DK hits a home run!

 You would think the end of a mission would be a time when you could back off and slow down a tiny bit.  I think most missionaries don't actually do that, but for us, it has been a tremendously busy time.  We are closing down the apartment where we have been for the last year and more.  The church won't need it, because they are putting our replacement couple in Celje.  Closing it down included showing it to new prospective renters.  We also had quite a few things that were passed to us from prior senior missionaries.  We try not to accumulate things we don't need, but it is overwhelming how much stuff we are moving to Celje and how much more is going into our suitcases, of which there are more than we brought with.

We also were busy arranging for the new apartment in Celje.  It was used by the last mission doctor we had, about 2 years ago, and has been vacant since then.  The family who own it, have had it going back into the late 1800s.  They love renting it to the church, because we pay on time, and take care of everything.

This is a corner of one of the two living rooms in the new apartment.  That is amazing woodwork on the coffee table, with rare and expensive woods.  The lamp is about 100 years old and is ready to crumble at the slightest touch.  But behind it is one of the amazing, old tile fireplaces they have here.  There are three in the apartment.  This one is about 7 feet tall.  You can see the grate at the bottom.  They are designed so you only put a few small pieces of wood into them and when they get hot the tiles radiate heat.  And they are gorgeous.

All the furniture is old, but it was hand made to order by the family.  It is far larger than any other senior missionary apartment in the mission, but the price must be good, because once we pointed it out to the office, they jumped all over it, and got a contract right over to the owners.

The elders were talking about what to call this apartment.  They kind of settled on "The Celje Mansion", but Sister Ashurst is campaigning for "The Villa".

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We have been saying goodbye to the young missionaries as we see them for the past week.  But today we said goodbye to the members of the Maribor Branch.  Some of them drove for more than an hour to be there and hear what we had to say.  I spoke about 1st Corinthians 13, and how much I love all of them.  Sister Ashurst told them of a dream she had about thousands of Slovenes joining the church.

The best part of it all was that DK will be called as a counselor in the Branch Presidency.  He has wanted more responsibility from the beginning and finally it is coming to him.  He is ecstatic about it.  The current branch president is also very excited, because he is hoping to train up someone who can take over for him.  He has been branch president of a bout 15 years, needs a break.

We have a special relationship with DK.  We were there for his very first lesson by the missionaries.  I was privileged to be able to baptise him.  And we have had him in our home almost every week since we first met him.  Sometimes we just visit, but he usually has a question or two that lead to discussions about how the church works.  He is still eager to learn more.  I am sure we will have an ongoing friendship with home:  HERE WE COME!!

White Christmas

 Thursday, Liz had an appointment to see the orthopedic surgeon in Zagreb to get her stitches removed, etc.  Fortunately, it was for 4:00 pm, because we woke up to about 4" of snow on the ground and more falling.  At about 10:30, the sisters called to ask me if I could help them get to the train station with their luggage - one is going to Zagreb in preparation for her return home, and the other is going to Ljubljana to form a trio with a companionship of sisters there.  When I got back, I noticed that a significant part of the snow had already melted on the roads, while at the same time the snow level had increased to more like 6".  Not true on the sidewalks - they are a mass of slush and ice.  However, we decided to make the trip to Zagreb.  I was nervous about it, especially when it started to snow again.

The snow on the trees is very heavy.

As we climbed onto the small range of mountains betwwen Slovenia and Croatia, the snow increased, but the roads were little more than wet.  At the very peak, there was a short stretch where I felt the tires slip a couple of times, but we had no trouble with it, to speak of.  After clearing customs and heading back downhill, the roads got better and there was a lot less snow.  By the time we got to Zagreb, it was just a powdering.

  We stopped at the church and dropped off some Christmas things for various missionaries and to watch some of the lip synching performances - we had missed it during our conference the week before.

The surgeon took out the stitches and told us everything was fine, except that he wanted Liz to keep the brace on for 6 weeks, but after 3 we could increase the range of motion to 60 degrees, instead of the current 30 degrees of motion.

