An extra day on the Island!

I was supposed to fly back to dry-land today. But the Weather Gods did not want that to happen, my flight was cancelled. Yesterday two flight got cancelled (Kristin's flight got cancelled, but she managed to rebook to an earlier flight!), and today 8 flights have been cancelled so far.
So I am the lucky winner of an extra day on this "all inclusive" resort in the Caspian sea! I did bring some extra socks and underwear, so I am all set for an extra day. Let us just hope it is just one extra day, not two….
This nice little sign is posted above the sink in my bathroom. What does it really mean….

K and K on the island

It is unbelievable! It has happened! Two Ks on the island at the same time! Even in the same cabin! (well it must be said that Mr. Kristin was first put in 405 with a Per, but she quickly found out that the clothes in the cabin did not look like my clothes, so she went down to the reception, and sorted it out!)

Plenty of food and nice coworkers to take us out to dinner. We went "slumming" yesterday on the Caspian princess, and tonight we are going to high class on the Ravel, the vessel with the nicest dining room, they even have a lounge area with nice sofas for after dinner coffee and tea! Nice!

Mission Complete!

I now have fabulous earplugs, so I sleep like a baby! The little box with the white dots are my fantastic ear plugs, you just mold them, and put them in to cover your ear canal, and swoosh, you are in a silent happy place!

Well, actually I have to sleep like an unborn baby, as the bed is about 1,80m and my duvet is only 1,50m long. But not a problem, I have socks!!

And I cover the drain with a towel and a pillow, and the door with the extra duvet! Sleeping pretty well now!!

Today's Mission: ear plugs!

Today I feel a little sorry for myself. I did not sleep well at all last night! I can usually sleep anywhere anytime. But not in cabin 337 on the Ersai 400 apparently… Very noisy! 3 different "noises" kept me awake; toilet, dishwashing and door slamming! Since it is a boat, the toilets function using a vacuum. And it is usually pretty noisy, but this room is different, it seems like the whole vessels vacuum is echoed in the shower drain… very annoying…And 337 is at the end of a corridor, the floor below the canteen. And let me tell you, they clean and stack dished until 2 in the morning…And every time the people on the floor above exit and enter the vessel (every 5 min all through the night, as they work during the night, make food for the night shift as well) the door/hatch is banged shut. And that makes the whole room shake a little…So today's mission: EAR PLUGS!
I have a theory that I can make the shower drain scream less if I put some towels or pillows over it. So will try that. And I will also try to cover the 3 cm crack under the door out to the corridor with a duvet, and hope that will reduce the kitchen noises a little. Nothing to do with the door slamming, but if I can reduce 2 out of 3, that can not be bad!!
Other than that, I can report back that today it is rainy and stormy outside. Great day in general on the Island today…On my 10 min walk this morning over to the office vessel I considered walking backwards, as the strong wind was right towards me, but that is not so smart when you are walking amongst huge trucks and fork lift… pretty wet and cold, I made it to my desk only 3 min after 7, so not so bad after all!!

Time to go to the Island

It is time again to go out to the island in the sun. I will be going for a week this time, so I have my bag packed full of clothes and books! Do not want to do laundry, they apparently boil everything... And I must say, I have the best offshore bag!! Dark pink North Face bag/backpack, nice!!

Kristin will hopefully come out during my week, and if we manage that, there will be two Ks on the Island! It's a first for everything!!

This is what the island looked like in March! The vessel I will be landing on and living on is the vessel in the lower right corner of the picture! Ship o'hoy!

Happy Easter Sunday!

Happy Easter! And Happy Birthday pappa!

We just came back from the best lunch to date in KZ! The Renaissance had full Easter lunch with egg hunting for the kids.

Catrin, Gregor, Kristin, Linn and I had full Easter buffet, and it was fantastic. Incredible amounts of different foods: warm, cold, bread, fish, cheese, exotic food, pancake bar, and an INCREDIBLE dessert buffet! And yes, we had to try every one of the desserts! Let's just say we were so full that we ended up walking back to the office, we needed a stroll...

Today's view from the office

Today's view is kind of funny! Just looking out it seems the normal houses and the church, less snow that before, now just mud, mud and more mud. It is pretty warm during the daytime now, in the sun it is around 20 degrees, but a night it is down to around 0 again.
But if you take a closer look you see the spring bbq party! Looks like they are having a good time. Maybe we should go down and join them!Bring some vodka maybe!

Spring and coughing…

Not much exciting has happened in KZ lately.
I have been home sick. Upper respiratory infection = coughing a lot…
So apart from sleeping 14-15 hours a night, I have been napping and eating and drinking lots of water. Catrin has been taking good care of me! And even made sure the fridge was full of all my favourite food!
I has been sunny days and during the day the temperature has been up above 15 degrees, so the apartment was rather warm, sunny and nice! I slept with the balcony door open during the day, nice! Spring is here!!
I took some nice daytime pictures out our apartment window, I will post them when I remember to bring the big new camera to work!

Back in KZ again!

After a rather pleasant travel day down here we are back in the 28 day work marathon!
K&K decided last rotation that we should spend a night in down town Amsterdam, not just at the airport hotel. So this time we had booked a super duper hotel in the city. We put our budgets together, and ended up at the best hotel I have ever lived at. It was fantastic! Check out www.dylanamsterdam.com it is great!
So after a stroll in the city and a nice lunch at Metz & Co with a nice view of the city, we did some shopping and made it back to our fantastic hotel. We decided to "stay in"! So we enjoyed a couple of drinks in the lobby lounge, and booked a table in the hotel restaurant "Vinkeles" (that has a star in the Michelin guide). So let us just say, it was a fantastic dinner! Full and satisfied (mett og trett…), we retreated to our room and put on our slippers and bathrobes… nice life!
The breakfast was of course also fantastic! So it was with a heavy hart we had to check out and leave at 10. A beautiful and sunny spring day in Amsterdam. Ahh, the great life in the western world… So now you should think we are saturated with beautiful places and can make it for 28 days in this melting mud and rather exhausting place… let's hope so!

The great month of March!

March has been a great month! The 4 weeks off went by too fast, but it was very eventful and fun! Three major cities and a couple of birthday-parties later, I am back in KZ… NY was great, my birthday party at my place was super, London was superduper, and Copenhagen was very nice! And not to forget 24 hours in Amsterdam on Monday/Tuesday, it was super! The Dylan hotel was fantastic, highly recommended! Now 5,5 weeks in KZ is on the agenda. 4 weeks working and 1,5 week in Almaty and surrounding areas/mountains/national parks!