A Holiday

This week's prompt for the Gallery is that of holiday. It's a tricky one because it's not easy deciding which holiday story to share. There are lots of memorable holidays, our camping trip to Italy (I'm not one for camping but it was fun anyway), our amazing trip to Cuba, my bachelorette trips with lovely friends to Iceland, Mexico and the Pacific Northwest/BC. Then there was a honeymoon ever so slightly blighted by feeling rather pregnancy sick. And staying on that theme, the holiday I've decided to share today, which is our first proper family holiday, destination Lanzarote.

It's rather unusual because we didn't as such choose the location. Neither was it a place I would choose for myself. Sometimes, you need to go with the flow and that's what we did and how we got to Lanzarote. When I set my sails for countries north west, my parents were never particularly supportive. They were honest really, not having any connections to cold, windy places where English is spoken, and just never pretended they liked my infatuation with Ireland, England and finally Scotland. Of course they never stood in the way of me finding my path, but that doesn't mean they had to approve of all my adventures. So, they did not approve of my year as au-pair in Spain and Ireland. They did not approve of my choice of university study. They did not approve of my terms and years spent in Ireland and England. They did not approve of my post degree year in Ireland and subsequent job in Scotland. They did of course see the pattern - and as their only child it must have been very hard to see me slipping away to a different country ever more permanently. It's not been easy for me either, with no visit ever from my parents, one from my mum, and after her passing away (and I count myself lucky, if you can use that term in a situation like this, for her illness happening at a time where I could just take a break and be in Germany for a couple of months to be with her) only a few visits from my father, each one taking all the coercion I'm capable of.

My father does not like Scotland. Nothing personal, it's just too cold. People don't speak German. He doesn't speak English. He feels excluded, out of place, not right. He likes Spain, the sun, the heat, the sea. So while it takes me months of guilt tripping to get him to visit us for 4 short days, he happily spends 3 months a year in Lanzarote. I could be angry but I'm not, because those trips are recent and have given him something truly positive in his life. It is good that he has something he enjoys, that he has his own life, and I don't want to grudge him that.

Yet, I also want to see him, spend as much time with him as I can, and above all, I want Cubling and him to have a good relationship, want him to share in her growing up. As a result, we travel to Germany a lot, but it's not an ideal situation if the three of us (soon four) come down on his flat. So it's often just me and Cubling and I doubt that I'll be able to cope with travelling on my own with two kids any time soon. Our arrangement also means that we don't really get the typical family holiday, because most holidays are spent in Germany. Again, this is not a massive problem as I'm not particularly partial to the heat or beach holidays, so I'm quite happy to go on the occasional long weekend close by.

Still, it's nice to do something different for a change and that's why we decided to join my father in Lanzarote for one week - which became two weeks thanks to the snow decending on the UK and cancelled flights.

I was pregnancy sick (again), so didn't really get to enjoy it as much as I could, and to be fair, I really get rather bored with the limited options you have on a summer beach holiday. Beach, pool, restaurants, awful shops, walking up and down the resort - done in one day, repeat for 14 and I go ever so slightly mad.

What to do to keep sane? Watch your child. And I did a lot of that, because I felt so rough and couldn't join in the beach fun. I watched her dig holes with daddy, make sand pictures, sand castles, chase the waves, run wild, explore the water, go under for the first time, splash us all, get messy, fear the shower, fear the sea and explore the world with her 2 year old eyes. And I knew that my attitude was selfish. Months later, she still talked about her favourite home, the one beside the pool. This world of beach, sun and summer, in the middle of winter, was her big world, to be explored at her fingertips:

It was her favourite holiday so far. And that made the holiday a very special one.

when on holiday...

Now that I've survived my first two days back at work after a full month off (how did that happen and where did the month go?), it's surely high time to share some of my favourite moments of our holiday. I know, I'm a real grouch to complain about our involuntary extended stay, so just to set the balance right: we did have a lovely time, the weather was generally perfect and I truly managed to catch up on about 3 years of sleep deprivation. There were nights where I slept 11 hours. Bliss (then the cough started and I slept about 3 hours a night in 50 instalments, at least that's what it felt like, but nevermind).

There were real special moments, for example when Cubling declared "I love Opa!", whom we visited every day. Sometimes even in time for a beautifully cheesy sunset view from his balcony:Lots of time was spent on the beach because Cubling also declared "I love Strand!":

And she was clearly also fascinated by the sea, which she called river for almost the entire two weeks. Yes, we live near rivers, but this is the sea (can you hear me singing the Waterboys tune?). There were endless chases with waves and mostly, Cubling won. Just sometimes she didn't and the tears were the size of crocodiles.
I think the photo above might be her enchanting the sea. There was lots of quality daddy time, who was a great builder of big holes and what better can there be than building big holes and then...
of course, jumping in!
Of course, you can also draw in the wet volcanic sand. Buses for examples, while singing "the wheels on the bus"; such lovely symmetry between father and daughter:

Literally Stranded

Well, if you follow me on Twitter or are a Facebook friend, you´ll already know. Thanks to the cold spell in the UK we are literally stranded in Lanzarote. Which is kind of weird, it being all hot and sunny, it´s hard to imagine that the reason for our extended and involuntary second week here is in fact snow and ice in Scotland.

As this is also a very busy time at work indeed, I´ve got a feeling that even on our return, which hopefully will be very soon, blogging will have to step back just a little bit. I´m amazed that I actually managed a fortnight away from this screen. What I miss most is that I wasn´t able to keep up with my favourite blogs, except for a couple which I just have to read. Reassuring that I´m not addicted to blogging just yet.

What I miss most is that I never brought my knitting needles, I didn´t think I´d need them for a week´s holiday, now it´s two weeks and the one book I brought is read and all the other books I can find bore me endlessly. It´s a funny old world, I love to travel, I love Spain, but in spite of having been brought up in a family where beach holidays were an annual event (well, from when I was seven or so), I never liked them, and still don´t. I´ve always been one who enjoyed discovering new places as a backpack tourist, or staying in new cities until I knew them like the palm of my hand. Even as a child, the annual trip to the Spanish seaside always felt long, boring and a bit pointless.

So we trail between beach, pool, restaurant, cafe, another beach, another cafe, my dad´s appartment and ours, endlessly, in a different and not exactly inspiring routine. Cubling enjoys this beyond words, and there´s joy to be had from her sense of wonder. She draws on wet sand, digs holes, asks neverending questions of why where what, chases waves and splashes in the "wee pool". It´s a delight to watch her. At the same time, all I want just now is to cuddle up at home, get the heating on and a proper cup of tea from my favourite mug, and enjoy a few rows of knitting, a few lines of blogging, and getting my teeth into the very challenging piece of work that lies ahead of me.

Yet still, I´m willing to enjoy this unforseen and unwanted time in a special place as much as I can. And I can´t wait to share some of the best moments with you once the going rate for internet access is less forbidding and I can upload some of the photos I took.