We went prepared to stay the night in Zagreb, if we needed to.  But everything looked OK outside, so we took off for home.  I have admit that I was very stressed about the slush on the roads, and the worry about the temperature dropping below freezing  - but it never did.  We drove home without incident.

Friday, I had to run some errands, and we had to get serious about packing up all our junk.

This is the bridge next to our apartment.  I was trying to get a photo through the windshield to show the snow after 24 hours.  This one also shows how much Slovenes love to walk.  The packed snow was slippery and the air was frigid - near zero, but look how many people are out there.  The bridge leaves one exposed to the full force of any winds and the chill factor is large.

I went into Center to pick up a special bakery order Liz made.  It wasn't ready, but I did take some shots of Center.

Looking East at the little shelters in the Christmas Market, and the big tree in the center of the roundabout.

This is the City building with the infamous balcony where Hitler spoke.

And this is looking West, towards the Maribor Hotel with stripes where their huge skylights let out the heat.

Today, we did more packing and moved the last of the stuff that is staying with the mission to the new apartment in Celje.  We are debating whether to call that apartment "The Vila", or "The Celje Mansion".  It is an older building, furnished with marvelous antiques.  Despite that, it is quite nice and has modern appliances and other touches, including the largest refrigerator in the mission.

This coffee table in the living room is worth a fortune!  It is incredibly difficult to find wood like this!  And it was masterfully incorporated into the table.

This is the bedroom.  It has an oversized King bed in the middle of a room that is about 40' long, by 15 feet wide.

On the way home tonight, we joined a Zoom call with all Liz's siblings.  We do this every week, but tonight's  was the last one while on our mission.   In a few minutes, there is another Zoom call with all the senior missionaries.  This one is strictly social, and we all love it.   It, too, will be our last.

Tomorrow we will give our fairwell talks to the Maribor Branch.  

We have two more days.

More adventures as our departure nears

 

The castle in Varazdin.

Before we came, I surfed the internet to try to figure out what life on our mission would be like.  One of the people I talked to mentioned the white castle in Varazdin.  I found a photo of it looking up the main road in town with this white castle at the end.  Seeing that castle was high on my to-do list.  But, COVID changed everything and we never got a chance to go there until just the past few months.  We went there  in August because the main border crossings into Croatia had big delays, up to several hours, while the small crossing near Varazdin had wait times counted in minutes, although slightly out of our way.  When we drove through the flatlands into Varazdin, I finally got to see the castle, and found it to be unremarkable.  To begin with, we have seen hundreds of castles while here.  This one is attractive in itself, but the setting is not particularly enticing.  So, my reaction was, "Ngha."

Contrast that with the cathedral in Celje.  It is across the street from the LDS church, right next to the police headquarters.  It is part of a continuous row of large buildings, which makes it extremely inconspicous.  We enjoy seeing these old churches, partly because we both read a book centered around building cathedrals while we've been here - "The Pillars of the Earth" by Ken Follet.  So, we were waiting for the young missionaries one day and decided to go inside the Celje Cathedral.

It is closed off, so you can't go all the way inside except when they are conducting services.  The remarkable chandeliers, and use of extensive, but focused, gold leaf are remarkable.  More subtle is the extensive carvings on the ends of the pews.  It was very difficult to see the art work, but I did not see anything about St. George, which is unusual.

MAJOR MEDICAL

Last week we were in our preparation for departure, which is making us frantic to get everything done.  We had a packed schedule, including giving our farewell reports to the missionaries on a mission-wide zoom call, and had a Christmas Conference in Zagreb on Thursday and Friday, which only made it more intense.  

Wednesday evening, Liz bent over to clean something off the floor and felt a pain in her knee - the one that hasn't been giving her trouble.  When she stood up, it hurt quite a lot, and as the evening passed the pain got worse.  She took both Tylenol and Advil and went to bed hoping it would feel better in the morning. 

