Snow, Snow, Snow

Well, it snowed all last night and looks very pretty this morning. Surprisingly not so cold as yesterday....only -2C. We went for a walk through St. Wolfgang, unfortunately the Advent Market isn't open today, but I took some photos anyway so you could see the snow.
Go here to see the snowy pics:

http://picasaweb.google.com/Colin.Jen/AdventMarket2009#

Our Local Library

After living in St. Wolfgang for nearly 2 years we decided to join the local library. We hadn't done so before because our German was hopeless and thought that they would only have german books. How wrong! Our friend told us that not only do they have some english books but also rent out DVDs and.......games!! Ah...well, I thought, that would only be 'Spiele für Kinder', you know Bob the Builder and Spongepants whotsitzname. Wrong again, they had a few 'games'. Keltis, Tikal, Fossil, SoC, Carcassonne and Mississippi Queen to name a few. Only a few titles admittedly but how many libraries in the UK would have even heard of any of them.

Tikal is a game that I played many years ago and liked. I have played a few online games at SpielbyWeb but nothing recently. So I thought I would rent it out for a couple of weeks at the outrageous price of 1 Euro and reacquaint myself with it. A discovery and treasure hunt game that looks good and plays well. I'm sure Tina will like it. I have been looking at Tobago, another treasure hunt game that looks impressive. Oh, by the way, it's snowing as I write this, the weather forecast for next week is warmer so I don't if we will have a White Christmas or not. Be ironic if the UK is white and we aren't.....

Happy Gaming!!!

Caylus finally arrives along with the Krampus

Well the postman finally brought last game I had ordered from Spiel-Offensive, Caylus, I have been playing this online and can't wait to tear off the shrink wrap. I played the game I think 2 times when it first came out and wasn't too impressed, but now I think it's a great game.

We went for a walk round the Advent Market yesterday, I had some gluhwein, hot spiced wine and it was quite strong. As we were standing there we heard a bit of a commotion, all these bells and shouting.....well, the Krampus had arrived. It is a tradition in parts of Austria that the young men of the village dress up as Krampus and terrorise the local young ladies (officially supposed to be virgins), they would put sacks over the girls heads and drag them away. Then at some point a chap dressed up as St. Nicholas would come and banish the Grampus and save the village’s virgins.

The Frightening Face of the Krampus!
I grabbed the camera to get a few shots of the great costumes but didn't get out of the way quick enough and got whipped with birch twigs......great fun.

You can see more on the Krampus here......http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krampus

And I've put some more shots of the Krampus on my Advent album on Picasa here

http://picasaweb.google.com/Colin.Jen/AdventMarket2009#

Must go now, got some shrink wrap to destroy!

Happy Gaming!!