Round Table Charity

Our main money-raising every year happens end of November/beginning of December - this time already for the sixth time!

Round Table Villach is organising a sports lottery - called "TOP 10 Lottery"! - Ten famous Austrian sportsmen - like Olympic Champions, World-Champions, Worldcup-Overallwinners, ...etc... - are making personal sport-items available to our lottery!

Top-donnor this year: Double-Olympic-Champion Benjamin Raich!

For two days we´re having a stand in the city center and there we´re selling home-made "hot wine" and "hot cider" (an Austrian speciality before x-mas-time!) - and are offering our lottery-tickets to our visitors.

This year the weather has not been the best - therefore a bit less people came to the city for their christmas-shoppings - but our Round Table Team worked together in a perfect manner (which made me as the current President really really happy) and we topped our last year´s record results: we organised more than EUR 8.000 for our actual children-project - fantastic!

Half-Marathon - New Personal Record!!!

After finishing a half-marathon in quite a good time at the beginning of October - I felt that I even could do faster - I´m feeling to be in a fantastic shape (maybe better than in my best-running-periode 5 years ago.....)!

Through a friend I learned about this half-marathon-event in Palmanova (Italy) - about 150 km from Villach - so, another focus had been defined....

This Sunday, early morning - after a "pasta-breakfast" (traditional for me!) - I left home to drive south to this medieval town. At the car-park I met the first faces I know: friends from my city - excellent runners (much much faster than me.... :-) .....).

This running-event is big - very big for this time of the year! More than 2.000 people on the starting-list! ....although it has been f...ing cold: -2 ° centigrade (28° F) on arrival in Palmanova, 0° C (32° F) at the start - and around 5 - 6 ° C (41 - 43 ° F) at the finish.....

But the race has been quite fast - lots of quick runners, therefore always good pace-makers around you - and it came like I was hoping: I finished with a new personal halfmarathon-record! 1:26,06 hours (breaking my top-time from 2003!!!)..... - I´m quite satiesfied - and already motivated to try again in spring-time....

A new record must be celebrated - of course!

Only 30 minutes driving from Palmanova there´s the City of Trieste - where I´m having some friends from Round Table 9 (partner-club from my local Table) - and I visited them for good Italian food (thanks Gian-Luca for cooking!) and some nice glasses of Italian wine....

GoKart-Trophy

My local Round Table Club this season has decided to organise a Fun-Event instead of every second meeting a month.

November we had "GoKart" on our filo-fax - and as we have only one indoor-gokart-possibility in our region (in the City of Wolfsberg/about 100 km from Villach), we contacted our dear tabler-friends from RT 38 Wolfsberg to join us!

....and some phone-calls later the idea of organising a Round Table Kart-Trophy for the whole Region has been completed!

This Friday 16 motorsport-fans amongst the tablers - coming from 4 different clubs - met in the "Raceland"-indoor.

Kart-racing is allways big, big fun for me.....! - And after completing training- and qualifying-laps the final race has been abolutely unique - a real "fight" - with lots of exciting wheel-to-wheel-actions! Woowww - really fantastic!

Only after passing the final-line I could see on the big screen that I´ve finished 3rd - during the race I didn´t realise - and I didn´t care at all - only the big fun and the amazing moments did count for me....!!!...

And finally our team from "RT 11 Villach" even has won the team-trophy - what a big success!

Now we´re holder of the challenge trophy - and therefore forced to organise next year´s championships..... - but that´s more than okay! :-))

Full Moon-Hiking

My friends from Round Table 12 Leibnitz (the organisers from last week´s Pheasant Dinner) told me about their plan to go on a hiking-tour Saturday night (two days after this month´s full moon) - and invited me to join them.

We met about in the middle of the road from our two cities (about 1:15 h driving from Villach) - at a ski-ressort called "Weinebene".

4 tablers and 3 wifes/partners - made 8 all together including me - started at 7.45 p.m. at a level of 1.550 m (5.100 ft). Our goal has been the peak "Huehnersteig" (1.989 m/6.541 ft) - which we reached after about 1 1/2 hours - walking about half the way on/through snow!

What a fantastic feeling! White underground - and white light from above..... - really ungredibly wonderful! Unfortunately you can´t catch that with your digi-cam..... - the human eye is much better than any digital fabrication.....

At the peak our main-organiser "Ditz" has even brought a bottle of champaign - and 8 wonderful plastic drinking-cups :-)

Around 10 p.m. - after about 45 min. descent - we reached the "Gruenanger-Huette" (cabin / 1.560 m/5.130 ft above sea level) - where the hut-keeper has already been waiting with freshly cooked Red Deer-Goulash - awsome!!! She´s a real cooking-champion....!!!

