Good-bye Ortis

by Piers
Categories: General, Work
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Published on: 12 May 2012
LH845C harvester with telescopic boom

After almost 9 years in the Export Sales at Ortis I have decided to leave and take a new, well return to an old passion actually, direction.  I have joined the Clohse Group as Technical Manager.

We are setting up a new business unit importing and selling forestry machinery.  The Clohse brothers have been in the forestry business for nearly 40 years and about 23 years ago I helped build up the very first de-limber from Harricana.  Everyone who knows me knows my love of mechanical and all technical things so the step was pretty much a logical one to make even though I really enjoyed my job at Ortis.

We are the authorized dealer for the Canadian manufacturer Tigercat in a part for France, all BeNeLux and Germany.  These are the absolute top of the class machines with particular attention to the safety and comfort of the operator.  I am really looking forward to this new challenge, we have a great team and a bright future.

Don’t want another week like that

by Piers
Categories: Home
Tags:
Comments: 1 Comment
Published on: 9 April 2012

We are back from good ol’ Blighty. I usually love to go home and see the family but this was a visit I don’t want to repeat.  We were there to attend the funeral of our nephew Hugh.

Hugh is the same age as Christopher and his life was tragically and abruptly ended in a car accident.

There aren’t any words to say but I suppose we should celebrate his life rather than mourn his death, but that is not easy.

Rest in peace Hugh.

A border control conundrum

by Piers
Categories: General, Travel
Tags: , , , , ,
Comments: No Comments
Published on: 16 March 2012

A British citizen, a Belgian citizen, a Nepali student studying in Aachen driving a Luxembourg registered car going from France to England. This was a bit complicated for the border control ☺so we got questioned at French customs, British customs and the border control.
Still everyone was polite and satisfied so we are off the Adam & Ying’s wedding

Independence Day

by Piers
Categories: Home
Tags: ,
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Published on: 7 March 2012

Today is Independence Day for Veda! For the first time in his life he is fully independent, he is staying in his new digs in Aachen, cooking for himself and free to do whatever he wants.

Cool!

OpenMTBmap review

by Piers
Categories: Bike Stuff, Equipment, MTB, Road Biking, Technology
Tags: , ,
Comments: No Comments
Published on: 4 March 2012
Screenshot of our area

I discovered this Open Source project and have spent the day getting familiar with it.

It is great!

As I have a Mac, using Garmin maps is a pain: first convert them on a Windows computer then install them in BaseCamp.  I have been running Windows under VirtualBox (also Open Source) but that is also a pain.

OpenMTBmap is great when combined with Qlandkarte GT (also Open Source)  It can visualise both vector and raster maps and both are routable.  I have been looking at the Belgium topographical map today and it is really quite good.  Not all the tracks I know are there but there are enough for anyone to plan a MTB tour.

Once I am more used to the 2 programs I may be able to contribute to the maps and help improve them for the future updates (made roughly every 6 weeks)

I have tested the maps on my Garmin GPSmap 60CSx: works perfectly and the roads are routable on the handheld. I’ll certainly be using it in the future, on the trail and we will see how it performs

Unlikely to happen to me

by Piers
Categories: General
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Published on: 16 February 2012

This is an hilarious clip and it is unlikely to happen to me for 2 reasons:

1, I don’t park on the street

2, My car has an unusual colour!

Water frozen……again!

by Piers
Categories: Home
Tags: ,
Comments: No Comments
Published on: 12 February 2012
icicles on the garage gutter

We have been having problems with the water freezing in the house on and off for the last 2 weeks.  The temperature here hasn’t risen above -5°C and has been down to -20.5°C.

Now it seems that it is not our water that is frozen but the external supply from the SWDE.  I am now quite good at locating the frozen pipes in our house and can usually get them defrosted in less than 1/2 hour.  Not today!

At least the forecast is predicting warmer weather (around 0°C) but we will be shoveling snow instead of defrosting pipes.  Roll on summer :-)

Cold weather reaches -20°C

by Piers
Categories: Home
Tags: , , ,
Comments: No Comments
Published on: 7 February 2012

We were under the -20°C this morning, no water in the house as the mains were frozen behind the kitchen units.

We already had the ‘fridge open to heat the house, now we can open the freezer to heat the house as well :-)

 

Gran Canaria West coast GC-200 video

by Piers
Categories: Holidays
Tags: , ,
Comments: No Comments
Published on: 5 February 2012

Just uploaded another short video of our ride along the west coast of Gran Canaria.  This is actually the second part of our ‘Loneliest road in Gran Canaria’ ride. Great road which was not very frequented by traffic wit fantastic views of the coast and Tenerife.

 

Cold weather also in Belgium

by Piers
Categories: Home
Tags: ,
Comments: No Comments
Published on: 3 February 2012
Our kitchen sink this morning

It was -18°C in the Eiterbach on the way to work this morning.  Our water is frozen in the pipes (again) so we have opened the fridge to help heat the house :-)

 

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Recent Posts
  • Good-bye Ortis by Piers

    After almost 9 years in the Export Sales at Ortis I have decided to leave and take a new, well return to an old passion actually, direction.  I have joined the Clohse Group as Technical Manager. We are setting up a new business unit importing and selling forestry machinery.  The [...]

  • Don’t want another we… by Piers

    We are back from good ol’ Blighty. I usually love to go home and see the family but this was a visit I don’t want to repeat.  We were there to attend the funeral of our nephew Hugh. Hugh is the same age as Christopher and his life was tragically [...]

  • A border control conundrum by Piers

    A British citizen, a Belgian citizen, a Nepali student studying in Aachen driving a Luxembourg registered car going from France to England. This was a bit complicated for the border control ☺so we got questioned at French customs, British customs and the border control. Still everyone was polite and satisfied [...]

  • Independence Day by Piers

    Today is Independence Day for Veda! For the first time in his life he is fully independent, he is staying in his new digs in Aachen, cooking for himself and free to do whatever he wants. Cool!

  • OpenMTBmap review by Piers

    I discovered this Open Source project and have spent the day getting familiar with it. It is great! As I have a Mac, using Garmin maps is a pain: first convert them on a Windows computer then install them in BaseCamp.  I have been running Windows under VirtualBox (also Open Source) [...]

  • Unlikely to happen to me by Piers

    This is an hilarious clip and it is unlikely to happen to me for 2 reasons: 1, I don’t park on the street 2, My car has an unusual colour!

  • Water frozen……again! by Piers

    We have been having problems with the water freezing in the house on and off for the last 2 weeks.  The temperature here hasn’t risen above -5°C and has been down to -20.5°C. Now it seems that it is not our water that is frozen but the external supply from [...]

  • Cold weather reaches -20°C by Piers

    We were under the -20°C this morning, no water in the house as the mains were frozen behind the kitchen units. We already had the ‘fridge open to heat the house, now we can open the freezer to heat the house as well  

  • Gran Canaria West coast GC-… by Piers

    Just uploaded another short video of our ride along the west coast of Gran Canaria.  This is actually the second part of our ‘Loneliest road in Gran Canaria’ ride. Great road which was not very frequented by traffic wit fantastic views of the coast and Tenerife.  

  • Cold weather also in Belgium by Piers

    It was -18°C in the Eiterbach on the way to work this morning.  Our water is frozen in the pipes (again) so we have opened the fridge to help heat the house  

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