up to snow the other day and it has actually stayed around all week due to the cold temperatures. Beautiful and novel for us here in the south of England. 

 

Plumbers in the house

 We've had a leaky tap (faucet) in the kitchen sink for a few years now and Rhodri has fixed it several times, but now its time for new tap altogether!  Rhiannon came home last week and even though there are mixed emotions about that generally, it is so wonderful to actually have her here at home.  She and Rhods had a bit of a laugh installing the new sink faucet.

Jakarta etc

After my grand adventure in the Ijen - Banyuwangi area, I flew back to Jakarta for a night and then connected on to travel home.  In fact, I did another brave thing which was to participate in a conference panel discussion about the reuse of wells for geothermal purposes. It was scary but I survived!  It was a strange experience since I was on Zoom and so was everyone else, but I could only see the other panel members and the moderators. I was glad when it was finished, and then I actually went out to dinner with a colleague I hadn't met before. We had a delicious meal in some fancy place near my hotel.

I did love staying in this hotel - Hotel Mulia - and especially the tropical paradise view from the hotel lobby and restaurant areas, complete with a waterfall, flowers and lush plants. Wow.

It would have been fun to stay and explore this part of the world, but I needed to get home. I saw some fun stuff along the way, like all the paintings on the wall of the airport which incorporated the [real] fire extinguishers - so clever!

Anyway, heading home now.

Very foreign

This has been a very intense and strange week for several reasons, but one of them is that I am in Indonesia for a few days. So exotic!  First a couple of days in Jakarta, then a domestic flight to Banyuwangi in East Java to be part of a geothermal site visit on the flanks of an active volcanic area.  This is pretty much a dream come true for me, I'll admit.

The site visit was great, and I was able to stay an extra day here in order to just work from my room and do a bit of sightseeing.  In reality, the emphasis was totally the reverse.  But anyway, today I had this great experience in the first part of my day and then spent the second half of the day working from my hotel room.  I spent quite a bit of time gazing out the window at the fields and houses and trees below.  I started to notice more detail, and one scene that I enjoyed was watching a bunch of boys jump into the river and play. I noticed more spots in the river that had people either washing themselves, washing their clothes, or just hanging out. It looked like such a happy and tranquil scene from my 7th floor hotel room, in this total eyesore of a hotel in a stretch of otherwise low lying tropical colorful houses and businesses.  I could see that on Google maps it would be possible to walk a circular route which led over the river and through some residential streets and the whole route looked to be about half a mile or something. Nothing. So then later in the afternoon (after a massage!), I started walking. 

I got about 100 feet into the first street and then did a U-turn. So many eyes on me!  Just staring at me and I felt so alien.  I went back to the main road and then around the other way - maybe the street would be slightly bigger and easier to casually walk along. Wrong! Two guys on a moped even stopped me to ask where was I going?  (in English).  I didn't have a very good answer and so they zoomed on, but that was when I turned around.  It didn't feel dangerous, just uncomfortable. I felt like I was totally invading other people's space and I didn't like it. Although when I smiled at someone, they immediately would smile back. But still.  I realized that I would never be able to just casually stroll through the neighborhood, so I headed back to my room to observe from a distance and get back to work.  It was a weird experience.

Ijen Crater

Today I got to do a little detour and hike up to the Ijen Crater!  

I woke up at 2:40 am so that I could be downstairs for my taxi at 3:00 am. We drove back up the hill towards the site area and then my driver let me off at the starting point so I could meet my guide that had been arranged by one of my pals yesterday.

I met Mehta the guide and a colleague from yesterday, and we starting hiking up the trail in the dark.  It was fairly crowded as the gate had just opened at 4:00 am and people race up there to watch the sunrise.  I didn't care too much about racing up to see that but it was still pretty early when we got up there, about 05:30 am.

As we rounded the final hillside, the Sulphur smoke was billowing over the saddle and across a strange landscape. At last we got to the crater lake, which is the most acidic lake in the world at a pH of 0.02! 

We spent about an hour up at the crater admiring the view from different perspectives and taking loads of photos. The smoke was coming from the sulphur vents which are right down at the lake level.  At night the burning sulphur appears as blue flames, and this is what draws tourists from all over the world to this place. Awesome!  I didn't get to see the blue flames since it was already daylight when we got up to the crater. But it was amazing to see the geothermal site in the distance where we were yesterday on the site visit.

Indonesia for a week

I got asked to go on a 'Site Visit' for one of our geothermal projects, and the site in this case was eastern Java, Indonesia.  This was quite a rare opportunity, and since I've known about it for a few weeks, I've been able to study up on this project in preparation to go.  I left on Friday and arrived Saturday into Jakarta. I started by taking the bus from the village to Haywards Heath station, then train to Gatwick Airport, then flight to Doha (Qatar), then connecting flight to Jakarta where I took a taxi to the hotel and settled in for 1.5 days before the real work started.  

I bought myself a new swimsuit that had more coverage since none of the other ladies I saw in the pool were wearing 'normal' swimsuits.

I had a full day (Monday) in the office for a technical workshop with the clients, 

then everyone from that workshop (about 20 people) flew together from Jakarta to Banyuwangi on the eastern corner of Java for the 1-day Site Visit. 

Although I was only here for a short time, I saw so many things!  I was in an SUV that was part of a 12-car convoy for the day, and I got to ride with 2 awesome guys who were able to tell me about the different plants and geology and loads of other things during our time in the car.

I saw allspice trees, rubber trees, jackfruit trees, macaques up in the trees (!!), people sitting in doorways, families on mopeds, little kids outside in a school playground in a small rural village, people with the wide cone shaped hats working in rice paddy fields, bamboo scaffolding around houses under construction, beautiful mosques and flowers, and so much more.

On our way back to the hotel where we would all stay for the night in Banyuwangi, we stopped to look at a toxic waterfall and river.  This was toxic not from pollution, but from the very acidic volcanic crater lake in the Ijen crater.  Notice how the foliage near the water is brown (i.e., dead!). Yeow.

Here is the view from my room at the Kokoon Hotel.  I really enjoyed looking out of it.

One great happiness is that I was able to get permission to stay on for an extra day and night instead of flying back to Jakarta the following day.  This meant that I could get up in the middle of the night and go hike up Ijen crater!

A week of separation

This week is the winter half term for Tryfan, so Rhods and Tryfan went up to North Wales for the week while I stayed at home with Annie to work and get ready to go on a field visit on Friday.

 

In fact, since yesterday was Valentine's Day, I went over to Cat's house and had a lovely dinner and chat with her and her Mum.  It was such a lovely midweek evening.

Sunny Sunday at the rugby club

Today I went down to the rugby club and actually watched Tryfan play for once! It is rare that they actually have a game here at home, but to have this happen on a Sunday morning when I don't have another commitment AND the sun is shining!

The pod work continues

The pod (sauna complex) in the back is coming along nicely.  Here is Ben in the future bathroom during mid-morning.

Pottery Class

 Rhiannon is taking Ceramics this semester at school, and she shared these pictures: