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17.08.2011 09:12

Summerholiday

We are back from our summerholiday in Austria.

It was very, very nice to meet family and friends and to have a look at the Worldchampionships for the Icelandichorse in St. Radegund.

We started our trip a few days before our flight to Vienna, using the time to go to a concert with "Greifarnir", a band Ingólfur used to spend a lot of time with as the members are mostly from Húsavík, friends and family of him. Eventhough it was quite late when we arrived, both of us tired after the long drive to the south, the concert had not started yet. We had a good time there and went with Gunni, the drummer, home to Hveragerði as we could stay there the next days.

There was one place of history I never visited before, eventhough I have been travelling quite a lot around Iceland. So Þingvellir was the place to go and I have to admit, I was very impressed by the beauty of that very place. We had a good walk there, took a look into the visitors' center, where the geology and history of the place was explained, tried to imagine how it was in the old days, when people from all over Iceland travelled there to meet on Þingday and meet the local geese, that take care of keeping the lawn trimmed (and fertilized...). To my surprise we even saw two rather big waspnests in the rocks next to the walking path.

The flight to Vienna was nice, with good service and we enjoyed having a straight flight with Flyniki. My parents were waiting for us and they brought my little nephew Philip along as a surprise. Think he was quite impressed by all the stuff at the airport.

We stayed 2 days in Vienna and then we went to St.Radegund, where the WC was taking place. You would expect that an event that big would be announced properly, but we didn't see a single sign showing us the way nor did you hear about it in the news. What a shame!

After scouting our way to the area, we had to get a place for our car and the tent. The young man responsible for that, was very helpful and showed us where we could tent. The ground was muddy and soaked from the heavy rain earlier that day. Well, we chose the driest place and then went to have a look at the competition area, so we would be able to find it easily the next morning.

Wow, it was quite a walk and now we understood, why they had shuttle busses. But in our eyes, it was very expensive to buy these bustickets and we didn't understand why it wasn't possible to include that in the ticketprice (which already was skyhigh). Everybody had to use the bus, so why not make it easier. We regretted having paid the tickets (yes, we bought them) as the busses were sooooo full all the time and nobody checking if you where with the armband or not.

After a short night we had a pleasant time watching the Fourgait and having a good look around the place. We were disappointed about the high prices for food and the lacking possibility to choose from different caterers. One cateringservice "owned" the place, where was the variety?
We were so lucky to meet Inger, a friend of us, taking care of the tent of the Austrian Icelandichorses Association (ÖIV) and she offered us to come and have coffee there, whenever we wanted. We of course used that offer a bit ;) Think she was very busy telling everybody that complained, that the ÖIV didn't come near that WC, it was the event of Karl Piber, the owner of the stables.

Friday night we went to the partytent, nice music there, but sometimes you'd like to talk to people too, so we tried to go to the catering tent. Well, we were stopped and told, that's not possible, as there is a closed party there. In the end we just went back to our tent.

Saturday we were grilled in our seats. The sun was very strong and we were in the seats without roof (not ready to pay quite much extra for that). Think I've never been that sunburned before...

We saw good horses, but there were poorly ridden horses too and I don't understand why a rider, that is permanently pulling the reins left to right and back is not getting lower marks for that. The poor horse had not a single second peace in it's mouth.

Due to the Galashow and Galadinner that evening (25? show, 50? dinner, together 70?), it was not possible to eat at the cateringtent, so we took a drive and had a very, very nice dinner at a local restaurant for 24? both. We heard from some friends, that they left the Galashow before it ended as it was not Gala at all... Well, saved some money ;)

Gabi and two friends of her were too at the WC, they arrived on Friday early. We had a great party together, meeting other friends from Iceland and Austria. Thanks everybody for a great night!

Sunday greeted us with upcoming clouds, so we packed and moved the car out of the campsite before we went to watch the finals.

It started raining soon and we were happy to get free raincoats (used one to reserve our places). The rain came and went, but it was nicer for us than all the sun the day before.

My personal highlight were Magnús Skúlason and Hraunar showing their harmony in the Fivegait. I hope, that in some far far away time, I'll achieve that harmony with List.

What made me sad, was to see how Jóhann Skúlason used "Rollkur" in front of everybody during his A-finals and not getting punished for it. That's no horsemanship...

Well, when we went back to our car (Brigitta was coming with us to Vienna), we saw it was a very good idea to park somewhere else. We saw 4-wheeldrive cars that had to be pulled out the campsite by tractors (of course you had to pay extra for that...).

My personal conclusion of these WC is: I'm very disappointed about how expensive it was to go and be there, you had the feeling to be the cashmachine (btw: there was supposed to be a cashmachine at the WC area, but there wasn't and some shops just took cash...).

But the helpers did a great job, the track was perfect and the horses had good material.

After this exhausting weekend we took a few days to relax, go to cinema, shopping, visit my grandparents, eating with my parents, more shopping, meeting friends... Best to say: time just rushed!

The second weekend of our holiday we spent with my parents and my brother and his family at our summerhouse in Waldviertel. It has always been a place to go for me, beautiful surroundings, forrests and meadows around. a bit enchanted. My mum has been very successful in raising roses and now they are everywhere, flowering like their life depends on it. She is in a constant fight whit these huge red slugs eating all her salad and vegetables (flowers too)... Not so much fun to try and grow something with these fearce creatures around.

Philip and Anna definitely enjoyed themselves on the meadow, Philip playing soccer with Ingólfur and his dad, Anna taking first steps and having fun in the sandbox. Philip took a big liking for Ingólfur, asking him specially to come and play with him.

Last year we took a set of KUBB, the Vikinggame, with us and already had a lot of fun with it then. It was even more fun now, us playing against my dad, brother and Philip. You could see, how much they wanted to win, even accusing us of having trained hard in Iceland before coming.

Monday was "Kirtag" (once a year, kind of outdoormarket) in the neighbourvillage, where you could by a trillion of toytractors and all the machines going with them, socks, footcream, underwear (big sizes) and a lot of other stuff you wouldn't expect. But there were a few marketstalls with local and handmade products. Think my dad was very happy to go home again ;)

When we drove back to Vienna, we chose the so called "Romatinc route" (think it's the old main road) and drove through the famous Wachau, having a short look at Dürrenstein, where Richard, the Lionheart, was kept a prisoner and went slowly home.

Tuesday came far too soon, we had the eveningflight back to Iceland and, after buying as much beer as we were possibly allowed to in the Duty Free store, drove straight home to Húsavík, where we arrived early in the morning.

It was a great trip, really good to see everybody, have good chats, good food and good beer ;)