(It's about time I got some more photos on our blog. I have others, but they'll have to wait for a later date. I hope to get this up to date within a week, so there will be more after the ones I'm posting today.)

Early morning view of our apartment area. Our building is on the right, and our place is the two far windows on the third floor. We have grass and some flowers year-round, and a balcony that faces south. A lot of our neighbors are retired, and some of the others are professionals. It's most of the time quite peaceful, and we're only about 15 minutes walk from the church and the center of downtown.

Liz and I were going to a home teaching visit and went past this building. Curious as to what it was for (it has a cross on it but is way too small for a church), we stopped and visited. It is a German cemetery in the little town of Orglandes, not too far from Cherbourg.

A view across a portion of the cemetery. Originally there were German and American soldiers buried here, but as another American cemetery was opened up further south, those soldiers were moved to the new one, and German soldiers who had been buried in a number of smaller places were brought here. There are just under 10,000 graves here. We have seen at least three German cemeteries in our area of Normandy.

On one of our outings, Elder Jurrus had to go say hello to the cows. They weren't particularly interested in a conversation that day, but we enjoyed watching them in their nice green pasture. Exciting viewing, as you can imagine.

One of many lighthouses in this area. This is the Gatteville lighthouse, and was built in 1835. The light can be seen from the Isle of Wight on the coast of England (about 100 kilometres from here). It is especially interesting because of numbers: it has 12 stories, 52 windows, and 365 steps to the top. The little tower behind it is a weather station.

This is the kind of rock in this area (yeah, I know most people aren't at all interested in "rocks", but I love geology). It is all granite, and the crystals are really large. If they didn't weigh so much, I'd bring a piece home to put on my desk. Maybe Delta will change their weight restrictions before we go home. Not likely.

I really liked this area. The rock is all granite, and the lighthouse was built of material from this same area. The tide was out when we were there, and the elders went wandering to see what they could find. The ocean was beautiful even though the sky was overcast.

These are a shellfish called "Chinamen's Hats" because of their conical shape. We have been told that they taste good, but I tried cooking some once and they came out like rubber! I'll have to find out how to do it right, as they are very plentiful. It takes a knife to pry them off the rocks (these are coarse granite).

Here we are (yes, we are wearing P day clothes) in front of the Gatteville lighthouse. Unfortunately it was closed all month, so we couldn't go in it. Much to Liz's dismay - I am sure she wanted (not) to climb to the top!

In the town of Gatteville which is next to the lighthouse, is a little church called Notre Dame de bon Secours (our lady of good help). It was built about 1090 AD, during the reign of William the Conqueror. And in Montana, we think that a building that has existed since 1840 is ancient!

South of the little church is a much larger and more recent church (probably built in the 1600s and 1700s), and behind that church is an old cemetery next to the residential area. We love the old stone houses that you see everywhere in the villages, and nearly all of them are still used for homes.

Another lighthouse on the east part of this peninsula. This one is in the town of St. Vast, and the grey stuff in the background is Tatihou Island, with a 17th century fort. The lighthouse is still in service, as there is a fishing fleet that still uses the little harbor there.

Just to prove that we really were there - here' s Liz standing in front of the lighthouses. She has done a cross-stitch of this scene - someday you'll be able to see it when we get it hung up in our house in Montana.

We took the elders and went to the American Cemetery at Omaho Beach one P day. It was cold, windy, and snowing off and on. But we were asked to help with retiring the colors that afternoon. What a great experience! Helping to lower and fold the flag with a backdrop of 10,000 graves of American soldiers who gave their lives to liberate France and Europe was humbling. Elder Jurrus and I did one flag, Elder Jurrus and Messick did the other.

We had a branch party for Christmas (yes, I know I haven't put photos on the blog for a long time), and this was my favorite photo. It's of Elder Jurrus on left, Jean-Claude Michel (a recent convert) and Elder Messick, trying to decide who gets the first piece of a chocolate "cake" that must have had 500 calories per slice! It was great.

The branch president and I went to visit a family in a little town called Brix. We had to walk through an old cemetery in the church courtyard to arrive at their door. The moon was showing through the breaking clouds and I happened to have my camera with me.

This statue of Napoleon is next to the harbor and across the street from a city square named after him. I don't know who the sculptor was, but he did a great job representing power and strength of the horse and master.

This is the view we get from a hillside we walk up two or three times a week. The path to the top is 2 minutes from our apartment door, and the view of a portion of the city, the old forts in the harbor (built along with the harbor walls by Napoleon), and the beautiful blue sea never become old.

I took this photo for the houses mostly. As you can see, many of them have skylights, even in this often cloudy city. Electricity can be expensive (although 89% of power in France is produced by nuclear reactors!) and people take advantage of natural light. Behind the homes is one wing of a "lycee", the equivalent of High School. What you see is about a third of the building. How can you find your way to your next class?

This is hard to read, even if you know French. It is a plaque in a church here, and represents what I believe is one of the reasons why religion lost importance in France. It is a tribute to a Catholic leader who was killed "by hate of faith" in Paris during the French revolution. The revolution tried to remove religion and replace it by humanism, and largely, over time, succeeded.

These statues are behind the altar in the Trinity Cathedral here in Cherbourg. This depicts the baptism of Christ by John the Baptist, with the Holy Ghost descending as a dove. There is a small baptismal font in this church dating from the 1500s, presumably for people to stand in while the water was poured on their heads.