Switzerland - Sunday Bern Church

We had to get up early to be ready to get the train at 8:13.  It is wonderful to have Sally with us.  She is so excellent at looking at the rail schedules and getting us where we need to go.

Mom wanted to walk-- I think she didn't want to make us push the wheel chair-- but it was tiring for her.  I think we've convinced her to do the wheel chair from now on.  It's not hard to schlep it around.  It's light.

The Bern ward had translations in English and that helped us feel part of the ward.  After church Rachelle showed us her harp and played for us.  It was delightful. She is very talented.

Sue and Steve came home with us and stayed the afternoon.  We had cheese fondue for dinner and it was mighty tasty.  We finished up the last of the Black Forest Torte.  Yum.  It's a good thing we're doing some walking.

Sue and Steve played the alphorns again.  It's such lovely, mellow music.  The landlady was finally here to listen to it.  She just sprawled in the chair with her eyes closed absorbing the tranquility of the music.

Steve and Kathy left at o-dark-thirty this morning to head back to the USA. We will miss them.  I moved to the downstairs apartment to be with Mom and Sally. I was able to post pictures using Steve's computer.  Now that that's gone, I don't know that I will be able to post as many.  When I take them from the camera stick they don't have preview pictures, just numbers.

It is fun to be here.

Switzerland- Saturday- Temple

Sally and I went to the Bern temple in the morning. Susan was speaking at a baptism at the building right next to the temple.  So they took us there and met us when we were done.

We did a little shopping at Megros and Coop.  Then came home and relaxed most of the afternoon.  I snoozed.  5 hours of sleep a night catches up to you.  I sleep in the beginning of the night, then wake up about 4am.

Sue and Steve visited... and we had Kathy and Steve there, too. Had a nice dinner.  Susan fixed a Black Forest Torte for dessert.  Yumm!

Sue and Steve played the alphorns after dinner.

Switzerland--Friday-Turner Sea

We got off to a slow start on Friday.  Actually, Sally, Steve, and Steve Swarthout left pretty early to take Steve English to the airport.  Since Steve had a ride-for-two railpass.  If we went anywhere, Kathy would have to purchase a ticket on the train.  And Sue and Steve were supposed to come over about 10:30 to help us decide what to do.

They arrived closer to 1.  Mom and I had walked to the Coop grocery store and were just coming out as they exited the train station.  So we walked back together and Sally and Steve S. arrived shortly thereafter.

Kathy is gulten intolerant.  She must have eaten something with gluten in the filler because she was not feeling well.  She stayed back to read and rest when we went out.

We decided on a boat ride and a trip to the clock and music box museum.

 Sue and Sally had a little mix up with the train, bus, tram, boat schedules.  So we dined an early dinner at Megros overlooking the Thuner Sea.  Then we caught a boat that took us up the lake nearly to interlocken and back to Thun.  We had rain on and off during the day.  On the boat it mostly rained.  But we were under shelter.

It was a steam paddle boat and Steve enjoyed watching the HUGE pistons turn.  That place was also the warmest on the boat so when we got chilled from being outside, we when to the little dining area near the pistons.

 This is the castle and church in Spietz-- where we stayed last time we were in Switzerland.  Er... not in the castle, but in Spietz.

By the time we got off the train at Uetendorf where we were staying-- it was nearly 10pm-- and still light outside.

I posted 11 photos, waited forever for them to load... and they got dumped.  So you only get 5.

Switzerland day 4- Castle Chillan and Chocolate Factory

We planned an ambitious day for Thursday.  We went to the castle Chillan (pronounced She-oo-n) then on to Broc to the Cailler (pronounced kai-ear) chocolate factory.  Can you tell we were in the French speaking part of Switzerland?

We left to catch a train at 8 am.  We got home at about 8pm.  Mom decided she'd stay home and read, nap, stroll or sketch.  It was a good decision on her part.   There were lots of changes of trains and stairs... not to mention the time we got off the train one stop early.  We walked along the train track for a bit... on the gravel... before it became a walking path.

But, all in all, a fun time was had by everyone.  We had patches of sprinkles but the only heavy rain came while we were on trains.  And we had some toasty sun as well.

 Castle Chillan

 The dungeon. It seemed bright and airy, however without the lights and in winter, I expect it would be a totally different story.

 Castle bedroom.  Heater is on the right, toilet to the left, and there was a "sink" with water holder and basin off to the left of the door.

 This was one of the banquet rooms.  The tables were around the outer edge with built in seating,

 Some of the parapets.

 Here are some of the halabards.  Those are the ones with the little ax on top.  Then there were ones with big axes, ones with hammers to bust open armor,  and ones with blades to chop things off.

 A view from the Keep.

 One of 4 courtyards.

And at the end of the chocolate tour, we got to taset all the chocolates.  The whole time going through the tour, I kept humming the song: "Oh we work all day at the Chocolate Factory..."

