Fall Break

Here's looking at a one-day work week, then fall break in honor of Reformation Day and All-Saints Day!!  We'll have our very-full teaching day tomorrow (Monday), and then hurry home to change clothes, grab our suitcases (already packed!), and catch our train to Bratislava.  Then on to Wittenberg Tuesday, Eisenach Thursday, back to Bratislava Saturday, and returning to Liptovsky Mikuláš after church in ENGLISH on Sunday!!  :-)   So, probably no posts for a week, unless I can figure out how to access the blog on our i-touch.  Sorry!!  But when we get back, expect a lot of pictures from our "Martin Luther - Reformation Pilgrammage" in Germany!!  

I made Rice Krispie Treats this afternoon to take to school for our colleagues as a Halloween treat --- each little piece has a candy corn on it --- very festive!  (the candy corn was a surprise from Mom Olson's package last week!)  Our sack supper for the train tomorrow is already made too.  We are so ready to hit the trail!!  :-)   

Have a wonderful week!!  Tune in next Sunday for the next installment of the blog.   :-)   

Quiet Weekend

Here's the latest synopsis of the rest of our week:

• Thursday - Tim and I both gave English lessons in the early evening to adults.  My two women are so much fun!!  Eva and Tania both have teenage children, so we often trade stories of our families.  We sit at the kitchen table and talk, go through the lesson book, and enjoy hot tea together for an hour.  (Eva comes twice a week, and Tania once.)  Tim teaches a young businessman named Marian who is quite fluent, but wants to keep in practice and improve his English for when he is in other European countries for work and they all communicate in English as a common language.  Marian comes at the same time as my gals do, so he and Tim talk in the living room.  It is interesting to meet Slovaks who are not educators, for a different perspective, kind of like back home in Iowa!  :-)
• Friday - We had time to come back to the flat after school and chill a little bit before heading over to the gym across town (about a 25 minute walk) for volleyball.  It was a fun time again - we love it how these people are very competitive on every point, but very good sports about it.  And you volleyball folks will want to know, they play "real" volleyball, with pass-set-hit attempted on each side every point, not rec type where people just smack it back over the net the first chance they get!!  LOL!!  Erik (the P.E. teacher at our school) stayed with Tim as usual for basketball, and Erik's wife, Jana, gave me a ride to HyperNova again, where I got a few groceries and then walked back to our flat.  Tim went with the guys to the pub afterwards again, and he's really bonding with them.  Several are right around his age, though quite a few are younger too, and the older ones especially enjoy having the American in their ranks!  
• Saturday (today) - We are just laying low!!  It's a yucky weather weekend with cooler temps and rain, so we decided to just hang out in the flat most of the weekend, getting rested up before our fall break trip next week.  We were a little tired this past week, and I figure it's just because we've been on the go soooo much ever since we got here.  Working all week at school, teaching extra English students, taking our Slovak classes, playing volleyball & basketball, doing biking and running when the weather is nice, walking everywhere we need to go all the time, and then going off on adventures every weekend, has all caught up with us a little, so we liked the idea of taking it easy for a couple of days for once.  :-)   Several of the various American lectors who we trained with have gotten colds, etc. lately, so we want to prevent that and stay healthy by listening to our bodies!  We did take a walk for a couple of errands after lunch - mailed some postcards, did a little shopping, stopped at a hotel to inquire about a place for some of the kids to stay when they're here over the holidays, and ducked into a little coffee shop when it rained on us for hot tea and fancy desserts (incredibly inexpensive!)  Now we're inside for the duration of the day, hopefully for some Skype time with the U.S.A!!  And we're enjoying our quiet weekend very much.   :-)

Mail from Iowa!

