About three weeks overdue; I finally got around to writing something about the Snowboarding in Czech Republic.
In the weeks leading up to the trip, I had been looking at the weather forecasts, hoping to hear there had been snow. There hadn't been any snow for weeks. As it turned out (as you can see below), it all worked out. It had finally snowed a day or two before we left, and continued to snow the whole time I was there.

I flew into Prague, took a bus from the airport to the Metro station, the Metro across the other side of town to Inter-city bus station, took a bus from there to a town called Liberec, where I finally met the other guys, then finally a train from there to where we were staying - Smzvorka. I had everything worked out, except in Liberec getting from the Bus station to the train station. I had tried looking it up but I had found no clues about where the two where in reference to each other. As it turned out, with a little bit of German, it was pretty straight forward - the train station was more or less over the road from the bus station. If they were on the other side of town, like in Prague, I might have had some problems...

The point of the trip - The snowboarding - [or was the point the drinking?] I only had two days on the slopes. Saturday was spent travelling, Sunday and Monday snowboarding, and then Monday we (eventually) headed into Prague. On Sunday there was a reasonable amount of snow, but it was a little icy. On Monday morning, despite the fact that it had been snowing all night, there was hardly any snow on the roads around where we were staying. Despite that, the slopes were actually reasonably nice, better than the previous day.

Czech Beer is reasonably good. Even better when it's $0.50 a bottle.

I'll post some photos of Prague some other time.

 
When I stepped off the plane, it became apparent that the concerns about the snowfall were probably not going to materialise. Prague was completely covered with snow, and not the superficial layer we had got in London a few days previous, but proper snowfall. Incidentially, this was the first time I had ever been in a real city properly covered in snow (Tahoe doesn't count)

 
I was a little surprised at the size of the icicles.

 
It snowed quite a lot while we were there.

 
I was attempting to demonstrate the depth of the snow by the side of the road, but you can't see the depth in the photo. The hole was made by my foot; the snow went past my knee.

 
My first ever, "real" snow-ah-person. The 'extra' additions aren't something I would normally do (of course), but it was a joke alluding to the previous evening. I did like making the snowballs, though.

 
Here are the guys at the little cafe place half-way down the run.

 
My Last night, out having dinner.

Some old photos of Trafalger Square and Big Ben

Incidentially, this was one of the few days when I first arrived that there was actually direct sunshine.

Made it back to England, business as usual.

First of all, I assumed that the fact I was making a post at 1:30am would be indication enough that there was something a little different going on, but as I have been asked by people I will make it a little more explicit.
I now have a proper place to live. I have been here for almost two weeks now (moved in Sunday 21st). The house is nice, in Camden Town, living with a guy, a girl and a three-legged cat.
So good news on that front.

Secondly, my senior manager informed me a couple of days ago that when the project I am currently working on finishes in two weeks, I'll be going back to work in the city on a project that involves a little development along with other things. Good news there too, but I'll wait for it to happen before on commit on how good it actually is.

Today I bought a new pair of running shoes. Cost me ₤85. At the current exchange rates, that converts to US$167, or NZ$245. My last pair of running shoes cost me US$50. I could a new pair of shoes every year for the next three years and still have money left for some new socks.

I mentioned that I was going to the Czech Republic to go snowboarding. That was last weekend; I'm back now. Before I say anything about the trip itself, there's something else I want to go into.

I don't think that I look like a terrorist. I don't think that someone would look at me and think "Hmmm, he looks like he is considering blowing something up (possibly himself)." Perhaps a drug deal, or a smuggler of some sort. I can accept that I might conceivably fit that profile somehow. Or maybe it's simply because I am a young, white, male, that I tend to walk with purpose and that I don't get flustered with the whole Airport experience, despite what I've gone through on previous trips.
Whatever it is, I seem to be targetted by airport security.
Going to Canada I was made to go through the 'special' device that blows jets of air on you and then does God knows what else (probably giving me a healthy dose of cancer-causing radiation).
Coming to London from SFO I got the special 'ZZZZ' marked on my boarding pass when I checked-in, and then had to go through the same air-blowing machine before everything I was carrying onto the plane was taken out of the bags and swabbed.
Arriving back from Prague I was pulled aside and taken into the side room for my bags to be searched. I think in this instance once the woman briefly asked about where I had come from, had begun her search through my bags and seen the ski-gear and other clothing quickly decided that I wasn't carrying anything incriminating and let me go.

I remember when I was in Australia, Ian (who was born in China, lived in NZ since 7 for those of you who don't know) was stopped and 3 out of the 4 times at the airport, while I cruised through. Unfortunately, that isn't what happens any more.

Ok, that's enough writing for today. I described the snowboarding another time.