Oct. 14-20, 2018

The Schwenningen District

Monday was District Meeting in Singen.  It was about a 2 hr. drive in the beautiful mountains and countryside full of Fall color.  We had our meeting and then went over to Elder and Sister Andreasons home for grilled hamburgers.  It was a real treat for the missionaries.  They do not get hamburgers very often.  We ate and the missionaries had fun singing and playing the ukelele.  Listen to the LAVA song on Disney Pixar shorts.  The picture is of them singing along with the video.
We had a long ride home because of a really bad accident on the road.  There is only 1 road through the mountains and when there is an accident all you can do is wait.  We made it home just in time for Family Home Evening.  It was nice to go and have dinner that I did not have to cook.  One of our young married couples cooked tonight.  They made pumpkin ginger soup.  It was really good and the ginger made it spicy hot.

Tuesday P-Day.  We have been looking forward to this adventure for several weeks.  It was a perfect day to be in the mountains.

 A 20 minute bus ride out of the city took us to Schauinslandbahn Freiburg.  It is a mountain in the Black Forest with an elevation of 4,213 ft. above sea level.  It was originally developed for  silver mining.  For over 700 years silver, lead and zinc were mined here.  In the 14th century it was so productive that the mine company was able to donate glass windows to the Freiburg Minster.  The mining tunnels are spread over 22 levels and total about 100 kilometers.  Production ceased in 1954.  Since 1975, the Barbarastollen, a reconstructed part of the mine, has been used by the Federal office for Civil Protection and Emergency Aid as a storage

 facility for Germany's archived materials.  The tunnel is Europe's largest long-term archive.
The schauinslandbahn is Germany's longest cable car.  It ascends a height of 746 m and has a length of 3600 m.  There are 37 car cabins that can transport up to 700 people per hour.  It started it's operation in 1930.  I have to admit I was not feeling very good when I reached the summit.  The altitude took a few minutes to get used to.  Once we started walking and hiking, I started feeling much better.  The views were spectacular. 

 We hiked to the Eugen Keidel Tower.  It was built in 1981 and named after a former mayor.  It has 91 stairs, roughly 20 meters high and a viewing platform at the top.  On a clear day you can see the Swiss Alps and Mount Blanc from the top of the tower.  After  hiking and still getting used to the altitude, We decided we could climb the 91 stairs for the grand view.  It was worth it.  Amazing when you are above all of the trees what a difference the view can be.  We have noticed every tower we have climbed the stairs get very narrow at the top.  Do they think you get thinner as you climb to the top and don't need as much room?  It was easy to get dizzy at the top. 

Russ just catching his breath and taking in the view of the French and Swiss mountains.

 Looking from the tower to the town of Hofsgrund.  It is a very quaint farming community and has been there since 1590's  An original farm house built in 1593 was used until 1966 and in 1972 was turned into a museum.

 Gate house for Cable Cars. We are just starting our accent up the mountain.

 Fun tree carvings.  This tree was alive until the drought in 2013.  It was in Freiburg and when it died it was cut and brought up to the mountain.  Beautiful carvings on the inside as well.

This is the same tree, other side.  I think the expressions fit!

There is a lot of history on this mountain.  The German Military has used the mountain since 1943 and continues to have a solar telescope and an observatory for radio communications and an air measuring station for radiation.
Hitler Youth used one of the monuments on the mountain that was a memorial to a group of English students who died on the mountain when they were caught in a snow storm while hiking.  They used it for propaganda.  After WWII, "Hitler Youth" was replaced with "Youth of Germany" and the swastika and imperial eagle were removed.
We really enjoyed the day.  It was a great day to hike and enjoy nature.  We ended the trip in the little cafe at the top with locally made ice cream.  Russ had chocolate with vanilla raspberry meringue and I had vanilla with fresh raspberries and sweet potato biscuit (cookie) crumbled on top.  It was amazing.  I was not sure what the sweet potato biscuit was going to be and it was wonderful.  Kind of like a snickerdoodle made with sweet potato in it.  The ride down was much more relaxing and my body was much better coming down than going up.

 Interesting Pine trees that are wispy and loaded with pine cones.

BIKES AND MORE BIKES
 School started on Monday for all of the University Students and they are out in force.  This is in front of the library and on the edge of the city center and University.  Bikes are everywhere.  Driving is very interesting as you have to watch for cars, buses, trams, bikes, and people.  Most of the time you are also watching your GPS to know where you are going.  It gets very tricky.  They also have traffic cameras everywhere.  The police do not stop cars for violations.  They just take your picture and send you the bill.  I just got my first speeding ticket in the mail.  They do not tell you where you were speeding, just that you were caught on camera.