It's crazy, but we got TWO pieces of mail from Iowa on the same day this week!  Wow - it was fun to open a package from Tim's mom (she sent lots of fun treats and baking supplies, and even a recipe for me to bake goodies for people here), and a large envelope from our neighbors across the street in Ankeny.  Curran, our favorite 4-year-old, made a pumpkin decoration which we posted near our desks in the teacher room.  There was also a note, a family picture, and colored leaf decorations.  :-)   THANKS for the surprises from Forest City and Ankeny!!  

The American Lector cabinet right by our desks has Curran's
pumpkin and their family photo!  THANKS, Curran!!  (and Julie!!)  

A quick run-down of the week's activities.... 
Monday we got groceries after school, did some emailing, and skyped with my dad on his 85th birthday!!  That's a big occasion!!  We feel so blessed to be able to see our parents face to face, like being in the same room, on our computer!!  
Tuesdays we always have staff devos before school, so we get up a little earlier than usual.  We had our Slovak lesson after school, then we had a light supper before my English student came for her lesson, and finally we played volleyball with a group from school until 8:30.  We were tired!!   
Wednesday (today) has been nice with nothing on the agenda after school.  We did venture out to locate a shoe repair shop (for one of my shoes) after getting info from colleagues at school, and had to use the Slovak phrasebook exclusively for the transaction.  :-)   But this evening we have just been taking it easy - warmed up goulash for supper - emailing - and we'll get to bed early.  

The English newspaper (yes, the Slovak Spectator comes out about twice a month and we get it at school), has been reporting on recent developments concerning teacher pay and funding for education. There is the possibility of another teacher strike in November - this one perhaps for 2 days or even a week.  Evidently, the union turned down the government's offer of a 5% pay raise.  That may sound like a lot to us in the U.S., but their salaries here are so incredibly low that it's a drop in the bucket as an increase for them.  So we'll see what happens next month!  

Beauty on a Bike Ride

The leaves are really changing colors now, and we especially appreciated them on our trips outside under today's cloudless blue skies.  It was much warmer today - definitely in the 70's - no wind - and bright sunshine.  Loved it!!  

On the walk to church

The public school we go by on the way to church.
(I always call it "Hogwarts")    :-)

Just a random tree next to church

 We have never had communion at our church, but Carol had mentioned that about once a month it is offered after a service.  Today we noticed about 30 people heading up to the front section of pews after the service, and someone brought a bowl and a chalice out to the altar, so I asked one of my students if it was going to be communion.  We decided to stay, and it turned out to be another 35 minutes or so.  We sang 2 hymns, went through what we assume was the full communion liturgy, and there was another sermon!!  Wow!  We figured it would just be a short serving of the bread and wine, but this was pretty involved.  But it was good to receive the blessing of communion! 

Looking out one of the 2nd story church windows.
I sometimes look around during the sermon in Slovak!  ;-)

 After church, we had hot chai while listening to our online sermon from Mike Householder at the Lutheran Church of Hope in WDM.  Another Sunday blessing!  In between everything, I got 4 loads of laundry done, which was badly needed after our busy week.  I made goulash for Sunday dinner, at Tim's request, and it turned out well.  We'll have leftovers several times this week.  :-)  Then we decided to take advantage of the gorgeous weather and go for a bike ride.  We had been wanting to go up on Háj Nicovô Hill, (where Janka had taken us after we returned from our medical exams in Martin), to see the fall colors. 

This hillside is full of cottages where people have their gardens.

Tim just biking along, enjoying the day

O.K. so the hill got a little too steep, so we walked a while.    ;-)

Crivan peeking over the top of the hill

The orange trees on top of the ridge line the road up to the monument

The road winds around to the left, then up the line of trees to the right

A closer view of the last part of the road up to the monument.

Crivan in the distance

A village down below the mountains

The road to the top kept getting more beautiful!

Liptovská Mara  in the distance, from the top of the hill

Tim taking in the scenery

Wow - it was so beautiful up there!!

Another view of Crivan

Looking back down the tree-lined road

This is the monument at the top of the hill, in honor of the
WW II soldiers from this region who perished in the war.

