In England's Green and Pleasant Land

The annual Mission Presidents Seminar for the European Area was held in Preston last week. The bad news is that we had to connect through Charles DeGualle to get there, which meant we missed our connection (it took a full two hours to go from the arrival terminal to the departure terminal - we missed the flight by a full 30 minutes). But since this happens regularly, they put on the next flight. We had to take a taxi from Manchester to Preston (about an hour), but rode with Elder Paya from France who was also on our flight.

To say that we had a great few days would be an understatement. We arrived on Wednesday night and returned on Saturday evening. It was a full schedule, but included a session at the Preston Temple and the bus tour of Church history sites in addition to the meetings with Elder Perry, Elder Rasband, and the Area Presidency. We came back with pages of notes and lists of things we need to do.

Interestingly, Europe is the first international area in the Church where the entire area presidency consists of local brethren who are members of the 1st Quorum of the Seventy. Elder Kopishke is from Germany, Elder Causee from France, and Elder Teixeira from Portugal. We have 27 languages in the area, so all meetings are conducted in English.

At 15 Wadham Road

With Don and Cyndi Staheli at the River Ribble

Downham...

The four mission presidents of Spain, with companions and Elder Camargo

It was a wonderful few days, but it is great to be back with our missionaries. We arrived home at midnight on Saturday, went to Church on Sunday morning, conducted exit interviews in the afternoon with missionaries who return home this week, then spent most of the day Monday doing additional exit interviews while Kathleen was cooking for the masses. We feed dinner 10 15 tonight at our trainers meeting - we are training 11 new trainers whose companions (including Elder Close and Elder Keller from the Bonneville Stake) arrive tomorrow from the Madrid MTC. After picking up the new arrivals, feeding them lunch, interviewing them, and sending them off with their companions, we serve dinner to the 9 missionaries going home (along with one mother of a returning missionary), then have a farewell meeting and testimonies. Wednesday morning we pack everyone and their luggage into three cars and leave for the airport at 7:15. Then we come home and breathe for a few minutes before preparing for Zone Concilio on Thursday and Friday, which includes feeding 23 people. As soon as that is over we drive 4 hours to Zaragoza to do missionary interviews and reorganize a branch presidency (the presidency moved back to Bolivia a few days ago). Somewhere in between we read 109 weekly letters and plan for the next round of Zone Conferences.

But for all that, I did get a 5 mile run in this morning along my regular route up Mt. Tibidabo. A nice way to start the day is to look over the city and see the morning sun reflected in the Mediterranean. Busy, yes, but having a wonderful time. Wish you were here.