It would be nice to know so I will be more careful next time I am in that area.  My GPS warns when I go over the speed limit, but on the highways it is really crazy how they change the speeds frequently and quickly.  All the more reason we like to walk and ride the tram to most places.  We love watching all of the families down to 3 year olds who ride their bikes.  Even the Post man rides a bike with big baskets attached filled with the mail.




So, it is Friday and am I ever feeling the 91 stairs I climbed on Tuesday.  I used muscles in the top of my legs I must not have used for awhile.  We climb 48 stairs at least 6 times a day, so I didn't think stairs would be a problem.  It must be the combination of trail walking and the stairs.

We have had some interesting experiences this week.  We are feeling more comfortable in our surroundings and it is feeling like "home" to us.  We were walking to a meeting at the Church on Thursday night and a lady who was drunk asked us if we were German.  We said "No" and continued walking.  She said, "Who are you?"  and then she threw a can of beer at us.  Luckily, she was drunk and could not throw very good.  It went into the street.  I thought it was good she threw it so she could not drink it.  We kept walking and got stopped at the red light.  She followed us and asked a few more questions that I did not understand.  We were very glad when the light changed and we could keep walking.  She is a regular on the street but this is the first time we have had an encounter with her.
Earlier in the day we were riding the Tram.  We usually sit together or if there are not seats together we stand.  There were two aisle seats next to each other so I sat next to a young college girl and Russ sat across the aisle.  I smiled and sat quiet.  I felt very strongly that I needed to talk to this girl.  She watched me for a few minutes.  Finally I asked her if she spoke English.  She smiled and said yes.  We had a really nice conversation.   She is new in town as a student and I could tell she needed a friend or someone to talk to.  As we left the Tram she asked me what Church I was from.  I told her, she had never heard of us and I told her to have a good day.  Maybe another day I will see her again and will be able to talk to her.
Friday we went shopping for some food.  You usually have to go to more than one store to find everything you are looking for.  We have found the ones we like the most.  Even different locations of the same stores have different things, so we have found the locations we like the best.  We were on the other side of town at a store and I still needed a few things from Aldi.  We decided to go to the one closer to where we were.  I was talking to Russ as we were waiting in line and a man came up to us and said, "you are talking in English and yet your name tag is in German."  We talked to him for a minute and he got in the other line and said we will talk later.  Then the man behind him said, "I would like to talk English with you."  He was in the film industry and had been to New York working on a Superbowl bid for his company.  We had a nice conversation.  When we finished checking out the first man was waiting for us at the door.  He wanted to talk.  He was very interested in our Name badges but did not understand them.  We told him we were with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  He said he was not familiar with that.  Russ tried to talk to him in German and he said, No, I want to talk in English.  I asked him if he had ever heard of Mormons and he said, yes, yes.  He said, they baptize at an older age than infants.  We said, yes we baptize at 8 years old.  He then identified himself as a Catholic Monk who lives outside of Venus, Italy in a Monastery.  He said he too was in the film industry and had made a film that was shown in the US.  He asked us several questions.  He said he had never met a Mormon before and was glad to have met us.   We asked if he ever went to Rome.  He said, yes.  We told him about the Temple being built there and that it would be open to the Public in March 2019.  We told him that he should plan to go and see the Temple and the visitor center.  We talked about our son serving a mission in Sicily.  He said, "there are no coincidences in life, you were here for a reason.  He said, even the sweater you bought was not a coincidence."  It was a nice conversation and interesting that English was the means by which we were able to have it.  I am grateful for tender mercies and I too believe that there is a purpose in what we do and the actions we take each day.  He brightened our day and I hope we made a difference for him as well.
                                                                                                                                                               

Freiburg Elders

We have three Elder's in our area now.  The new Elder has grown a little since he arrived and 3 of his pants have split open in the back in the last week.  I told him I would repair them so he would have some pants to wear.  We decided we would also take him and get him some new clothes.  We took him today.  It was fun just being with him and getting to know him better.  It gave him a chance to have some time just with us and he could feel good about himself.  When he came out of the dressing room to show us how the pants fit, we saw that his socks were completely worn out and his toes were showing.  So we added new socks to the list.  Socks are a big thing for our Elder's.  They like them to stand out.  He was cute when Elder Grimmett suggested plain dark socks - he picked the colorful patterned ones.  It was nice to help him have a good day.  We enjoy Saturdays in town.  We went to the Saturday organ recital at the Munster and really enjoyed it today.  Most of the organists have been female and today was a male organist.  We really enjoyed his selections, especially because he started with Bach.  There are so many people out on Saturday's and musicians playing on every street.  It is very festive and is a good place to be.

We hope our Texas friends and family are keeping safe and dry.  We hope our home is still an Island and not part of the river.  We appreciate all of your thoughts, prayers and letters to us.  Congratulations to the Hutchinson/Astorga families on their new grandson.  Beautiful baby!

Viel Liebe

The Grimmett's