Flight home and END OF BLOG

We turned in our rental car Friday morning and they drove us to the airport.  We knew we were in for a long day flying west against the clock.  I figured we would be awake for about 24 hours. The flight from Frankfurt  to Denver was long but not stressful.  We watched movies and read but didn't sleep.

In Denver Lindsey caught her flight to Kalispell and was on her way, but we learned our flight into Salt Lake City was delayed so we would miss our connecting flight into Lewiston.

We used Lindsey's cell phone to call and cancel our hotel reservations in Lewiston and then went through the process to get another flight to Lewiston.  Since it would be Saturday they had no direct flights so we had to go to Seattle then back to Lewiston.  Because the airlines created our problem they gave us a hotel room in SLC so we did get some rest but we found that jet lag in a westerly direction means you wake up about 3 a.m. and can't go back to sleep. We did manage about 4 or 5 hours sleep that night.

Both flights were not long but it was a tiring day.  

We did enjoy the dramatic sight of Mount Rainier as we came into Seattle but especially relished the recognizable but more mundane view of Lewiston Valley

All our luggage got there safely and our new car was even at the Lewiston Airport waiting for us.

After lunch at Zany Graze, we were finally on our way home.


Now, a week later, we are settled in and over the jet lag effect of waking up very early.





We loved serving our mission in Germany, as well as the others we have done, but Home is Home.

Overview Pat Two May 11 to 16

Sunday we visited the Hof Branch, not as missionaries but as friends.  Anna Weiss stopped by with her mother to say goodbye.  She is the young lady who did my nails while I was there.  I had her do some of her 'art' on them before I came home.

Early Monday morning we were on our way to Nurnberg.  We had lunch with Carolin Rupp, another young friend from Hof, then toured the Nurnberg castle and learned about the Holy Roman empire.

It was a very rainy rainy day.  We left in the afternoon to drive south to Fussen to stay overnight in a little pension.  Unfortunately it was in farm country and it really kicked Lindsey's allergies.  The next day we headed for the beautiful fairy tale castle of Neuschwanstein.  We took a horse carriage ride up the steep hill to the castle which saved our poor feet but about killed Lindsey.  I didn't know she was THAT allergic to horses.

After the tour we hiked around the castle to a bridge overlooking the waterfall.  Dave is in the blue raincoat assisting an elderly lady who was struggling up the hill.

 Later that day we drove into Switzerland and  stayed overnight in Appenzell.  That is a charming town I had not remembered visiting.  There were many humorous things there and, of course, we had to have a Cheese fondue in Switzerland.  We watched a metal picnic table on the banks of the river erupt into a fountain and wondered how many people were caught unawares.

The next day, Wednesday, we walked around the town enjoying the sunshine with fresh snow on the Alps in the background. We had been stopped on the freeway by a couple traffic accidents due to weather..

We stopped in Luzern and walked around town and saw an unusual museum housing a great variety of things on display in their storage area.
These included an alp horn and a guillotine among others unusual items.

We even saw swans on the river.  That should have been in Neuschwanstein, right?

After attending a session Thursday morning we took the advice of a young man who took this picture and drove further south, stopping in Murten for lunch, to a town called Broc in the mountains and toured  'Maison Cailler' where milk chocolate was invented.  After the tour you can eat all the chocolate you want....but after only 6 or 7 you can't eat any more because it is so rich!

It was a very well presented tour and worth the drive even if our Navi took us on a narrow one lane road and ignored the main road.

Sated with chocolate we began the 5 hour drive back to Frankfurt to prepare for our flight home the next morning.

A brief overview of our trip with Lindsey, May 7 to 11 (Part One)

We picked up Lindsey, our youngest daughter, in Berlin Wednesday afternoon, May 7th, and saw the Berlin aquarium that evening.  She took about a thousand pictures but I won't include any here because we saw so many other things driving from Berlin south through Germany to the Swiss temple and then returning to fly home from Frankfurt.

After visiting with the Kunz family we drove to the area where we lived in Berlin in 1966.  It is in Zehlendorf at Berlinerstrasse 14a.  We were there for the first year or so of our marriage before we moved to military housing on the main Berlin Brigade area. 



We also accidentally found Andrews Barracks where Dave had lived before we were married.  He was excited to know it was still in existence.  It is now serving as an archive for historic artifacts in Berlin and is being renovated as a museum.  It has a long history of barracks for the Kaisers cavalry cadets, the SS troops and then the American military during the cold war.

Not too far from the apartment in the Zehlendorf city offices where we were married on August 30, 1966.  This event took place during Dave's lunch hour.




After returning to our hotel Dave chose to rest while Lindsey and I rode the bus to the famous museum island.  In the 1800's many Germans were active in archeology and brought lots of incredible stuff back to Berlin such as the ancient Babylonian Ishtar Gate.  I could spend a week alone in these museums.  We wore our feet out and then took a pedicab four blocks to the Brandenburg gate and took more pictures before taking the bus back to our hotel.

