Frankfurt

After church, we drove back up to Frankfurt to catch our next day flight.  We knew that the temple was being redone, but we got there and the entire façade was taken off and being redone.  They were also remodeling the grounds and probably the interior too.  We got to visit with some of the members as they walked out of the church building.

We caught this double rainbow as we chased the rain around the city.

We stayed in this hotel for the last night.  We kept saying that it looked liked a cruise ship.

Bern #6

Last day in Switzerland, we found the temple and went to the ward that meets on the temple grounds.  It was very fun to hear sacrament meeting in the swiss-german language.  I could understand some of it, but Seth and Dad both would translate phrases for me when I asked.  The first pictures that I have of the Swiss temple is when my Grandpa took his family there when my Dad was 8 or 9.

I tried to take this from the same angle that my Grandpa took 50 years ago.  There's now a very large tree that covers the back half or the temple... But it's fun to think that I was where he was a long time ago.

It was kind of fun to see this too.  We found a copy of Brad's book in the window of the store next to the church building.

Bern, Switzerland

Our last touristy stop was Bern.  It's known for it's Bears.  It also posts the oldest mechanical clock in Europe, a rose garden, a series of fountains from the 1500s, and us Mormons took time to go see the Bern temple too.  It was closed while we were there, as was the Frankfurt temple, but we went anyways.

 

Bern has Celtic and Roman roots.  It was made a free city state by the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II in the 1200s and is now one of the largest cities in Switzerland and ranked top 10 cities for highest quality of life in the world.  Old Town burnt down and was rebuilt in sandstone in the 1400s.  Bern has been keeping live bears since 1450.  Currently they have 3 of them.  We were able to find two and only take pictures of one because the other was sleeping in the trees.  I thought it was funny that he was using the tree to keep himself from sliding down the hill.  Seth said, "And here we see a bear at it's melting point."

I loved that he just stuck his paw back there like he was completely relaxed.

Heidelberg #6

One of the highlights from the last time I was in Germany was this Kathe Christmas store.  So fun to look at and very expensive. We did get an addition to my little tiny matchbox Christmas village.  I'm excited to see how it works out.

McKay, we found a store that on the front was all lederhosen and the cute dresses from Austria... and in the back was all camo, guns, knives, etc...  Seth found a bullet shaped energy drink. That was funny.

City building.

I loved this one!

This is The Church of the Jesuits.  The inside was all white with some gold decorations, but the organ was amazing.  We walked in while the organist was practicing.  The tone and acoustics were great.

There were 5 or 6 churches all within about a mile's walk... so we walked past them.

I thought this plaque was kind of fun.

In the Jesuit church.

This was my Dad's apartment in Heidelberg.  He said that they lived way out of downtown in the more modern part of the city.  He only came into town when investigators wanted to take them to see something on PDay.

Heidelberg #3

One of the other main features of the city is a stone bridge spanning the Rhine.  The first bridge was built by Romans, fell down eventually and rebuilt as a stone one.  The current bridge was opened in 1788.  Jer and I crossed the bridge three or four times... the second time over we noticed this on the side of it.  It marks flood lines and their years.  It's pretty cool.

Our last time over the bridge was at night.  I was pointing out the locks earlier in the day, I told Jer what the locks on bridges mean and he went out and bought us a lock.  We put our names on it and locked it on the bridge.  They had told us that they only light the castle for special occasions and that it wouldn't be lit, but we went out and it was.

This was one of 2 or 3 pictures with all of us in it.