Mundíal...everything is put on hold

Sunday, June 15, 2014

We stayed in a very nice hotel that the office elders arranged for us.  We enjoyed a nice quiet dinner in their restaurant last night.
Then we got a call from the Stake President in Trenta y Tres whom we visited with last Sunday.  He suddenly became aware of the fact the we had scheduled our capilla abierta during Mundíal and he was pretty sure that NO ONE would come.  AHHH!  That put us in a panic because as we looked at our schedule, pretty much all of what we had schedule just got blown out of the water.  We had to call Bishops and reschedule.  So today will be our last orientation until mid July and our next Capilla Abierta won't be until July 28th.
Mike changed our presentation a bit.  He wanted to be led more by the spirit, so he dumped his powerpoint.  I just show my powerpoint now. It went very well and he felt more comfortable.  We were asked to talk again in Sacrament meeting, so having no better thoughts come to mind, we shared the same pioneer story.  This time I paid more attention to the audience and they were ALL riveted to our story.  I guess they enjoy hearing about the pioneers from a descendant.  After our meetings we drove 7 hours back to Montevideo.  Oh, and  Happy Father’s Day!  They do not celebrate this holiday in Uruguay.

View from our hotel this morning.

Can anyone guess what these machines are dispensing?
They are hot water dispensers for the Uruguayan Mate drink.
This is provided at a gas station.

Monday, June 16, 2014

Wonderful P-day!  Baked all day, to stay warm. Two different breads, granola, and chicken noodle soup for us and the hermanas. 

Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Email day for Capilla Abiertas.  Worked in office while Mike went with Elder Pugmire

I drove by myself again to get to the office and then I crazily offered to drive the elders to the bank!
I am writing this, so we all survived!  

Are there mountains in Uruguay?

Saturday, June 14, 2014

Travel day to Melo. We needed to stop along the way in a town calle Minas.  Sister Cook wanted to take some of these Alfajores Sweets back to the States with her next week.  They have a Mission Presidents conference to attend.  These are widely known as "the best" from Uruguay. 

 Well, we have Garmin map us to the address and we can't find a factory anywhere!  We see this sign in a small store that says "Pan Dulce" and decide to ask them where this factory is located.

                     

 No factory, this was the place!  

If we get a next time, we are going to ask if they do a tour of their facility.

 We took a nice little side trip and probably were in the highest mountains of Uruguay.  It really was quite outdoorsy and very beautiful.

Mundial. When in Rome....sorry Julie!

LookOut platform for the waterfall

Zip line. Not sure I would trust it.

Other side of the zip line.

Mike is in his "element"!

Good pic thanks to self timer!

Uruguayan House Trailer

High on a mountain top (hilltop?)

Have no idea why one train track with a couple of box cars
are out here in the middle of nowhere!

 
Video Clip:  Panoramic View

Come 4 pm all the streets were quiet. Mundial has begun!  The World Cup games and Uruguay played today.  We were at a gas station when they obviously scored because big blasts were going off somewhere!  Unfortunately, they lost.  We stopped in Vergara to see an empty house that was for rent. The mission president wants to send missionaries into this small town.  They have a small branch.

A wanna be "Nebraska" street light...sideways.