It was not better in the morning, and she needed both my cane and my supporting arm to get down to the car for the trip to Zagreb.  That didn't do my bad knee any favors, but we managed it.  When we joined the conference in Zagreb, it was obvious Liz needed professional help.  She and Sister Field conferred and selected a private clininc, and we immediately drove there, after having the sisters unload the food we'd brought.

The clinic was awesome and we met an orthopedic specialist who examined Liz and had X-rays and MRIs taken.  He diagnosed it as a burst meniscus.  He said it will not get better, and if left untreated it would get much worse.  He recommended immediate arthroscopic surgery.  We agreed and he decided to stay a little longer at the hospital the next day so he could schedule her.  They gave her a pair of crutches, and we returned to the party to find most of the food already gone.  We got some ham and some salad, and  the senior sisters had saved us the last pieces of Liz's carrot cake.  Nice sisters.

We were going to stay in the Mission Home (the "palace"), but it has stairs of uneven height.  We made a reservation at a hotel after Sister Field told us to submit the receipt for reimbursement by the mission.  It was a nice hotel with elevators and we got a reasonably good night's sleep.

The next morning, we drove to the surgical hospital owned by the same private clinic where we had seen the doctor.  Strangely, that surgery is located in Krapinske Toplice, which is almost half way back to Maribor.  It is a tiny little town in an out-of-the-way corner of Croatia.

First thing, they gave me a phone number on a slip of paper.  Then they told me was to go away and call back after 2:00 to see if she was ready.

The yellow building across the car park is the Surgical hospital.

I got some breakfast and drove over to Krapina (pronounced CRAP-eena) to check out the Neanderthal museum there, only to find it closed for the season.  I was looking forward to seeing a cave where cave-men lived, but no luck.

By 2:00, I was sitting in the foyer of the surgery, and when I called the number on the slip of paper, the nurse told me to call Liz directly and she'd tell me all I needed to know.  That was rude, I thought.  Liz was getting physical therapy and had an hour to go.  It turned out to be more like 2 hours.  I saw the surgeon as he was leaving, and he told me the meniscus was oversize, so he cut off some before he sewed it back together.  Also there was a lot of damage to ligaments, which he repaird while he was in there.  Also, she had a stray tendon stretched across the knee cap, so he cut it out.  Wonderful.  In the US they probably would have scheduled another surgery for those other things.

Finally she came out with her leg bandaged and fitted to a brace whose purpose is to prevent her bending her leg too much.  She will have to wear it for at least 2 weeks, which puts her wearing it on the plane home.

We had to drive back to the Zagreb church to pick up the Maribor sisters, and load up dishes, gifts etc.  By the time we left it was dark.  After we left town I noticed the lights were pointed way too low.  I had noticed this before, but now with a full load, it was bad.  I could get by when there were other cars around, but once out in the country it was not enough light to go highway speed.  I slowed down a lot and still felt uncomfortable with how little I could see.  

SO,  here we are, closing the apartment (the next senior couple will be quartered in Celje) and finishing our packing, with Liz hobbling around.

Last Monday was P-Day, and the missionaries had permission to go to a movie, Sing 2.  The talking was all in Croatian, which the young missionaries thought was a great immersive language school.  Fortunately for me, I've seen Sing and the plot is similar.  And most of the movie is music, which was in English.

In the theater lobby they had this photo Op wall set up.  Sisters King and Chandler, and Elders Pollock and Kjeldsen were still excited from the movie.

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Too Old to learn new tricks?

Over the last week, I've been thinking about those low headlights.  It occurred to me that we had the whole front panel of the car replaced not too long ago.  So, yesterday I drove back to the service center to demand they adjust the lights.  When the service manager heard what I wanted he gave a big smile and said he could help me.  He took me out to the car, turned on the lights and showed me a little wheel-control in the dash above my left knee.  It is for adjusting the headlights when the car is loaded.  Who knew?  So, today we are returning to Zagreb for Liz's follow-up exam, and we will have fully functional headlights.  Hurray!

