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Author: Hanneke

I started my first blog when I left the Netherlands (my home country) for an internship in Alaska in 2004, to keep my friends and family updated on my adventures over there. Little did I know it would be more than 13 years before I'd move back to the Netherlands! I spent a year in Toulouse (France) before starting a PhD in meteorology at the University of East Anglia in Norwich (UK) in 2005. That's when I started this current blog, first in Dutch but I soon switched to English. I really enjoyed life in the UK, and was actually planning to stay there after my PhD, but "life is what happens when you're busy making other plans" and I ended up moving to Tromsø in Northern Norway in 2009. Tromsø is a photographer's dream, surrounded by spectacular mountains, with the light ever changing from the midnight sun in summer to the dark days compensated by aurora-filled nights in winter. I learnt Norwegian and got a job as a weather forecaster - I got thrown in at the deep end, doing radio interviews and speaking with fishermen with way-too-strong dialects straight from the beginning, before I was anywhere near fluent in Norwegian :D I survived though, and slowly started to do some research on the side. I got more and more involved in research projects and in August 2015 I moved 2000 km south, to Oslo where I started working 100% as a researcher. A year after moving to Oslo, I met Michiel at a music festival in Brussels :) and we started to travel very frequently between Oslo and Rotterdam, where he lives. You can't do that forever though, and I soon realized I found the perfect "excuse" to finally move back home, something I had been considering many times before. So since July 2017, I'm living in Rotterdam! I'm actually taking some time off before finding a new job, and I'm looking forward to lots of adventures in the near future - so stay tuned!
Lucky

Lucky

I haven’t gotten around to editing any more of the Mexico photos, but I just found these photos that I took last Saturday. We went for a drive around Ramfjorden, to check out the sea ice (we are hoping to go ice-fishing!). I had been back for less than 24 hours, was very tired (jetlagged) and still trying to adjust to the very different climate here… I guess I didn’t pay that much attention to my surroundings, but I took pictures anyway 🙂 I then forgot about them, but found them on the camera tonight…

Mist over the fjord…

So beautiful! It made me realize how lucky I am to live in such a beautiful place… Harsh but beautiful, something I do forget sometimes… Sometimes I only see the disadvantages: the cold (you can’t just walk out of the door, always have to put on many layers), the dark (though that’s getting better very quickly now), the slippery roads (my bruised knees 😉 ), not seeing any flowers until at least May, no singing birds (unless you count screaming gulls)… but HEY there is so much more! It’s an incredibly beautiful place, and we really can just walk into the outdoors from our own house – I shouldn’t be complaining!

My sister is arriving tomorrow, and we’re going on an overnight ski trip over the weekend – how exciting! I’ve never done that before (not even in Summer), and finally feel confident enough 🙂 We are taking a quite easy (almost flat) route, and not much distance, and staying in a mountain hut in the middle of nowhere. I’m really looking forward to it! More photos soon 🙂

Mexico: Xochimilco

Mexico: Xochimilco

I came back from a week in Mexico City last Friday night, and am still trying to adjust to being back in the cold north 🙂 It was wonderful having a week of summer in the middle of winter, and I really enjoyed spending time with friends there. I took a lot of photos of course, and I won’t be able to post them all at once. So this post is about the first trip we did: to Xochimilco. It was Tanja’s birthday and we wanted to do something festive.

Mexico City used to be located on an island, and there were many lakes around. The canals in Xochimilco (an area within the city) are the only remains of what was once lake Xochimilco. This area is also referred to as the “floating gardens” (or chinampa’s), as originally they took the mud from the bottom of the lake to create fertile islands to grow crops. Nowadays, you can hire very colourful boats here! 

On weekends, it’s a very popular spot and the river is full of boats, some with people playing music and selling food. We were there on a Friday and it was very quiet… it was beautiful though, such a peaceful break from a busy city! This was the first day we were all together, as Nicole’s flight was cancelled and she arrived a day late – so it was a perfect way to relax and catch up 🙂

There weren’t many other boats out, we only met a few. These ones were being moved by a kid who had to work hard to keep going! After the boats we walked around the centre of Xochimilco – one thing I really like is the amount of Volkswagen beetles in Mexico City! There are lots of these green-and-white taxi’s but you also see a lot of other beetle’s driving around. They were still made in Mexico until five years ago – the last place where they were produced.

We went to the market, such a wonderful mix of exotic fruits and vegetables 🙂 The colourful dolls behind up are modern versions of piñatas, they are used at (children) party’s and when you destroy it you are rewarded with sweets that are hidden inside.

There was a big flower market too, so we bought some flowers for Paola’s mum. We spent some time relaxing in their garden, very nice!

In the afternoon we had a nice lunch outside, and after that we left Paola to do the last preparations for her wedding (the next day!). In the evening we went to a small restaurant just across the street from our hotel, for some birthday cake for Tanja – they had very good cakes!!

Ok, that’s all for now! More soon, I hope. My sister is also coming to visit on Thursday, so it’s a busy week!

Two last photos…

Two last photos…

…before I’m off to Mexico! It has been snowing all day today, but in the evening it calmed down. It’s so beautiful, there has been no wind at all, so all the trees are still covered in snow. I walked home through a winter wonderland, and just had to go back after dinner to get some photos… The first one is taken in our street, and the second is a museum very close to work.

Strange idea that I will be in a totally different climate in 2 days time!