On Friday we left Berlin early and arrived in Dresden and were able to see only one of their fabulous museums, the Green Vault or something like that.  It houses all the very expensive knick knacks the ruling kings collected.  It is room after room of gold and silver and pearls and other precious jewels made into beautiful non functional things.  I always think about the poor people who were starving while the aristocracy collected this stuff.  We did see part of a parade of costumed men marching singing and paying music.  You can see Dave trying to get in front to take a picture. 

They were also having a Spring Festival in a town square and we enjoyed the booths there before we went to see  the Frauenkircke

 



Later in the day we stopped at a castle near Mittweida called Kriebstein.  They were preparing for the weekend Middle Ages Fair but we passed the workers and saw the castle exhibits of armor (not nearly as much as in Dresden which we didn't see) and other  things, including a picture of an event in 1415. The castle fell to an invading army.  The leader of the army said the women could leave but the men would be killed.  The lady of the castle was allowed to take whatever she could carry on her back.  She chose to carry her wounded husband.  If you have seen Ever After this story is part of the plot.

For our evening meal we took Lindsey to a restaurant which has been in business since 1738 and introduced her to the local fare of kloesse, rot kohl, and sauerbraten.  Like me, she wasn't especially fond of the potato balls.

We stayed in Schwarzenburg that evening and walked around the town the next morning.  Lindsey loved the Glockenspiel and even saw the costumed player. We stopped at little town called Moedlereuth near Hof.  This town is often called Little Berlin because, like Berlin it was divided

right down the middle by the Communist East Germany wall.  It now houses quite a good museum about the 40 year history of the German wall.  As we were leaving we were passed by about 100 or more motorcycles..all styes and ages.  Another accidental parade.

 Then we got to Hof and walked up through Thereseinstein Park to the Middle Ages Fair we knew they were having.  Lindsey said it was very like Rendezvous but different costuming.

 We enjoyed the jousting (kids knocking puppets off a prop while riding stick horses)  the music, the costuming, people in hanging cages, and  Lindsey throwing the hawk.  She stuck two out of five so we bought her a new hawk as a souvenir.


We had dinner that evening with the Merkel family and enjoyed Racklett.  They had also invited the new missionary couple so we visited with the Kunz family again.

May 6 Relese from President Kosak

We drove to Berlin Tuesday morning May 6, 2014, expecting to return to our apartment the next weekend and finish cleaning it since we had been told there was no couple available to replace us. Among a crowd of young missionaries we checked out of the mission office then went to the hotel room furnished by the mission.  We all met later for dinner and then went to the President's home for a closing testimony meeting.  As I sat listening to the young missionaries I was thinking that these men had now paid a tithe of their lives to the Lord, 2 years from 20.  Then President Kosak pointed out that Elder Montgomery had also done the same thing; 70 years old and 7 years total on missions.  Kind of cool.

We rejoiced when we were told that Pres. Kosak had decided to send a couple to Hof after all.  Elder and Sister Kunz from Salt Lake City would be in Hof by Thursday so I had to call Angelica Merkel and have her finish the apartment cleaning.  What a good friend to take time from her busy schedule to do that for me.  We met with the Wednesday morning and had a nice visit to brief them on our thoughts about the branch.

Goodbye Zweig Hof

When you leave anyplace there are always two ways one feels;  glad to be going home and sad to leave dear friends.  On May 4 we had a meal after church in the hotel and visited to say goodbye.  The Stake President, Brother Hengst, came to install the new branch president, Elder Merkel again.  We will certainly miss these people and keep them in our prayers and hearts.

Samuel Grünbichler and his family of 6 will now go to Plauen

Sister Eva Schulze has been coming to church regularly since we began visiting with her.  She teaches Primary and is making progress toward going to the temple.

Grit Förberig's husband is not a member.  Dave told Thorsten that we would come back for his baptism, if and when.

 Manfred Lange and his wife, Tanya struggle to be active.  He has a strong testimony but has addiction challenges and she is a recent convert

Martha Ernst has said she would move to Kamiah after her dog Tina dies.  She would find it very different from Germany.  She has diabetes and doctors are often called to her home since she has some trouble managing her diet.  I don't think they do that in Idaho and the nearest medical care is at minimum 7 miles away.

President Hengst is a business man who travels the world so he is always connected with modern technology.

Thomas Rössler has been very diligent since he was healthy enough to return to activity. He teaches the priesthood lesson.

Rolf Hermann was Dave's second counselor.  He lives far away from Hof but is so reliable and diligent.  Although his wife is not a member he comes all the time.

We didn't get a good picture of the Heeman family.  They are just behind Eva in the group shot.  Kersten fulfilled a mission in the US on the Indian reservation.  She told a story of how her mother sent her some special Christmas bread and told her English speaking companions that it was stolen (Stollen is a fruit filled bread made only at Christmas)


And of course, our dear Merkels.  We plan to meet them in Hawaii when Sophie is released from her mission in 2016.