It feels good to be needed. 😉

Yesterday was our P-day and Mary offered to go with me to the national railroad museum as an early birthday gift.

It is an old rail yard where engines and cars were brought for maintenance and repairs. They were brought in and backed into the slots you see in the back ground above using the red, rotating bridge you see in the foreground.

Above is a selection of the old engines they have stored. They have information on the pillar next to each one giving their age and source plus other interesting facts about how they were used. As you can see, most are steam engines.

The engine below was referred to as the Sofia Loren because it was from Italy and had noteworthy curves.

Here I am in front of one of the steam engines.

Here Mary is on the back of one of the cars made of wood.

This is old Packard car that was modified so it would run on the rails.

The museum is named after Pablo Neruda (pen name and later legal name) a Chilean poet, diplomat and politician who grew up in Temuco. His Wikepedia biography states, "The impressive natural environment of Temuco, its forests, lakes, rivers and mountains marked forever the poetic world of Neruda."

We enjoyed watching the video highlights of his life.

After we moved to Fruit Heights, it became my job to wash the outside of the kitchen windows. As it turns out, I have kept that responsibility here.

It's just more complicated when you live on the fifth floor.

They use a very effective water-saving device here in Chile. It is known as a calefón.  Here is a picture of ours.

This is how our water gets heated.  Basically, it is heated on the fly as you shower or otherwise use hot water. What makes it water saving is that it is very hard to hold the temperature in the shower and one is not inclined to spend a lot of time in the shower.

Here is my salute to the Toyota Yaris we drive.

Yesterday I drove from Temuco to Lautaro (about 35 miles) carrying the following.

• Four young missionaries with their backpacks.
• One refrigerator (see picture below)
• The heavy luggage of one of the missionaries.
• My heavy toolbox.

It did great. 

Since we are using family history to reactivate members and strengthen the branch, our mission president's companion showed me the following on line game (https://geneopardy.fhtl.byu.edu/game).

Someone at BYU created it and it ties into your FamilySearch account.

My score ended up being 6,350 as I couldn't answer the last one before taking the screen shot or the board would go away. I challenge you to see if you can beat my score. (I did use the second chance for half points 2-3 times. It isn't available on the higher score items.)

Today, we helped the young missionaries with a Book of Mormon activity in the plaza of Nueva Imperial. It was a beautiful day in a nice, green plaza. The only challenge was that there was some sort of rap activity in the other corner of the plaza.

In any event, there were four impressive wood carvings in the plaza. Here they are.

I think this one was just labeled a Mapuche man. (Remember, the Mapuches are a native tribe in this area who were the last to be conquered by the Spaniards.)

This one was labeled as a man performing a religious dance in which he is seeking to imitate a bird.

I guess these two beasts are creatures from the Mapuche mythology.

I think this one was simply labeled a Mapuche woman. I didn't try to figure out what she is doing.

The Tolhuaca Branch put on a farewell party for a family that is moving to the US. (He is from CA but served a mission here and returned to marry a woman from the branch. She has been waiting over 5 years to get cleared to emigrate.)

They went all out and had a big gathering Thursday evening to prepare the decorations. Friday, they put in a lot of effort on the refreshments. Here's a view.

Here we are, doing what we do best - eating.

We love these people.

In an earlier post, I promised to share more pictures of wood sculptures we run into as we visit different communities.

This one is in Vilcún. Being exposed to the elements certainly takes its toll.

I thought I would share with you a very common site we experience as we drive on two-lane rural roads.

There is a lot of logging in this area and, therefore, a lot of trucks hauling the logs. You can get stuck behind multiple trucks during one trip. Mary says it makes her nostalgic because her dad worked for a lumber company and she lived the first 8 years of her life in Flagstaff. My feelings aren't as positive.

Yesterday, we attended the baptism of a 15-year-old girl named Lhys. Her mother, Amelia, was baptized two weeks ago and we were there as well. They might be considered refugees from Venezuela. Here they are with Mary.

The young sister missionaries needed a ride one night to teach these two sisters so they called us. I sat outside in the car while Mary went in with them. She created a bond with both mother and daughter and, when they took family pictures before each baptism, they invited Mary to stand in.

This bond was created in spite of the fact that Mary speaks very little Spanish. We will have them to dinner a week from today.