Who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks?

And, finally, I took a photo of another Sloveneian bee house along the way to the service center.

This bee house is on stilts, but the legs are not built into the beehouse.  The house is sitting on a frame.

I assume the whole house can be loaded onto a truck and moved.

Getting trunkie

 We are definitely getting trunkie - definition:  overwhelming desire to pack up my trunk and go home.  At this time, we have just over 2 weeks to go.

November 1     -     The day after Halloween is Day of the Dead, in this part of the World.  It is much like our Memorial Day in the USA.  People visit the graveyards where their ancestors are buried.  The main difference is that people here are very serious about maintaining the gravesites.  And of course, they go overboard on putting candles on them.

These photos are of the big cemetery in Maribor.  It is a huge cemetery

In addition to putting out candles (some electric, some oil burning, some actual candles) families spend an hour or two maintaining the graves.  They bring soap, water, and rags or brushes to wash down the stones and make them sparkly clean.  They clean up the site.  They bring fresh flowers.  It is amazing how much time and effort they put into it.  Of course, people are buried in crypts, so each headstone may have 5-10 names listed on it.

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Besides this, we have been hearing more and more about the Pacific Islanders who are stranded in Croatia, because the Islands are closed to travel, even by its own citizens.  If you are planning a trip to Tahiti, that's bad news.  So our islanders have completed their initial missions, but can't go home.  

This group is from Tonga, but the biggest group is from the Republic of Kiribati, whose biggest island is Tarawa.  They are singing songs from their home.  The Sisters are wearing T-shirts from Barbados, because that was where they served their mission.  The islands won't let them return while COVID is raging.  They went from there to The Dominican Republic in hopes they could get home from there.  Finally, they came to Zagreb because we have been the most successful at getting people in and out of Europe during the pandemic.  

We have a hotel in Zagreb we have mostly taken over for missionaries coming and going.  The ones coming into Europe come here for their quarantine period while continuing their language training.  Those can be rather large groups like the 40 or so missionaries about to go on to Russia in a few days.  But these poor Kiribatians, and Tongans, and Tahitians are just stuck here.  So they do missionary work with the missionaries who are assigned here, and we try to keep their spirits up.

We took the sisters out towards Murska Sobota last Tuesday (Nov. 23) to visit a beekeeping museum.  Of course I was interested in that.

This is the start of the museum.  It is run by a youngish couple.  The husband saw this octagon bee house abandoned on a property on his way to work.  He asked if they would give it to him, and after some persistence they did.  He moved it here and stabilized it.  The actual bee homes are the smaller German style instead of the Slovene style, so it is just for show.

The grounds have several buildings set in a garden with trees and flowers.  Very nice.

One of several bee sheds on stilts, just outside the grounds.  I like this one because they painted the hives to look like honeycomb with bees on it.  There is another one built on a small trailer, b ut it is pretty run down, so I didn't bother to photograph it.

This is inside the octagonal building, showing the old-fashioned hives.  These are smaller than the is now standard, and the frames of honeycomb fit in it so they are across the entrance - making it so to get the one farthest in, you have to remove all the rest of them.  Slovenes now put them in front to back, so each one can be removed.  They also have some even older straw bee "keps".  They weave the straw to make a shell, then cover it with cow manure.  The bees happily move in and make honey.  To remove the honey, you have to destroy the kep and hope the bees will move into the new kep nearby.

Some traditional bee boards.  The one of a town along the river is particularly impressive.

There were a lot of old extractors, as well as other tools and machines.

This is inside the main museum building where the lady is showing the sister missionaries and Liz a set of frames with photos of the frames of a hive.  These are common in the US, too, and are used for teaching people about hives without exposing them to wild bees.  It's hard to see, but just beyond Liz is a glass wall enclosing an are where live bees are kept.  You can just see the tops of a couple of hives built into the wall.  On the right are books for sale as well as tools and other touristy stuff.

