Category: Dortmund

Geometry, 2021-08-14

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I decided to start with something easy in Dortmund. This was great fun, and it was easy to pick out the pieces for each section. The little car is my new puzzle mascot – I saw some people had mascots in a Facebook puzzle group and decided I needed one, too!

Geometry, Cloudberries, 1000 pieces. Completed on August 14, 2021.

It’s an Opel Adam, and I have this car, also yellow with a black roof, although instead of the large Borussia Dortmund logos I only have a small sticker in the rear.

Speaking of Borussia Dortmund, on Saturday the first game of the new Bundesliga season was played at home, and I was lucky enough to be among the 25 000 who were allowed to watch the game in the stadium. 25 000 is still less than a third of capacity, but it’s more than has been allowed since February 2020. We won 5-2 against Eintracht Frankfurt!

Space Diner, 2021-06-24

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I finally managed to finish Space Diner, just in time before I again leave Dortmund for Helsinki. It was a lot harder than expected, and that was mostly because of the metallic effect that reflected light so that it was almost impossible to work on this except in daylight. It was very enjoyable, regardless, and I would buy other puzzles from the Cosmo Puzzle 2000-series if I ever come across any.

Space Diner by Jabo, Heye, 2000 pieces. Completed on June 24, 2021.

This definitely feels like a companion piece to the Happy 2000-puzzle. I already mentioned some similarities in my previous post about this puzzle, and I also remember a similar pint from Happy 2000.

There were lots of funny details throughout:

Dueling toasters.
Cops and robbers.
Here is something that from a 2021 perspective seems unlikely at a futuristic space diner: a phone booth 🙂

Pork Pies & Puddings, 2021-06-04

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Wonderful collage of British food and drink, from very old classics like haggis to more recent (at least in Britain) favourites like Chicken Tikka Masala. Thoroughly enjoyable as a puzzle, and also great quality. Gibsons is a bit of a mixed bag quality-wise, the previous Gibsons puzzle I did was shoddy with a poor fit, but this was excellent. I’m keeping this to do again.

Pork Pies & Puddings by Val Goldfinch, Gibsons, 1000 pieces. Completed on June 4, 2021.

Cakes, cheese, chicken tikka masala and drinks.

Sausages, tarts and tea time treats. I always love puzzling cake.

More cakes!

Space Diner, In Progress

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This Heye from the late 90s is proving a lot more challenging than I expected. It’s part of a series called Cosmo, all with space images and 2000 pieces (for the year 2000, I presume). The reason it’s difficult is that everyting except the black background has a metallic effect, making the pieces reflect light so that’s it’s almost impossible to make out the different colours unless there’s daylight. The poster is just a regular poster, without metallic effects. Since I do most of my puzzling late at night, this is going to be very slow, in fact I’m not sure I’ll be able to finish the puzzle before I leave Dortmund.

I’ve made a start.

A to Z of Rail, 2021-05-30

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I’ve arrived safely in Dortmund, and for my first puzzle I did this lovely puzzle with lots of text and great vintage images of trains. It’s only 500 pieces, but the pieces are really big, and the finished puzzle is as big as a normal 1000-piece puzzle. The cut was random, but not all that wild. Definitely a keeper!

A to Z of Rail, House of Puzzles, 500 pieces. Completed on May 30, 2021.

It’s difficult to pick favourites from these images, but I really enjoyed these three:

Good Friends Get a Little Kiss, 2020-11-05

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Sheepworld is a German company that produces gift items with cute sheep images. The texts here are all in German, of course. In the middle it says “Good friends get a little kiss, the best friend your whole heart”, and underneath “Best friends forever”. Not quite my style, but I got in a lot with some other puzzles. It was actually a bit more difficult than I expected.

Good Friends Get a Little Kiss, Ravensburger, 500 pieces. Completed on November 5, 2020.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

The Cosy Shed, 2020-11-10

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No 6 from the Ravensburger My Haven series. This was a great puzzle, with lots of interesting details and room where I think I would feel very much at home. The book that the (almost) unseen person is reading is Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë – the text is clear enough to read, and I googled the first sentence 🙂

The Cosy Shed by Steve Read, Ravensburger, 1000 pieces. Completed on November 10, 2020.

There’s plenty of evidence of various hobbies in the image, including puzzles. The one on the bookshelf looks to be another puzzle from the same series, called the Sewing Shed. There’s also a stack of puzzles on to the left on a sideboard (the box on top may not be a puzzle).

There a site called Ancestry Detective open on the laptop, and some genealogy charts on the wall.