Location: Train
Lesson: Less is more
Today we saw our first snow!
It's seems crazy that just a few days ago it was close to 36degrees
and we were wearing shorts and sunscreen. We are only in Romainia
which is closer to the equator than England so surely it should be
warmer?
We are up in the mountains, so that might explain it. But no one has
explained it to me. I know there is a logical explaination but... We
are up a mountain, mountain closer to sun, sun hot, so we hotter? But
no, higher equals colder.
From D: I have now explained it to him. See Rob I was listening when
it was your turn to teach.
I have been feeling a little strange the last couple of days and
unable to put my finger on it, yesterday it came to me.
Every now and then I would wake up, usually on a weekend meaning a
little later than the working day and under the curtains or through a
gap between them the sun would be streaming, this would signal the
first of some long, hot, happy days.
The opposite would happen months later. It would hit me, normally in
the shower ( unneccessary detail I know), that it was still dark and
for the first time, cold.
Both of these have happened in a mere 17 days. First morning waking in
Turkey knowing it was a sunscreen day and 2 days ago waking on the
train from Istanbul, peaking under the curtains and just seeing grey.
This put an automatic downer on Bucharest. It was an ok city. But for
me it was the first day of winter.
We are currently on the train from Bucharest to a small town in the
romainian countryside called Sighisoara which once might have been
home of/birthplace/once stopped by for coffee of Dracular or someone
that met him it may be just one guy that had heard of him. Really the
whole area has built up this legend to support the tourist trade.
As we crawl up from bucharest we noticed patches of snow on the
ground. It looked like the morning after a day of snow in england. So
nothing impressive, but still it was our first. On the flip side the
journey has been very impressive. Our train has been winding through
the mountains that are covered in massivly tall pine trees
interspursed with small villages of a slightly romantic if not
delapidated style. Large pointy roofs and balconies all made of wood.
Alpine lodge style. The clouds are very low and cut the tops off the
highest trees. It's the kind of journey that could be the setting for
a novel if you could replace our cowded and dirty inter-city train
with a steam train, cosy first class compartment and an old gentleman
wearing a flat cap and walking with a cane.
Possibly even the begining of "the woman in black"!
It's now that I am greatful for the large fleaces and rain coats we
have been hauling around Turkey.
Right from day one I noticed "pack envy". In hostels or stations I
would notice other travels and their bags, were they bigger or small
than ours?
When we were researching our trip I read a post about luggage, it's
main point is that one moves from A to B with your pack but if it's
small enough you can stop off at point C on the way.
We aimed to take as small rucksacks as possible knowing it would make
our life happier.
We are both carrying 55L packs. So not tiny but also not these
monstrous of 65L, 70L or even 90L.
Our main problem was the diffrent climates we are visiting. Sticking
with just tropical warm locations means you need less and when it
comes to washing this takes much less time than in cold damp places.
We had those silly trecking flip-flops and shorts as well as windproof
fleaces and thermal underware.
To compare to those we met in Turkey is just not fair. There were
those that were lugging around huge suitcases, one girl had hair
strainers and a hair dryer. Come on!
Yesterday we went to a supermarket to top up on supplys, the down
point to this is the extra weight. This morning we left with
4L of water
400g of detergentt for hand washing
20 ziplock bags (one of the most important things)
Loaf of bread
Pack of cheese slices
Jar of jam
Jar of instant coffee
Box of tea bags
Apples
Oranges
2 tuppawear tubs for left overs
So we might not have the smallest packs but at least we won't be cold,
wet or hungry.
Sent from my iPod
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