This wooden portrayal of a bee was hanging on the wall of the gift shop.  It is nicely done, although not quite anatomically correct.

Bronchiitis? Pneumonia? COVID?

 For the past 10 years or so I have enjoyed a bout of Bronchitis during the winter.  At first it was just an annoying cough that lasted a month or 6 weeks.  The third time I had it, I was driving the car along a major road - a good road in good weather, going straight ahead on a level path.  While driving along, I realized that I was out of breath.  That's not normal!  So, I went to my doctor.  He told me I had bronchitis AND pneumonia.  He prescribed an antibiotic for the pneumonia.  Bronchitis is harder to fix.  I got an expectorant, and an inhaler.  The expectorant didn't seem to have any noticeable affect, but the doctor assured me it would help clear it up.  The inhaler wasn't any fun - it burned my lungs every time.  Not too bad, and only for a half hour or so, but it was uncomfortable.  It did seem to help, though and the bronchitis got gradually better until I was back to normal.  

So, the bronchitis has reoccured every year.  The pneumonia has only come back 3 or 4 times.

When we came on our mission, I told the mission doctor about it and when I got bronchitis last year he put me on an expectorant and an inhaler straight away.  Then I got pneumonia too, and he gave me an antibiotic.  I told him I hated taking antibiotics, because they always mess up my GI tract.  But that is better than having pneumonia, so I took it and three months later my GI tract was nearly back to as good as it gets.

This year I got both of them again, and I am just recovering.  The pneumonia this year was as bad as any I've had.  I'd get up to get a drink of water - maybe 30 feet away - and I would be wheezing and gasping for air.  I had high fever and chills, the whole nine yards.

The worry about these last two bouts is that if I were to contract COVID while I had bronchitis and/or pneumonia (B&P), I would be starting with 2 strikes on me.  It would be very serious, indeed!

Fortunately, a week before I got this year's B & P, we got our third COVID shot, the booster.

I think the writing is on the wall.  When I die, it is most likely to be the result of lung issues.  So I'l take every vaccination I can get, lots of vitamins, etc. and pray for protection.

DK

 DK has been an amazing member.  He joined the church about a year ago and has been on fire to learn more and do more in the church.

As his one-year date approached, the Branch President asked Liz and I to teach him the Temple Preparation lessons.  He loved it, and can't wait to go and get his endowments.  But as the time came to interview him for his temple recommend, the Slovenian government imposed a new restriction on meetings, including church meetings.  We are required to post someone at the door and ensure that each person entering the building has one of three things:  a certification of vaccination for COVID, a doctor's certificate of having recovered from COVID, or a PCR test result showing no infection, within the last 48 hours.  And we still have to wear masks.

The members here do not trust their government, and the COVID vaccines come from the government.  They don't trust anything the government wants them to do, so many of them refuse to do any of the things the government is doing to limit COVID-19.  The restriction came suddenly and there was active protest.  Many of the members have chosen to stay home and watch Sacrament meetings over Zoom, rather than comply, including DK.  Well, we have counted Zoom attendance as church attendance since the COVID restrictions first started.

However, in DK's case the local leaders decided that if DK won't get vaccinated or get tested, and therefor can't attend church and partake of the Sacrament, he isn't worthy to hold a temple recommend.  And that is when I got sideways on this issue.  Temple recommends are highly structured.  There is a series of questions that must be asked of a member before you can issue a recommend.  The instructions are very clear that you must not skip any questions, and must not add any of your own.  Further, it says you should not express opinions about the questions or omission of anything you think should be included.  My take on it is that the leaders should not deny a recommend to DK, because it is not included in any of the recommend questions.  I argued for DK, and finally escalated it to the mission president.

He took the position that while they can't add a new requirement in the interview, they don't have to interview anybody they don't feel is worthy to attend the temple.  So, DK was out.  For now.  I tried to convince him that the vaccination is a good thing and he would get his recommend if he would comply.  No dice.  He says nobody is going to force him to get it.

