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!

Hiking-Tour Kossiak

Last week Thursday (wonderful late-summer-day outside) I spontaneously decided to take afternoon off - and go for a hiking-tour to the "Baerental" (Valley of Bears/ about 40 km from my place) together with my long-term-friend Astrid!

We went up to the 2.024 m-peak "Kossiak" (6.638 ft) - a 2:15 h hike with some really steep parts! - But up there we rewarded ourselves with a nice chilled bottle of wheat-beer!

On our way down we stopped for a pleasant rest at the "Klagenfurter Huette" (alpine cabin) - and did enjoy the breath-taking scenery and the beginning sunset......

Summing up I can tell you this afternoon has been much better than sitting in the bank-office (especially in days of financial-crises like this.....)

Half-Marathon in Ferlach

After my big Round-Table-activities mainly have been over (June this year) I found more and more time for my "sport-life" and I did really a lot of running, cycling, mountainbiking and hiking the last 3 months. - Pretty soon I got back my "old shape" - and therefore I felt I have to participate at least in one half-marathon before the end of the year 2008!!!.

In Internet I found this small running-event in the city of Ferlach (about 50 km from my place) and I did register 5 days ago (but already knowing abou maybe taking part since 5 weeks.....).

The weather-forecast has been perfect: dry conditions and temperatures of 8 - 10 ° C (46 - 50 ° F) - and it came like this!

The run itself has been quite difficult: only 10 % of the distance on concrete roads - the rest on gravel roads and dirt-roads (and a couple of small hills along the track.....).

But I felt good - and although I had to run about two thirds of the distance only for my own - I could finish in 1,28:53! My best half-marathon-time since more than 5 years!

And my ranking surprised me as well: 16th in the overall (out of 112) and 5th in my age-group - which even brought me to the podium-picture (the top 5 have been named and have got a medal.....).

I´ve been a bit tired after finishing - but very, very satiesfied and very happy!