Looking down the hill from the monument

Many, many soldiers were buried here, including many "Unknown Soldiers"
It reminded us a great deal of Arlington National Cemetery.

The entrance to the monument area from below

Statue at the entrance, cross part-way up the hill, and monument at the top.

The monument site was very impressive, and a wonderful
tribute to soldiers who died in WW II

Right below the monument was a pasture with many grazing cows.
Not an unusual sight for Iowans, but the sound was different --
cowbells were gently clanking melodiously!!  :-)

This cow was right by the fence, so I tried to get a picture of its bell
But I startled it a little!

After stopping to pose for a picture showing off the cowbell and the
changing leaves behind, it left to join the rest of the herd!   :-)

We ran into this group of students from our school near the monument!

Kids in Slovakia like to play in the leaves too!!  :-)

I asked a lady to take a picture of us under this golden canopy! 

So I included another of her creative shots!!  :-)

When we headed back to our bikes, we saw our
students up in a tree ---  Slovak kids like climbing trees too!!  :-)

The WW II monument

Ready to get back on the bikes for the ride down.  

On the way back down the hill --- coasting all the way!! 

We tested our brakes a lot -- it was all downhill!!

Two hours later, we landed back at our flat after a wonderful afternoon of bike riding.  We're thrilled that the pictures turned out so nicely.  Hope you enjoyed the ride with us!!  :-) 

See Beth, we're wearing our bike helmets!!  :-)

Our flat with fall foliage.
(And our white sheets on the line outside - second from the top!!)

Orava Castle

We're back at home after another wonderful adventure!  3 buses each way, and everything went smoothly.  First thing in the morning, we were a little worried because the bus that came by at the appointed time was a huge, fancy bus, and the stewardess (yes, there was a stewardess!) said we didn't have a reservation.  Finally she came back out and asked if we had Euros and wanted to ride on her bus, so we did.  She even brought us free hot tea!  Wow!!  We really went in style, and we were on the top deck so enjoyed the panoramic views.  After that, every bus was on time also, which is typical for Slovak public transportation in general.  

Our Slovak "Megabus" was amazing!   :-)   

We went through Ruzomberok, Dolny Kubín, and finally Oravsky Podzámok, which is the village at the foot of the castle, Oravsky Hrad in Slovak.  There were some clouds and fog in the mountains, but it was still a pretty ride through the countryside and mountains.  We had about an hour before our bus left Ruzomberok, so we wandered around a while there.  

This is the railing on the bridge across the river from the train/bus
station into the town center in Ruzomberok.  I happened to notice....

Every single space between the supports had a spider web, glistening
with morning dew.  I had Tim put his jacket behind them so they could be seen.
It was really an amazing sight to see!!  

This is the Ruzomberok train station - a really pretty one!

These were windows of an old church in Ruzomberok.

And these are the stained glass windows on the other side -
I took the picture through the broken window above.  

Tim in a narrow street leading to the centrum, with the
church steeple above shrouded in fog.

Staircase in Ruzomberok - the second half is covered. 

When we finally arrived in Oravsky Podzámok, we didn't need to ask directions because the castle is right above the town, and it's HUGE!  Different sections were built in various time periods, starting in the 1300's.  It's the biggest castle in Slovakia, and it's the only one that was never captured by an invading army in its history.  We took a 2-hour guided tour with a large group.  It was all in Slovak, but in several locations there were laminated information sheets for us to read during the narration.  It was AMAZING!!!  

The sign at the entrance

Waiting for the tour guide to open the castle gates.

The knocker on the first castle gate

Just after we got inside, we saw a couple having wedding photos taken!  

This picture is for Papa, who kept asking if the castles have moats.....NO!!
They are built high up on rocky crags.  But this castle did have a drawbridge
at the second gate, inside the first one! 

This is a view from inside the castle gates, looking up to the higher parts.