When General Conference came around (first weekend of October), the people speaking Macedonian complained that the translator was doing a very poor job, and the word went out to find a replacement ASAP.  DK was born in Slovenia, but his parents are Macedonian and speak that language.  DK speaks Macedonian, English, and Slovenian fluently, so the District President asked him to help.  DK was happy to help and did a great job on the second day of the conference.  So good, that the church officially offered to hire him to translate church materials.  That was great news because he has been having trouble finding a job.  The hickup is that the church requires the translator to hold a current temple recommend.

But then the Slovene government decided that self tests would be sufficient to attend meetings.  They are inexpensive and easy.  DK got one and attended the Branch Conference, based on passing the self test.  Hurray!  So, now he has met all the requirements, real and imagined, and has passed his first temple recommend interview.  He still has to get the second interview and then he will be able to get the job.

And, he also wants to go to the temple.  We have already told him we will be happy to take him to the temple, which we should be able to do because we were involved in teaching him, and he wants me to be his guide.

Everything is now perfect, right?  Yes, except that during all this drama, COVID has increased here and in order to go to the temple in Frankfurt or Rome, unvaccinated residents of Slovenia now have to be quarantined for two weeks upon entering the country.  None of us are willing to endure that to go there.  And that is where it stands today.  We don't know when we will be able to get him to the temple, but at least he will have his recommend so he will be ready.  And he will have his new job.

It really feels to us like we have been battling for DK for months now and that the opposition has been strong and unrelenting.  We are making progress, but it has been so slow and difficult.  We are discouraged, because it isn't clear that we will be able to take him before we go home.  But we keep battling.

Angela, Ruth, and Haley arrive! October 15

 Angela and Ruth, with Haley, planned their trip to the Adriatic area, with some advise from us.  We decided that Lake Bled is the obvious choice to begin, mostly because it is near the Ljubljana Airport, which is not that close to Ljubljana.

We enjoyed staying at Vila Bled (Marshall Tito's summer home) with Bill and Barbara, so we decided to stay there again.   The girls were due to land in the evening, and our car was finished at the repair place that afternoon.  So, we drove our old, stick-shift, loaner car to Ptui and traded it for our shiny Hyundai.  What a relief!  I grew up with stick shift vehicles, and we had them exclusively until about the time Nancy was born, and both stick and automatic for many years after.  But I soon learned that the muscle memory for driving with a stick had alzheimers.

So we got our Hyundai back and drove straight to Vila Bled and checked in.  The girls were due by 9:00 pm.  As the sun went down, I took my Nikon out to get some photos during the golden hour.

The island.  From the veranda of Vila Bled, I got a good view of the steps leading up to the chapel.  Clouds were lowering, so the normal view of the Julian Alps is covered with cloud in this shot.

And the castle at the far end of the lake seems to almost reach up to the clouds.

At about 7:30, we decided to go down to the restaurant and get ourselves some dinner.  We ordered, and then Sam and I both recognized the voices in the foyer.  The girls had arrived!

It is hard to explain the emotions running wild in me at that moment.  I got both my daughters in a bear hug and just held on.  I didn't even let go to take a selfie.  Oh, happy day!!!

We had their luggage taken up to their room, while we all went back into the restaurant.  Soon we got our food, and the girls ordered theirs.   I had ordered prime rib with vegetables.   I don't know what you call the green sauce on the meat, but it was absolutely wonderful.  And the vegetables were just the way I like them.  

We had a great visit with them, but, of course, they were jet-lagged and almost dopey from their long flight.  So, we visited for a while after dinner and then they headed off to get some sleep.

Next morning, we all met for breakfast, and then headed to the lake.  The plan of the day was to see Lake Bled.  Then Sam and I would leave together and I would drop him off at the airport, then I continued on to Maribor.  Branch Conference was that weekend, and I had to be there in the morning.  Meanwhile, Liz and the girls would go on a grand tour of Istria and Croatia before joining me back in Maribor, about a week later.  I was sad to be separated, so I tried to get some value out of our Lake Bled day together.

