Conferences Galore; Second pass: Bayonne/Biarritz/Pau

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Our Church Week—Well this is General Conference Week (Saturday and Sunday with 10 hours of instruction), followed by Zone Conference on Tuesday (only 3 hours) and Stake Conference on Saturday and Sunday, another 2 hours.  So we will be riding on a high after all our spiritual instruction this week.  That’s hard to beat, three Conferences in one week! 

General Conference is an amazing time to listen and reflect; we just never grow tired of the instruction and are always sad to have it end.  It’s often called our “Road Map” for the next 6 months; true to form there is enough meat in the talks to last the duration and in 6 months, and true to form we seem ready for more spiritual food….in 6 months.

We had one non-member attend General Conference with us.  After the Sunday morning session (really the Saturday Session of Conference because we are 8 hours ahead of Utah), we had a 2-hour long discussion with him along with the Elders. These are highlights of our week, if not our entire Mission.  His choice to talk for 2 hours:  he is quite a talker—a true Frenchman!  He has SO many questions…..and we have answersJ  
  
On Tuesday, we drove with our Elders to Zone Conference in Toulouse (2hrs) .  We combined with the Bordeaux Zone so were able to see how much better Elder Carter, our Elder who just had his appendix out, 2 weeks and a few days after his surgery.  It was nice to see him with color back in his face and standing upright this time!
As always, the messages from Zone Conference are inspirational, uplifting and practical tips for missionaries.  And we got to meet up with 3 other Senior Missionaries.  That is worth its weight in gold.  

We also scheduled to meet with the Rapp couple in Pau the next day.  They live way to our East in Bezier and they planned to spend the night in Pau to finish their second-year legality and French driver’s license so they wouldn’t have to back-track on another day.  So we drove the 45 minutes over to meet them for lunch and show them the chateau there.  They would have easily found it on their own; but it’s worth a second visit and they are wonderful company.

Thursday, Marc went out with our Missionaries to visit Louise since Meg had the stomach flu.  By Sunday, the flu was reversed and Marc stayed home while Meg went with Valerie to Church.  The 24-hr bug became the 48-hr then 72-hr bug so Marc still has a few days to go before he’s through it.  We are both very tired of being “sick”.  All the germs are new to us here and we seem to have no resistance.  C’est la vie.  No fun being sick, that’s for sure—no matter what it is or how long.  We can’t complain, even though we do when we’re in bed and not working:  overall we are happy and healthy meaning nothing serious.  So we try to count our blessings.  

Town of the Week—Second pass to Bayonne/Biarritz….Basque Country.  Located on Atlantic Coast side of France.  The Basque language is ancient without known roots.  The Basque are fiercely protective of their language and keeping their culture alive.  The deeper you go into Basque Country the more noticeable it is.  They would say they are not French; they are Basque and keep the distinction alive. 
Enjoy.

A la prochaine!



Tatiana and Jean Michel 
Our new Elder, Elder Church to the left

Watching the second session of General Conference.  The French takes a day and a half to translate these later sessions so it will be available after Sunday in French and other languages.
Zone Conference
These Sisters and Elder are part of our apartment rounds.  They are great fun and energetic.

This building was to be used Sunday for seating for Stake Conference so the missionaries were 
asked to knock down tables and set up chairs.  It was a beehive of activity...they were so fast they
 got everything ready before we could get the camera out.  They know the drill and went straight to 
 work lickety-split.  Growing a work ethic and love to see it!

The Rapp Couple

  


Cobblestone design in the streets of Old Town Bayonne

Basque architecture to right mixed in with Medieval architecture to the left


This is one large door-knocker

Cathedral in Bayonne--paintings were incredibly rich with color.  These are fresco style (paintings on wet stucco).  The colors remain richer and last longer.  Just renovated.  This foto doesn't quite do the richness in color on the ceilings.  More below. Think...really vibrant, velvety-feeling colors, almost a suede-like texture.

Soldier renting his cloak in twain to share with an impoverished passerby













These squares within the painting are original paint from 1300s.

We talked with the friar about the cathedral and he gave us a bit of private tour letting us 
get up close to the original painting patches (above) roped off to the public.  
The larger key is still used to lock the Bayonne Cathedral today













Macaroons...color indicates flavors




This shade of red indicates Basque architecture








Mistletoe



This forest green is also Basque architecture
Both the red and green can only be used on Basque buildings



Now Biarritz...on the coast; Bayonne is inland















From our hotel room; tide is in and goes out as far as first boulder.















Romanesque Cathedral in Biarritz






Caught our eye--doing some rappelling repair work; quite fascinating to watch him up and down
Tide heading out
























Not a bad location for a castle/home


Bird on branch very content to let us near him











Espagne=Spain

Yellow is colza (rapeseed).  Fields and fields of it coming in.


Finishing off with Pau













Bank building in Pau




















Circling back to Tarbes


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