Walks around Maribor

We are loving this beautiful town of Maribor, Slovenia.  We are so blessed to have an apartment that overlooks the river Drava.  A major tradition throughout this area is the locking of padlocks on bridges and in this case heart art work, to "lock" your love and throw the key into the river. These hearts rest in front of our apartment and yes we locked our love!







This is the cute little alley leading from the main road to our apartment by the river. Talk about charm!










The river Drava is crossed with about five bridges just within our range of vision.  One by railroad, one walking only bridge and three car bridges. It's a slow moving quiet river and with the ducks, geese, gulls, and swans swimming past, it brings a peaceful feel to many people who walk along the river trail.






Walking about town there are several unique and beautiful buildings. One of our favorites is this corner hotel, which displays beautiful architecture and charm.

We love the beautiful green of this Posta...post office and the yellow of the University of Maribor Administration Office.

This is the ballet and opera house  and our landlord's wife who is the prima ballerina. We have been enjoying the benefits of reduced ticket sales, and attending as many culture events as we can.  What a treat!









We've been trying out some of the local restaurants and found a couple of favorites.  These are "kebobs", a pita-like toasted sandwich, with shaved meats, vegetables and dressing.  Very yummy!

In the center of town is a statue monument dedicated to six saints, to which the townspeople prayed for intercession of the 1680 plague epidemic that claimed a third of the city's population.




Our Beautiful swans are laying their eggs and this one choose to build it's nest right next to the sidewalk...Nice for us so we can watch it happen.  Hopefully the dogs and cats will leave her alone.  The city workers put up caution tape around the nest to keep inquisitive humans away from the mother.  The father swan kept a dedicated guard around her while she was laying her 7 eggs.  Now that she is sitting, he is just in the area and will trade places with her to keep them warm, while she eats.  They will be "on the nest" for 35-40 days.


This is the Maribor Castle.  Not a traditionally looking castle, but non the less, it was a residence to a royal family at one time.  On this flag covered porch, Hitler stood in 1941 and declared to "make this land German again".  Nazi Germany then began mass expulsions of Slovenes to the Independent State of Croatia, and Serbia.  By the end of the war Maribor was the most war damaged major town of Yugoslavia.

Above the city, rests the hill Pyramid, where once there rested a castle in the 11th century.  Today there are only ruins to view but a short hike can bring you to the top and a fantastic view of the city below.  Surrounding the hill are rows and rows of grape vines, where every year people gather to harvest the Pyramid hill grapes for making of a special wine.





Speaking of grape vines.  Next to our apartment is the 400 year old, famous Guinness World Book of Records, longest living grape vine growing.  Tour buses stop to view and appreciate a taste of their famous wines.






Maribor is also known for its football (soccer) team, wining domestic title 14 times, and it's handball club and winter sports.  Every January the Maribor Pohorje Ski Resort hosts the women's slalom and giant slalom races for the Alpine Skiing World Cup.  Also in 2012 it hosted the World Youth Chess Championship game.

We are enjoying working in this beautiful, historic town and hope to finish out our mission here.  But you never know...transfers are coming up again soon!

Single Senior Conference - April 2018

As part of our mission assignments, we plan and conduct a two day Single Senior Conference (ages 31+) held over night at the Mission Home In Zagreb.  Along with several other senior missionaries, we plan learning and fun opportunities for the older singles from the five countries in our mission...Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia, Croatia, Slovenia. 




This April conference we had 25 members and some non members attend. Our theme was "Faith in Every Footstep", living a life, that if we followed the footstep of Jesus Christ, they will lead us home.  Among other spiritual lessons, we talked about attending the temple and showed several short films about the building of the Rome, Italy temple, which is about an 8 hour drive away.  We were fortunate enough to be able to give them some of the extra leaves which were prepared for the stained glass windows of the Rome Temple. 

I think everyone had a great time, and even one couple, started dating while the conference was going on! 

Italy: Venice - Florence - Rome

In the middle of March, my two sisters, Lana & Trudy came to visit!  We were excited to show them around some of our favorite mission tourist sites as well as visit our branch and interact with the members and missionaries.  We were so happy they could come.  Most of the sites we took them to I have already posted about so I won't repeat them but we received special permission to leave the mission and take them to the Rome Airport for their flight home.

We left on a Sunday afternoon and drove straight to Venice, Italy.







The city of Venice began around 400 A.D. when the first people began filling the Lagoon with rocks and soil to build a safe place to escape to when attacked from the main land.  For centuries these people had enjoyed prosperous lives along the mainland, but with the collapse of the Roman Empire barbarians swept down from the north and their communities were thrown into chaos.