I am not sure why this ended up being a commercial for Coke Zero, but there you go.  We talked to the driver of the Pletna Boat and decided to get our ride out to the island in the afternoon.  You might notice that everybody was happy.  We all had a great time, including Sam.

We walked all along the side of the lake, but there are SO many places to stop and take photos, or just stare, that we were all spread out.  Then we'd gather up, and pretty soon we'd all be spread out again. 

They all wanted to walk all the way round the lake, but I was only good for the walk to the city end of the lake.  

There is a particular place with this view of the castle and church and boathouses and mountain.  I've had my eye on it, but never had a chance to take photos with the tripod at this location, until just then.  Notice that the clouds had lifted, leaving behind snow.  I probably have a couple hundred photos of this place, and I still can't resist taking more.

We stopped for the obligatory photo in the Bled heart.  Sam tried to escape, but I got him!

And the girls then settled down for a serious portrait.

I told everyone I was good for the walk to the bee house at the head of the lake, and this is it.  I wanted to show it to my prospective beekeeping daughter.  It was barely into the 60's, but the bees were working, to my surprise.

Liz, too, wanted to be a beekeeper for the day, so she posed by the bear.

And then she insisted that I pose with my very favorite oldest daughter, of whom I am very proud (in a good way.)  After that, I went back and they continued on to circumnavigate.

This is the view of the church from the bee house.  It is a pretty church, in a fabulous location.

Ruth noticed this fountain along the side of the lake in an out-of-the-way place.  I had never noticed it before.  Clearly not many people do notice it.  I'm sure it used to be very nice, but now it has become quaint - which is not a bad thing.

On my way back to the Vila, I stopped to take some art photos, and just enjoy a beautiful day in a beautiful location.

The others got back to the hotel at about the same time as I did (because I doddled along with my cane and sore foot and knee), after having had a grand time walking around the lake.  We had lunch together, and spent some time looking at all the relics in the hotel from the days of Tito's Communism.  Then it was time for Sam and I to leave.

I dropped Sam at the airport, even though I wanted to leave him at a nearby hotel, because his flight wasn't until the next morning.  Then I had a lonely drive home.  As I drove along the wonderful scenery between Ljubljana and Maribor, I felt sad that our daughters would not see that part of Slovenia during daylight.  We drive the route frequently, and never cease to marvel at it.

The girls spent another night in Vila Bled, before heading south to the Istrian Peninsula, then on to Rijeka and Hreljin for family contacts with the Benac relatives who live there.  Then they drove down the Dalmatian coast, visiting Plitvice Falls, Zadar, Split, Krka Falls, and Dubrovnik, before returning to Maribor on Saturday  evening.  On Sunday, Ruth spoke in Sacrament meeting and ended by singing.  Then Angela spoke.  D.K. translated for both of them.  It was a good ending to an epic vacation for them, and a wondrous reunion for us.

On a previous trip we had some time to kill and wandered along the edge of the mountains north of the Ljubljana airport.  We saw a castle at the edge of the wooded hill a ways off the road, so we drove up there and found that it is now a hotel.  So that is where we stayed on the girls final night in Slovenia.  Actually, Ruth had an earlier flight and I took her to the airport that afternoon, and then Angela and Haley the next morning.

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As we left Maribor, we had an adventure that I want to share.  When the girls arrived in Maribor, a light came on in their car saying that a tire was low.  When we left town, I was riding with Ruth in the car she rented for their stay, while Liz had Angela and Haley with her.  As we analyzed the tire situation, we realized it was more serious than we'd thought, so we stopped at a rest stop just outside Maribor, to pump some air into the tire.  At first, I thought it was a slow leak, and that we could stop for air a time or two along the way, and it would be fine.  As I pumped air, two men who were eating lunch nearby came over and offered to help.  One of them was carrying a little boy in his arms.

