forest house update - windows

Just a quick update - the upstairs windows have been fitted! The carpenter did a good job. Obviously the brickies and the roofers will need to come back to finish the work off, but not much left now before the house can be tucked in for the Winter.

tree-lined country roads

As I drove to the Lake house the other day I was reminded, by seeing the last apples clinging onto a roadside tree, that I keep meaning to blog about this typical feature of the countryside. While the British roads have their lovely thick old hedges, almost all the minor, and many of the major, roads here are lined by - mostly old - trees. Now roadside trees are not something you wouldn't see in other European countries, but what is so special here is the frequency of them, and the variety. You get the giant lime trees or oaks along the routes that once were linking the important market towns, you get acers and ashes along others. Elsewhere you get liquid gold tunnels of beeches, especially colourful now in their Autumn glory. You see willows holding the road-banks in damp places, or tall poplars shielding the more exposed roads from the wind. But the most touching of all are the avenues of fruit trees that decorate the smaller roads, village to village everywhere: plums, apples, cherries, pears.
It is said that all these trees have a double function: 1/ to strenghten the road edges, and b/ to serve the travellers. Of course, in the days before cars, people used to travel more slowly, in their wagons and coaches, and so many just on foot. To markets, to work, to see the world. And the trees were there to shade their path from the sun, to shelter them from rain, and to provide them with sustenance. To this day, these trees bear their fruit for the travellers, but who needs shelter in rain-proof, air-conditioned cars, and who would eat the fruit polluted by so many passing exhausts? So the trees come to blossom and fruit, mostly to drop piles of rotting, unwanted produce - quite poignant, really. And there are many drivers who would have all these trees cut down. They curse and swear at them, because they slow them down, keeping the road span narrow, having never been intended for such speed. Indeed you see far too many little sad remembrance wreaths on the old tree-giants' trunks along the major roads, where two speeding cars coming in opposite directions had no room to move over and swerved head-on into the tree's arms.
But I do hope that the trees stay. And it seems that some local authorities here, including ours, favour the trees over the 'freedom to drive' too. I was very unhappy to see some giants felled on the road to the Mill but then, just a mile or so, I saw a brand new avenue planted, leading to the village where our friendly carpenter lives. So the tradition is surviving, and long may it live.

... and one more photo for those who may be interested how the Lake house is doing: currently it is a total mess of pipes, but it's progress : soon I hope to be able to report that the bathroom, hall and pantry are at the stage of rough finish. Watch this space :-)

Forest house yields another treasure

You might find this very interesting, in the sense that I've never seen a picture in the churches here or any museum etc, of this kind of 'icon'. I'd love to know where the original is (does anyone know?) because this must be quite a rare print which was found in the Forest house barn when I was clearing out its attic store, which is full of old beekeeping equipment.
As you may know from my previous posts, Forest house has an abundance of bees, very friendly ones. The previous owner didn't bother about beekeeping (or anything else for that matter) but the owner(s) before him, who left or died in 1973, must have been very keen beekeeper(s) judging by the amount of now frail and rotting hives and stuff in the barn attic, as well as the now rickety empty hive-shed in the far corner of the garden. As you may also already know I have been very keen to make sure the bees are happy in my new garden and made them their big water container to drink from, and generally I came to appreciate them, especially with the news that bees are declining in the world.
That's why I was extremely pleased to have found this picture. It has now been cleaned, restored and framed for me by one of my closest local friends - she is a bookbinder and restorer by profession.
She said that the patron of bee-keepers is St Ambrose, but after researching the web, I don't believe this is Ambrose as he seems more like Christ to me - any opinions on this? I would welcome feedback as I really have never seen this combination of symbols or attributes before.

Forest House news

As you've seen from the last photographs of the insulation installed, the latest is that the roof has been covered with a weatherproof cover as the building-site is now shut down for the Winter, apart from the new upstairs windows that will be fitted tomorrow.
The roof tiles will have to wait till the Spring.
I am now much happier about the end result, as it wasn't easy, especially where the new roofers had to make good over, or joining onto, the timbers that were done by the guys before them. But they did manage pretty well (see this picture):

There are still a few small problems to do with with the aesthetics of the finish (pic)
Other than that, I shall be looking forward to restarting the site again in April. In fact I'd like to get the barn roof done together with finishing the house roof at the same time, just to avoid any further potential problems! The plan is to get the future, bigger, barn roof fit snugly onto the new gable end, which is now at least 4 ft higher and much wider (as you can see from the photo on the top)
Meanwhile I should be coming back here to ski and to enjoy the Winter snow and sun, I hope.

