(Friday, 24 April 2020 and Saturday, 25 April 2020)
Now that the trees in the forest around us have all come out, the mountainsides are the most striking shades of the lime green of the new leaves, interspersed with the dark green of the evergreen firs. As spring moves on into summer, the lime green colours will slowly darken and there will be less of a distinction between the two.
When we first moved here in the summer of 2016, we had no idea that so much of the woodland consisted of deciduous trees and in all honesty, just assumed that it would be predominantly fir trees as we were used to seeing in ski resorts. We never really gave it much thought.
Consequently, when we experienced our first autumn here, it was something of a shock when the vast majority of the mountainside turned the most incredible shades of yellow, orange and red. If you’ve never experienced an Austrian autumn, put it on your bucket list, you won’t regret it. If you think of the most beautiful of the UK autumn colours and then times it by 10 (there are a LOT of trees here) you won’t be far off! It is nothing short of stunning! 🍂
Spring on the other hand heralds the awakening of those same trees and as I’ve mentioned before, takes around a week to go from bare mountain sides to the striking colours we have now.
This year is a particularly warm spring with little rain and the last time this happened, we found that every day, everything was covered in a fine yellowy green dust for a week or so. Having been used to the desert sands occasionally falling with the rain in the UK, we initially thought it was that. But it’s not, apparently it’s pollen. Presumably from the forests but we’re not 100% sure on that… I’m sure someone will know the definitive answer on that. 😉
I’m not sure if it affects hay fever in the same way as normal spring pollen does, but I’m very, very grateful that I no longer suffer from it. Having been a very snotty, sneezy child/early adult and suffering badly from hayfever, someone (my Mum probably, she is the source of some pretty damn useful advice and wisdom) once gave me a tip about getting hold of some local honey – local, as in local to you, the nearer, the better.
Taking a spoonful every day or, in my case, having it on your morning toast for a month and hey presto! No more hayfever! Certainly not a hardship in my case as I love honey but honestly, I’ve either had no hayfever, or very, very little ever since. Whoever was the source of that advice, I thank you! 🙏 😁
It’s certainly a bonus now with all the pollen around this week. It gets everywhere and there’s a lot of it at the moment. Left unwiped, it covers every surface until everything turns a dull shade of light green, it really is quite weird.
Take the ‘sodding balcony’ boards for example, the deck boards are now looking very dirty, whilst the upright sections are largely OK. Mark fitted up the long decorative sections which sit around the bottom edge of the balcony and they are a completely different colour than the rest of it since they were laying flat to dry for a couple of days and have accumulated a layer of the pollen. We are hoping it will hose off, when we get the chance, or even come off with the forecast rain next week, but if not they will need another coat… so keep your fingers crossed for us! 🙏
Yesterday, we finally finished the main bulk of the work together, the new handrails are on and it all fit together perfectly in the end. With neither of us being anything other than enthusiastic amateurs at any of these given skills, we are pretty chuffed with it.
Mark particularly had had more than enough of going up and down ladders, climbing over fences, in and out of gates and backwards and forwards to the temporary workshop in the car port. It has not been an easy job and with all the issues we discovered, took so much longer than we were anticipating. There was a big push over the last couple of days to get it finished, culminating in much head scratching over cutting of the mitres on the corner section to fit perfectly – it’s not a true right angle, but then, these things rarely are – but we got there in the end! Woohoooooo!!!!! 😁 😁
There is another part of it that will need to be picked up again in a week or so – replacing and remaking the decorative pieces – but for now it is done, finished!
Friday had been a bit of a low day really, so it was especially lovely to have the opportunity to have a couple of rather long and cheering telephone calls with dear friends that I hadn’t caught up with properly in a long time. It made a big, big difference and lifted spirits tremendously. Thank you 😘
Celebration took place via the medium of laying around in the sun, reading for Mark and crochet for me. Which reminded me to honour a special request.. during one of the phone calls and a discussion on relaxing, the subject of the combination of Mark’s large hands and crochet came up. It was suggested that the sight of Mark trying to work with small hooks and yarn would be particularly amusing. I enclose the photo for you…. you’re welcome! 😂 😂
Stay safe everyone xx