We stayed over-night (having beer, wine & schnaps - in sufficient amounts.... - and singing half the night....) and after a really good refreshing breakfast we started hiking back to our cars.

I really enjoyed this tour - and will join them again for another full-moon-tour if they´ll organise any!

Crazy run-event

Since a couple of years some friends meet once a year - to run up a pass-road in Slovenia, just across the border - half an hour from home.

Starting a bit outside the City of Krajnska Gora - the winding road (24 sharp bends!) is bringing you from about 800 m (2.630 ft.) altitude in less then 10 kilometers up to 1.611 m (5.298 ft.) above sealevel to the mountain-pass called "Vrsic"!

Last Friday it has been happening again - the craziest fun-run I´ve ever heared about - and I have been invited to participate!!!

The weather has not been the best (cool, foggy, a bit windy) - and we have had to expect some snow up there!

9 guys did start together - and after some minutes of warming-up in a gentle group-run my friend Erwin and me started to speed up - getting into "real uphill-speed"....

The road was really steep (up to 14 % gradient!) - and the run has been much more hard as I´ve been expecting (normally I´m not a mountain-runner.....) - but at the end we all reached the goal! Erwin and me in only a bit more than 1 hour (Erwin even 1 minute ahead)....

At the pass 40 cm of snow have been waiting for us :-) - so we hurried up to change and find the nearest bar to get some beers! Mountain-running makes very thursty......

The event ended with a fantastic dinner in the City of Krajnska Gora and some more drinks on the road back to Villach......

Looking already forward for next years Vrsic-Run!

Pheasant-Dinner in Leibnitz

Since more than 20 years my local Round Table Club "RT 11 Villach" is having a very close partnership with "RT 12 Leibnitz" - located in the Region of South-Styria (about 2 hours east of my home-city). Each year in the beginning of November our tabler-friends from Leibnitz are organising a nice weekend including the traditional "Pheasant-Dinner" (which in the last couple of years more and more turned into a "Game Dinner" - as the pheasant-meat for a many people is tasting a bit too dry.... :-) - including me....).

Also our tabler-friends from Trieste, Italy, are coming to this event year after year - and especially this time in a good number!

After doing bowling in the afternoon ( as a rainy weather program) - where we had an international match Austria vs. Italy (I´ve been called upon the Italian Crew - and we´ve lost.......) - we went to this fantastic dinner in the evening!

Food has been really great, wine.....excellent, fun.....big, bar....well equipped, night.....very long!

The big friendship between RT 12 Leibnitz, RT 9 Trieste and RT 11 Villach has had another highlight - and is strengthened for the future!

Next common activities are already arrranged....

Hiking with Pia and Michael

Pia and Michael from Coburg, Germany, are very close friends since almost 10 years. We know each other through "Round Table" - and through their love to Carinthia (my living place). Since more than 30 years they are coming here regularely - and about 4 to 5 years back they´ve bought a nice wooden-mountainhouse at Verditz (about 20 km from Villach).

Now first weekend in November they´ve spent a couple of days there - and we arranged to make a hiking- and relaxing day up there!

The day has been presenting on it´s best: blue sky and nice, warm November-sun - so our hiking-tour turned out as an un-expected perfect late-autumn-summit-victory!

The house is located at an altitude of about 1.250 m (ca. 4.100 ft) - and the peak of 1.900 m (ca. 6.250 ft) we reached after 2 hours - where Norbert surprised Michael with a nicely chilled bottle of wheat-beer.....

Round Table Austria Half Yearly

This weekend we had our National Half Yearly Meeting in Knittelfeld (Styria / about 160 km north-east) - organised by our dear friends of Round Table 43!

I drove there already Friday lunch-time as we had a National P.R.-Board meeting at 1.30 p.m. and the National Board Meeting from 3 to 7 p.m.. - Right after finishing the working-session and welcoming many good tabler-friends we really could get the party started!!!

About 150 friends arrived to the welcome at "Bachwirt" - where we got real good local food (very typical: "Steirisches Backhendl" - a fried chicken dish....) and plenty of beers and good Austrian wines.....

Later this evening we changed locations (two different bars - to be hounest....) - and after receiving a call at 3.15 in the morning we went to a tabler´s house where a special "after-show-party" took place: Ferdi and his girl-friend prepared 40 (!) scrambled eggs with ham and onions - in one big pan.... - fantastic (late-night-)taste!