Food - Italy v Bohemia

One of the greastest compliments I ever received was that my 'melanzane Parmegiano' would make an Italian mother in law jealous - this in Italy from an Italian who wasn't trying to chat me up. So speaking as an Italophile who spends time in the Czech Republic I have to admit to having a bit of an attitude problem to Czech food. It's the absense of fresh veg in the restaurants which suprises me because the countryside bulges with fresh produce. Every back garden has fruit trees, soft fruit and a vegetable patch; the small side roads are lined with apple trees dropping their crop into the verges; the forests are full of people foraging for fresh, free food. However, order a salad in a restaurant and more often than not it will be the ubiquitous combination of iceberg lettuce, watery tomatoes and bland cucumber. (We asked a restaurant friend why he never had any of the wild funghi on his menu in autumn. He shrugged and said well, he wouldn't be able to get them all year - try that excuse in Italy! Perhaps it's the menu printing costs, perhaps there are laws regulating what can be offered in restaurants. Does anyone know?)

There are certain dishes which give a glimpse of the potential of this fertile land. There's a garlic soup on the menu of many of the local restaurants, best served in a bowl made from an excavated loaf of sourdough bread. It's a thin broth, probably chicken stock with grated raw garlic added and then immediately taken off the boil, put into the bowl with a generous amount of stringy mozzarella type cheese and a sprinkle of parsley. This is a desert island dish or a last meal for the condemmed, so satisfying you feel you'll never need to eat again - until you get hungry of course.

If you are lucky you'll get with your fire-grilled meat a freshly grated heap of horseradish root and this will satisfy a full weeks worth of fresh veg cravings, and thoroughly clear any sinus problems. There's nothing subtle about this combination, it's a challenge to vindaloo fanatics, and the only solution to the burning sensation from eating too much in one mouthful is to breath deeply through a slice of the sourdough bread (mad but it works and you won't care if anyone is watching). The horseradish cuts through any fatty richness in the meat and seems to aid its digestion. This type of dish usually comes with a small garnish of undressed salad and on this plate it works, no oily dressing to add to the meat fats, just clean, fresh and crisp salad to clear the palate. I've had this more than once at U Baby in Cesky Krumlov, a pile of fire grilled smoked pork ribs, a heap of fresh horseradish (dug up that day from the cemetary according to the waitress, was she smiling?) and bit of plain mixed salad all washed down with a glass of beer. It was one of the most nourishing and balanced meals I've ever had from a restaurant.

I suppose there are many variables at play here, one of them being my own expectations of what constitutes a good, balanced meal and another being the ability to override ones expectations. One person's meat and two veg is another persons zapecene vepřova žebirka

St Hubert's Hunt

For the Brits, this kind of 'hunt' is nothing like you might imagine. Here it's another of those typically laid-back Czech occasions for a fun afternoon out.
In the stunning setting of the Cerveny Dvur parkland, on a lovely Autumn day, today's programme consisted of an easy but entertaining parcour in front of our audience,
followed by a 'hunt' where we raced off, following the 'fox' through the hectares and hectares of the park, weaving fast through the magical landscape of majestic, ancient trees. Meanwhile the audience, not able to watch the horses, entertained itself by campfires and songs to guitars.
Lastly, and again for the audience's benefit, we did a relay race, and then a final blast of a mad gallop to capture the prize of a fox tail pinned high up in the finishing arch.
The prize fox tail did go to our stable, but that was the part of the event that perhaps received the least notice. Because the Czechs just love any excuse for being outdoors, really. Competition? Ambition? Forget it. Who cares who 'wins', the main thing is the sun's shining, families and friends get to meet up, and everyone's having a good time.

As I was riding, I couldn't take any photos, so I begged a few from the onlookers. I might get some more - meanwhile this as a taster.

Fox-hunting, Czech style

This Saturday I'll be taking part in a fox-hunt. Except here the fox is a rider in mask, as you can see. All round the countryside the local stables are organising these fun hunts, and riders come to most of them, if the dates don't clash. Which they strictly speaking should, as the hunts are in celebration of St Hubert, the patron saint of hunters. But then, if all the stables did their hunts on the Saint's name-day, we'd all lose out, so, in an appropriately Bohemian way, we just stagger the events and do it as we please.
So on Saturday it's our lovely stable Pohoda's turn. The hunt will happen in the vast, beautiful parkland grounds of Cerveny Dvur, an ex-Rozmberk hunting chateau near Cesky Krumlov which has for many years been serving as a drugs and alcohol dependency clinic. So the only rule for the riders and the onlookers is 'do not bring alcohol'. But (how else?) there'll be sausages and bonfire and hot tea, so who cares.

We've been going there on and off to practise the jumps in the past couple of weeks, so fingers crossed our stable wins!
Hope I shall get some photos from friends - if I do, I shall post them here and tell you how we did.