Freiberg and Dresden, Temple and Cathedral

We stopped in Freiberg this morning to see the LDS temple, which was built before the wall fell. It was amazing to think that the church was allowed to build this beautiful building inside East Germany. Two years later the wall came down and the country was re-unified, but it stands as a testament to all the saints that remained faithful to the church behind the Iron Curtain.

Another coincidence (or was it a tender mercy?) was that we ran into a group of ward members from Halberstadt that were on a temple trip. They were taking some names to the temple. Thomas, who was baptized when Amanda was there, had done geneology research for his parents, grandparents and great grandparents! They greated us like long lost family. Sisters Munke and Mussman were both wearing necklaces that we had given them. And Sister Munke had listened to our CD (A Taste of the Prairie) three times already. She loved it and especially loved Ed's solo on Santa's Workshop. I love Sister Munke!

Our hotel, the Kleinshachwitz, is about a half hour outside of Dresden, right on the Elbe river. It is a cute old Kurhaus (resort hotel) that seems to have a hopping restaurant business. They don't have internet in the rooms, but have been nice enough to let me use theirs if I don't dawdle too much. When I asked them by email if they had internet, they said yes. Apparently, that didn't mean we would!

We saw lots of museums in Dresden this afternoon! They are even better than the ones in Berlin. There are several reasons for this:

1. Better treasures!
2. Everything printed in English
3. Air conditioning!
4. Not too crowded
5. Better treasures!

They have the most incredible riches here! August the Great must have been incredible wealthy to accumulate so much. This is his palace. That was our street car in front of it!

We were not able to take any photos in the museums. When you have great antiquities I guess you don't want everyone sharing them with the world! So, instead, I took pictures of Amanda and Crystal  (two of our treasures) outside the Zwinger museum right after we saw the Sistine Madonna with her cute little cherubs at the bottom of the picture.

Ed and I got our picture taken from the balcony of the Zwinger in the Oriental Porcelain wing.

We had dinner in the shadow of the Liebfruenkirche (Church of our Lady). It was only restored about 7 years ago. It is amazing to see the pictures of Dresden after the war. This church, as well as the Residence Palace were just a pile of rubble till after the re-unification of Germany . Russia held onto some of their antiquities for years after WWII (under the guise of having rescued them). Now they're back where they belong, and make Dresden a tremendous place to visit. We would have been sad to have missed this city!