February summary: Winter vacations prior to the serious stuff

Barbara and I were still with Jon and family in Luxembourg in the first week of the month. It’s such a small country that half day excursions can be made into Belgium, France and Germany. On our final weekend we crossed the border for lunch in Germany’s oldest city, Trier, in the Moselle wine region. The city core centres around the magnificent medieval Hauptmarkt, the plaza encircled by well preserved townhouses overlooked by the tower of St. Gangolf’s church.

Trier was originally a Roman metropolis, after their arrival in 17 BC, and a large number of Roman monuments can be seen, including the majestic 2nd century Porta Nigra gate, the largest Roman city gate north of the Alps.

While we were in Luxembourg, Amanda and Richard spent a week in Upper Egypt, exploring the region around Luxor and Aswan. This is one of the most fascinating places on earth (posting of 23 April 2020) and it was great to see Richard immersing himself in the culture.

A few days after we returned to the UK Jon and family left Luxembourg for a week in the French Alps, the children's first skiing holiday. 

Makes me very envious; a pity that I had to give this up a few years ago due to wear and tear on the knees, which certainly would not have stood up to the terrain in the photo below, which Jon described as a tough black run (aka formidable to we ordinary mortals).

And then we were all back at our desks, preparing for the serious stuff, not the least 4 upcoming MEI Conference this year. The programme for Comminution '23 is more or less finalised, and registrations are coming in. We will be on our way to Cape Town in six weeks time. We will be back there again in November for Flotation '23 which is also shaping up to be a major event, and in between we have Biomining '23 and Sustainable Minerals '23 in Falmouth, each with full programmes, which will be announced shortly. These will be held at Falmouth's National Maritime Museum, so it was good of the Prince and Princess of Wales to call in during the month to check it all out for us.

Photo: PA Images

Before all that, however, I was in Denver earlier in the week for my 20th Annual SME event and will be reporting on this next week. 

I travelled to Denver on the 24th, exactly a year after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The war continues unabated, a terrible humanitarian catastrophe, as was the massive double-earthquake which struck Turkey and Syria early in the month. With over 44,000 dead, it's hard to imagine what the people in these countries are suffering and our thoughts go out to all of them. And also to the heroic rescue teams, showing the best of humanity amidst the worst of nature.

@barrywills