Last night’s fly-infested camping farm left us no choice but to leave in the early morning, and by about 7.30 am we had packed up and we’re ready to leave. We brought with us a swarm of flies well over a hundred strong. These little fuckers were terrible to eradicate. I think we finally gotContinue reading “Tourists in our ‘home’ country”
Tag Archives: germany
Passau – the ghost town on the Danube
It feels like ages ago that we last went away with the camper. In reality, it has only been a couple of weeks since our van broke down in Berchtesgaden, and we were towed all the way to Freising. For some time we had no mode of transportation, while the Nugget was undergoing substantial repairs.Continue reading “Passau – the ghost town on the Danube”
Problem? What problem?
The longer I live and work in Germany, the stranger it gets. This makes me wonder whether I live in a particularly strange country or a strange neighborhood, work at a weirdo university, on an oddball campus, or that, perhaps, I just attract a peculiar type of people around me. One of the stranger aspectsContinue reading “Problem? What problem?”
Mosquito-infested Untersee
After blasting through the entire season of La casa de papel yesterday evening – I love this series and managed to convince Heike that we should watch all season 5 episodes – it was time for us to get ready for another trip. Two nights at home is more than enough, and I even managedContinue reading “Mosquito-infested Untersee”
A scene from a sci-fi movie
It was true. We ended up surprise camping in a beautiful place. Rothenburg ob der Tauber, the place unbeknownst to us, but that others ensured us would be great, was indeed a quite idyllic and beautiful town. But something felt off. Wherever we went there were crowds of unmasked tourists. It was a scene thatContinue reading “A scene from a sci-fi movie”
Teaching ecology in China
As part of my teaching, I offer so-called ‘projects’ to students that are interested in the work I do. Projects are basically semester-long student projects that can be part of longer-term research, or can be something tailor-made for the students. The idea is that students get to think about a subject, formulate hypotheses or researchContinue reading “Teaching ecology in China”
Snake wrangling with my son
As frequent readers of my blog may have noticed, I spend my free time outside a lot. As I have written about many times before, I’ve been an ‘unprofessional herpetologist’ from when I was seven years old. I have kept reptiles ever since, and for a part of this time I bred snakes in numbersContinue reading “Snake wrangling with my son”
Happy Easter
Easter Holidays for me already started a couple of days ago, and thus far I have made the most of it. The weather has been fantastic, and we have been outside quite a bit. Mostly, we have enjoyed family walks in the area (what else, given the circumstances). I have really started geeking out onContinue reading “Happy Easter”
A change of pace
As an ecologist that mostly focuses on plant-mediated interactions (above- and belowground!), I have worked with quite a few model systems, that I have gotten to know quite well. I have reasonable botany skills, too. Or well, good memory, rather. Of course, my knowledge is entirely limited to the severely depleted biodiversity found in theContinue reading “A change of pace”
Being outdoors is not what it used to be…
You know that feeling when you have been outside in the cold all day, and you come inside and struggle to keep your eyes open? That’s how I feel right now! We were ‘hiking’ in the Altmühltal today. Well, we spent the first two hours covering one and a half kilometre, that is the timeContinue reading “Being outdoors is not what it used to be…”
Robin Heinen 