They could hear the air escaping from the tire, but my hearing is such that I couldn't hear a thing.  They found the hole and it was a significant hole.  So we decided to change the tire and mount the spare.  The three of us worked together and got it done in good time and without too much drama.  The guy with the little boy held his child the entire time, even though he was working on the tire along with us.  When we were done, I offered to give them 10 euros for their help and one of them said, "No, it is good for men to do things to help other people.  It makes us better men."  The other one agreed enthusiastically.

Wow!  What an awesome thing for them to say!  What amazing men they were!  I wish I could have talked to them more, but by then Ruth was very worried about getting to her flight on time.

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The castle where we stayed that final night is only the gatehouse of a grand castle built in the 1300's.  It belonged to people in the old Yugoslav royal family from some time in the 18th century until the final owners passed away some 30-40 years ago.  The government then bought it and turned it into a museum and hotel.

This is the castle from down on the fields below.  The moat is just beyond the row of white posts.

A closer view, with the moat just visible at the bottom of the hill.

This the view looking down from the gate, near the courtyard on the uphill side of the castle.

The view entering the courtyard from the back side.

Grad Strmol.  Grad meaning castle, and Strmol is the name of the royal family who occupied the place for many centuries.

This large room is used for government and corporate meetings on occasion.  The current management had the table built especially for this room.

In the entryway there are rows of antlers, artwork, and relics.  One of the most interesting is this stuffed alligator.  The lady who lived here before the government bought it, kept this alligator as a pet.  One day it bit her, so she had it stuffed.  It is about 5 feet long, or maybe a bit longer.

This photo of her is hanging just outside her bedroom, and it shows her holding her pet alligator.  Clearly it was much smaller when the photo was taken.  It is an unusual relationship, but the gator seems fat and happy.  I think it would be a bad idea to give it a kiss on the lips, though.

I took many photos of the antique furniture in the castle.  This is a good example.  It has wonderful inlaid woods.  The level of craftsmanship is superb, and it would have been an expensive piece at any time.  The style indicates the French style of around the time of Marie Antoinette.

Liz was very impressed with this piece.  Besides being atractive, it is full of secret compartments and drawers.  Liz had just pushed the little pillar above her hand aside to reveal the row of little drawers.

This painting and the next are in the room where Angela and Haley stayed.  It is kind of a "Where's Waldo" style, with numerous little scenes of people, many of whom are caricatures, but mostly they seem to portray significant events.  I'd say it's a painting to help teach history, but I don't really know.

  I had trouble taking a photo without the light glaring off it.

This one is on the opposite wall from the first one.

I had to get up very early to take Angela and Haley to the airport.  I returned to bed for a while, then we went down for breakfast.  What a spread!  I told the woman who served us that it was too much for two people, and she said it was OK, because everybody working there got to eat.

Video doesn't seem to upload properly, so I put a photo below.

This door knocker/harp is built into the door to the dining room.  I assume it was to announce the arrival of the Lord and Mistress when they were ready to eat.

This is the balcony where our rooms were located.  Liz and I stayed in the closest one, while Angela and Haley were in the next one.

This was our bedroom.  Even the footboard had fancy inlaying.  The inlaid flooring was also pretty impressive.

This entertainment center was impressive.  It was built in the USA in the 1920's.  The turntable pulls out of the cabinet.  It works, although it needs a new needle.

The radio lights up, but doesn't play anymore.  The label indicates that there are several bands available.  One says, "Police & Amateur".  Others are "Longwave", "Ultra Shortwave", and 2 ranges labeled "Foreign Shortwave".  The manufacturer is "Scott     the Stradivarius of Radio".

  The woodwork was nice, but probably the most plain wood of any piece in the house.

On the way home, we stopped in Ljubljana to do apartment inspections - a monthly chore.  I noticed this on the wall of one of them.

I include this here to remind me of the names of missionaries with whom we have worked.

And then we went home to resume our normal missionary life.