Also special this night: about 12 tablers sitting around the table and starting a drum-session at 4 a.m. - knocking and making noises with drums, bottles, glasses, spoons, knifes, bells, etc..etc... - an ingredible new music-band has been born!!!.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZllRmuryXWs

Saturday morning we had two workshops (I missed them both....) and after lunch the Round Table Delegate´s Meeting. - There my part has been the presentation of our new international service-line "Service 90/10" - where I could motivate around two thirds of the Austrian clubs to donate money for three service-projects in Mauritius, Sri Lanka and Southafrica (in total around EUR 25.000!).

After the official part some of us went to a private wine-tasting before we all met again at the Gala-Night - a nice final of a wonderful tabler-weekend.

Here I also want to deposit that the mood in our National Board at the moment is a real great one! We´re a bunch of friends who work hard together but also have great fun when we see each other (see group-pictures)! Thanks for that, Muchachos!

Hiking-Tour Gerlitzen

One of our "home-mountains" is the "Gerlitzen" (1.911 m / 6.268 ft.) - and on a fantastic "Golden Autumn-Day" like today a fantastic target for a hiking-tour.

On the south-flank there´s a very steep footpath - and together with my friends Peter & Gittee (again) and with Eva (also again) we organised to climb it this wonderful Sunday morning!

About 1.400 m altitude (4.600 ft.) to climb - not so bad.....

On the tour again and again you´re having lots of fantastic look-outs down to our beautiful City of Villach and down to the Lake of Ossiach - all of us agreed how lucky we are to live in a magnificent area like this!

After three full hours of hiking we reached the peak (where me met hundreds of people "climbing" the mountain with the chair-lift......) - and after taking some peak-memory-pics we went down a couple of meters to the "Pacheiner-Huette" (cabin) where we found a perfect place on the sunny terrasse. "Traditionally" we took some Wheat-Beers and enjoyed maybe on of the last sunny autumn-days in this year´s hiking-season....

Another really beautiful day together with nice friends outdoor in our fantastic mountain-range! - Thanks for that!

Round Table Bowling Night

This year I have the honour to be President of our local Round Table Club in Villach - for the second time already! - At the chain-handover-ceremony in July this year I called out a party- and fun-year for our club - our members (and hopefully some new ones in addition) should enjoy every meeting and don´t want to miss any....

Therefore we decided to make a working-meeting every first Friday a month - and a fun-meeting every third Friday a month - starting Friday two days ago with a Bowling-Night in Klagenfurt (our region-capital / about 40 km east)!

Boris, Marco, Michael, Robert, Ruprecht, our pipeliner Christian and I had a lot of real good fun - and (sometimes) real success-feeling when we had the one or the other "strike" or "spare"....

After 4 hours of bowling we ended up in Boris´ office where we headed on with 3 hours of playing dart - finishing our good fun-evening at 4 in the morning...

...already looking forward to have the next fun-meeting (go-kart in November)....

Grape-picking weekend

Once a year my entire bank-team (incl. wifes/partners) is going on a weekend-trip - always big fun!

This year for the 5th time we travelled to my family´s winery - about 400 km north-east - to assist at the vintage and to "taste" ( a bit....) the new wines!

Friday evening we reached my brother´s wine-cellar for a welcome-drink ("Sturm" - an Austrian traditional drink - the grape-cider on its way to young wine - tastes superb!) and headed on to a wine-tavern - where we really celebrated our wonderful team-spirit and did enjoy the fantastic food, good wines and some fine Schnaps...... (leaving the tavern as "last-men-standing" and coming to bed late.....).Next morning working-operation in the vineyards! Only one collegue had some "physical handicap" - the rest of our team has been strong and ready for harvesting grapes! It was real fun! - Dry weather, big bunches of very sweet grapes, good mood and lots of laughs!In only 3 1/2 hours we picked 4.000 kg of "Green Veltlin Grapes" and brought them to the wine-cellar for further treatment!

In the evening we had a "wine-maker-supper" in my family´s wine-cellar - with lots of local specialities - and lots of "Sturm" and young 2008-wines!

My father invited us to his private vault - an extra tunnel where he collects and stores his best wines from all vintages since 1969. - Fantastic - I can tell you! We opened several old wines (1989,1990, 1994) and enjoyed this special atmosphere in the underground cellar!

I always like to go to my parent´s place - and I´m always pleased to see how my father really loves to tell us about his wine-maker-life and about his old wines (and some more "good old stories"....). - Really great!

Sunday we all packed some wine-boxes in our cars (of course!), some schnaps, some liquors, some fresh grapes,..... - and a lot of good memories from this wonderful weekend!