About 450 A.D. a large number of them decided to settle permanently in the lagoon. Venice eventually became a financial success where merchants set up storage rooms with large palaces above to house their incoming goods and entertain their families and friends.  Large merchant ships sailed in laden with rich cargo.

Now most goods are delivered by UPS on their very own water cargo boat.


There are over 400 bridges in Venice, but only about 4-5 cover across the Grand Canal.

Today the city is mainly for tourists and the city is sinking at a slow rate of 2 mm a year.  Often at high water, parts of the city are flooded for a period of time.  We were told that a lot of the citizens of Venice are moving out, because of the difficulties of getting around and the lack of space to raise a family.  Soon it will truly be "just for tourists"!





We did have dinner at a restaurant along the Grand Canal, rode the water bus, visited the glass blowing factory for Murano Glass, and walked many of the small narrow streets of Venice.  What a fun day!
























Next day on to Florence, Italy where a three hour stop over took us on a tour of Accademia Gallery, with a history lesson on how the Renaissance began.  The Gallery hosts many famous statues as well as art and artifacts but the most famous must be Michelangeo's Statue of David.






Michelangelo was only 26 years old when he was commissioned by the Cathedral Works Committee to sculpt a large scale statue of David, the Biblical hero, in 1501. They gave him a leftover single and neglected marble block from Carrara mountain quarries in Tuscany, Italy. It took him three years working mostly in secret before he presented it to the committee, who then felt it was too large (17 feet) to display in the cathedral where it would be too high for anyone to see, so they put it in the town square.  The original now rests in the Gallery.

Leaving Florence amid slow moving, heavy traffic, we finally reach the freeway and sailed smoothing towards our next stop.  On the north east side of Rome, rest the beautiful construction site for the LDS Rome Temple

We were pretty excited to turn off the freeway, roll underneath a small bridge and curl around the corner to this beautiful sight.  The Rome temple was announced nearly 10 years ago and construction problems and labor issues have plagued it along the way.








It is almost finished and we were hoping they would allow us to at least walk on the grounds but no go.  Lana even flirted with the security guard, but to no avail.  NO ONE IS ALLOW, was strictly enforced.  We were excited to hear, on our way home, that Church Headquarters announced it would be opening next year, in January 2019.  Definitely a return trip could be in order!




One our way to Rome, Italy...

Back in the car, and a short 20 minute drive on the freeway we found our hotel. The La Roccetta B&B, which would be our base for the next three nights.  It was a little difficult to find but well worth the diligence and "recalculating" of the Garmin.  We had wonderful front desk help with our plans for visiting Rome and catching the right train and metro to see all that Rome had to offer.  We had our own personal chef, which took great delight in planning "something special" for us after our exhausting days in the city.

Starting early the next day, with a 10 minute walk to the train station, we changed to the downtown metro system where getting off at our first stop was the Rome Colosseum.

Construction on this amphitheater began in A.D. 72, and it was a marvel of engineering since its enormous weight rested in a swamp on artificial supports. The completed stadium was dedicated by Titus in A.D. 80. Covered with marble, it could hold 80,000 spectators who watched games that nearly rendered extinct many species of animals from the Roman Empire (www.frommers.com)

The Arch of Constantine, stands near the Colosseum and commemorates Roman Emperor Constatine's victory over the Roman tyrant Maxentius in 313 A.D. Spectators would pass through on their way into the colosseum.

Then began a series of ancient ruins, titled Imperial Forums.  The remains of grand buildings and monuments to past Emperors:  Forum of Julius Caesar, Forum of Augustus, Forum of Vespasian, Temple of Venus and Roma.











A quick dash across town brought us to the Fountain of Trevi, and we did the traditional "tossing of coins" in the fountain. Throw one coin over your right shoulder will ensure you return to Rome one day. 







We had purchased a "skip the line" tour for the Vatican but because it was Easter weekend, all lines were terribly long.  It was wall to wall people throughout the tour, which took away some of the fun and grandeur of the Vatican Museum, but we were able to cross that off our list of sites to see.

Too many wonders to talk about here and to much history and art to remember but amazing sites, sounds and memories.

Finishing out the tour with a stop in at St Peter's Basilica, in the Vatican.

Next day our whirlwind three day tour of Italy ended with an early morning car ride the Leonardo da Vinci - Fiumicino Airport where we dropped Lana and Trudy for their long flight home.  Safe Travels!!