weird words

I took yesterday off - I've only got one more straggler to mark and I'm more or less on top of my planning - because the weather was gorgeous and my back and shoulders definitely couldn't take another day at my desk.

We spent the afternoon at Insel Hombroich, a museum, an island, a park, a place to experience the seasons, modern art and ancient artefacts in parallel to nature. It is not an island in the geographical sense, it is not in actual fact surrounded by water, but situated close to a river and its flood meadows.

I did not take my big camera, which was far too much weight for my neck, so all pictures were taken with my crappy little mobile phone camera.



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Only it wasn't a Sunday, it was last Wednesday - when Germany celebrated re-unification and we drove to a small lake close to the border to the Netherlands. There was a brisk walk on comfortable paths around the privately owned lake. In its current form it was created when the local peat bogs were harvested, but the lake itself is much older. Since the 1920s it has been a popular destination for daytrippers - there is even a small motorboat that takes you across the lake if walking all around it proves too much for you. Which even a four-year old can do, with a little bit of whining, but there was a treat at the end: Probably the last time this year that we sat outside eating some ice cream.

( Pictures from the walk: )