Down Under with Jan Mikaela Nora and Ella

In the past two weeks we were reminded how Swedish and Dutch we really are. The Euro2008 soccer tournament made our hearts beat faster. It dominated our life completely, as we went up early for all games of the Yellow and Orange: at 4 AM in the morning!!! Only a few games were live on public TV, but the other games we watched on the internet, or with Erik-Jan & Pien, who gained immense popularity among friends by subscribing to Foxtel pay TV. As the days went by the confidence kept growing and growing, and the lack of sleep almost brought us in some sort of trance. We kept going and going like real fans do. No stopping us, at least that’s what we thought ….. This morning however Russia rudely ended the Dutch dream. Same way as they did a couple of days ago with Sweden. So in this house the Russians are not very popular anymore;-) All in all we enjoyed it a lot. Too bad for the result, but we simply weren’t good enough. At least now we can we can finally catch up some sleep again.

How glorious to race down a hill, full speed across small dirt paths, frantically holding on to your handle bars while dodging tree stumps, branches or even wildlife, followed by a murdering ascend back up, to find yourself completely gasping for breath at each hilltop, being overwhelmed by the stunning views for a second, before crashing downhill once more! Truely 'breath taking' stuff ;-) Here’s Jan with his biking mates Mark and Erik, on top of Thomas hill in Cudlee Creek - Adelaide Hills.