Orava Castle is well preserved and restored, and there are many areas containing period furniture.  There are also historical displays of costumes, household items, nature and animals in the vicinity, and even artifacts from archeological excavations that show the castle grounds have been inhabited by humans for thousands of years.  It was a fascinating and educational experience!

This is a view out of one of the castle windows.  

Tim definitely had to duck coming through this doorway.
People must have been much shorter when this part of the castle was built!

Some huge pieces of furniture - and lots of horns!

There were many large armory displays - swords, shields, spears, and helmets

Getting higher into the older parts of the castle

Inside one of the castle courtyards

Ww went up the stairs at the left and into the next part of the castle

Looking down at yet another bride having a castle photo shoot!  

The chapel steeple through a castle window

We went up these stairs too - this part of the castle was 5 stories high.
We'd go up to the top of one section, then out and up higher and higher
into each successive section of the castle!  

This little alcove was so inviting, all bathed in midday sunshine.
I wanted to go curl up there with a good book!!  :-)

These chairs were intricately carved - each one unique.

This was a chambermaid's quarters.  The clock on the wall
above her bed has no hands, symbolizing the fact that she
was in service to her mistress every hour of every day.  

Tim says this shows why we call it a "king-size" bed ---
this was the king's bed!!  :-)

Yes, we went up these stairs too, approaching the
oldest section of the castle.

Getting closer to the top section

Looking back down where we had been before.
The large hole in the wall was a well that one king had
built down through the bedrock.

A view back down into the courtyard near the chapel, with the village,
the river, and the hills in the distance

A view in a different direction from high in the castle.

Room with a view!!  :-)

This is a cistern built down into the bedrock of the highest part of the castle,
to hold and store water in case of a siege.  It was HUGE!!  

This is the same courtyard near the chapel, from even higher.
Note the Slovak flag unfurled in the breeze!  

Tim heading back down the stairs from the very top

Loving the castle views!!  

Yeah, we were definitely way up at the top!!

Such a fun day!!

My Knight on the castle steps!

The Slovak flag at Orava Castle

This picture goes out to all the Olson kids, and every other Riverside Bible Camp counselor....
when I saw this statue in the chapel at the castle, this song popped into my head...
You guessed it...."Stomp on the Devil"     LOL!!  

What a fun day at the castle.  (The public stocks are at left!)

I just liked this shot.  That is all.  :-)

This reminded me of Cinderella's carriage - so pretty inside too!

At the drawbridge, ready to head back out of the Orava Castle

Outside the first castle gate again - holding onto that
dragon door knocker from the first picture!!  :-)

After we left the castle, we were starving!  Breakfast had been at 7:00 a.m. at home, the tour started at 11:35, and we got back down into town a little before 2:00.  

We headed down past this church first - pretty setting!

Then took a picture from the church yard back up toward the castle.
You can really see the different levels and sections from this angle.

And finally, we found this restaurant, with an outdoor patio on the second
floor of a hotel on the main road - perfect!! 

This was the view from our table.   WOW!!!

The view back down towards the town while we were eating.

Too bad we were in shadows, but so it goes!

This is the hotel - the balcony on the second floor only had
about 4 tables - it was amazing food too!! 

One last view of the castle before we got on the bus.  This shows
the top left section, which is the oldest, and it is build on a long, narrow rock formation,
going straight back from this angle.

On the way back to Dolny Kubín, we passed Likava Castle, which we visited a few weeks ago.  We also went by many small villages tucked into valleys - so picturesque!

The leaves were starting to turn colors, but it was difficult to get good pictures
through the bus window.  This hillside had splashes of yellows and oranges!

Likava Castle which we visited a while back.

Views from the bus window!

The sunset was gorgeous!

And that was our day in pictures.  Hope some of you made it all the way to the end!!  :-)   

The village is in darkness, but the steeple above is still visible!  In much the same way, God is always present, in all times and in all places in our lives.  He shows us his great love in the beauty of his creation on a daily basis.  And we receive his grace and mercy on a daily basis as well!!