Switzeerland day 3- Bern

Don't talk to me about sleep last night.  I only caught it in bits and pieces.  I heard the church clock chime the 15 minutes and the hours. At about 3 am one of the cows decided to be alert and munching-- which meant lots of bell clanging.  I suppose you'd call it a "Heidi Experience" but I was not able to fully appreciate it.  The place has fantastic windows.  I closed them and the bell music dimmed to a murmur.

We had a good day today. We toured Bern-- saw the cathedral,

 The clock tower

 Lots of fountains.  The pull the water up from the river below the city-- so people could get water for their houses.  Then it runs back down to the river. This is of Moses.

 This is the tallest cathedral in Switzerland.

 We lunched here close to the river.

Scenes of Bern

We went to the used goods store and the knife store Sue and Steve like so much. We had salami, landiager, cheeses and bread for lunch in a nice park by the river.  The birds were most interested in any crumbs Sally dropped.

Then we went to Sue and Steve's and saw their apartment and the Institute building. By the end of the day we were tired puppies.

Sue and Steve came back to the apartment and had dinner with us.  Worst, Sauerkraut, Roesti (fried shredded potatoes), and mozzarella/tomato/basil/balsamic vinegar dressing salad.  Mmm. Tasty.  And SO SWISS.  Sue and Steve played their alphorns in the evening before going home.

Switzerland trip day 1-2

I thought I'd chronicle my trip to Switzerland with Mom. It's a bit laborious writing on my tablet. But since I am on the plane with 3 more hours to go... I have time.

 I arrived at Mom's Saturday evening and Cynthia and Jim met me at the airport. Steve had arrived shortly before. We chatted and headed to bed. Sunday we went to Mom's church. We had a good discussion in Sunday school.

We spent a little time talking about where people get their moral compass. The leader said he asked several people how they decided what was right. All said they thought about it and decided. None said they turned to the scriptures to find moral truths. I thought back to the middle ages when people only had the words of the priests. Wycliff sacrificed his life getting the scriptures into the hands of the common people in English. They risked death to be able to read them. And now we've gone full circle. People only listen to the ministers. They don't take time to read the truths for themselves. Sad.

 Monday we did laundry, packed, and got ready for our trip. My watch battery was dying, so we went to a battery shop and got a new one. Then there was this watch store close to it. So I wandered in and found a watch. It is like my Casio- with timer and stopwatch and alarm. But it was in gold! We were ready ahead of time, made good time to the airport, and had time for a bite to eat with Cynthia and Jim before they dropped us off at the airport.

The flight was long, but okay.  Any flight that lands safely is a good one.  They wheeled Mom from the plane, around to a beep-beep car, up and down three elevators, to a shuttle van, to the wheel chair and through immigration, baggage, and customs.  Sally and Steve and Steve and Kathy were waiting for us at the exit from customs.

We validated our rail pass and just made the train. Almost made Steve and Kathy head to the wrong track at the transfer in Bern, but the incoming train was delayed and all worked out. Sally and Steve were clever at getting the wheel chair folded for the train and open when we exited.  It was about a 5 minute walk from the train station to our apartments.

Ah.  Switzerland is beautiful!  It's hard to capture through a train window.

And here we have the music of the church chimming the quarter hour and hour and the cowbells active melody.

Fox Family Reunion

We've had a fabulous week.  It's amazing that you can get 16-18 adults and 24 children together and have a good time all the time.   I suppose individually some of the children had some unhappy times.  Some got scraped toes and knees.  But mostly everyone had a good time.  We played in the pool and hiked and played games and kids played with toys and enjoyed hanging out with each other.

We went to the Dutton Show courtesy of Dan M.  Some people made frequent trips to Sonic and to the thrift stores. Some went to the Butterfly Palace.  We spent two days at Silver Dollar City with two families.

We breakfasted on our own in our rooms-- theoretically.  In reality, our condo held the food and people passed through for pancakes, french toast, or muffins.  On Saturday, we ran out of pancake mix, so Adam got creative and mixed up a brownie mix.  Of course the brownie "pancakes" needed chocolate sauce for syrup.   They actually tasted very good!  Kind of like a brownie cookie cooked on the griddle.

Lunches we planned to serve in the pavilion, but after the first few days the leftovers took over and so it was easier to eat in shifts in our house.  Each family was assigned a dinner.  It worked great!

Here you see Callie and Delaney showing off their dance moves.


Friday when we arrived they had free hot dogs.  Saturday Deborah Made Cafe Rio chicken tostidos.  They were very tasty.  We used the leftovers sauce for our meal Sunday of Taco Salad.  Then we had chicken tacos and cornbread casserole and pizza and bbq pork sandwiches.  Each of us thought we wouldn't have enough food and each time we had lots of leftovers.

We had a fun, fun, time till our Daddy took the condos away!

I wanted to put up more photos, but they are all HIGH resolution and take lots of time to load.