My small handful of readers will have noticed that Copydude has been off the planet for a week or so.

Over the New Year, the server moved from the US to the Netherlands - but not without incident. Some recent posts appear to have been lost in transit. I’ll have to look these out.

The upside is that I’ve had some time to plan my forthcoming trip to Svetlogorsk - a beautiful old Prussian resort just outside Kaliningrad.

Svetlogorsk was known Rauschen before 1945. Somehow it escaped the wholesale destruction of Konigsberg and the old German villas and chestnut trees afford a lot of time-warp charm. There’s even a Spa and a funicular railway.

In February I will be blogging from the bar of the Flamingo Hotel - that’s the nice old place pitcured above. Naturally I am looking forward to some sexy sprats fresh from the Baltic and a large plate of Olgas.