Heading Home August 22!

Our ride home!

Preparing for departure.

You are now free to exit the country!

German SUV!

August 21 in Remscheid

Claus with his new beer dispenser. The beer was good!

Ruby, Claus, Heidi and Mickey at Claus and Heidi's home just before we drove back to Frankfurt to catch our plane home. Thanks Claus and Heidi for your fabulous hospitality, wonderful food and great fun!

Billerbeck and Munster on August 20

Mickey, Annette (August's sister) and Maria in Munster. The Munster Cathedral is in the background. This is the Catholic part of Germany and most of the churches are Catholic. If you look closely (double click on the picture), below the steeple and above the clock are some cages. Apparently a few hundred years ago, some church dissidents were causing trouble, so they were killed and their bodies placed in cages high up on the church for the birds to eat. This was to serve as a warning to anyone else who wanted to cause trouble. My brother in law Steve says the cages were for the Lutherans, but I'll have to research this story a little more carefully. August, Annette and Maria toured us around Billerbeck, visiting the family church and magnificent Billerbeck Cathedral. We then drove into Munster for a wonderful lunch and tour of two other beautiful churches including the cathedral shown on the left. After lunch we drove back to the farm for more food! - waffles and fruit. We said our goodbyes and headed back to Remscheid that evening. The Grevings treated us to wonderful hospitality, great food and it was a lot of fun for Mickey to explore her German roots!

August 20 in Billerbeck and Munster

Paula and August Greving

August and Paula live in a beautiful brick home surrounded by pasture, hay and corn fields. Their son Friederich, wife Anya and two children Filip 3 and newborn Jacob have an apartment upstairs. The house has 14 foot ceilings. A large area of the house now serving as the garage used to house the pigs.

The Pig Farm

The fish! Paula, August's wife, had a fabulous meal for us when we arrived on Sunday. Later on that evening, all of August's siblings Maria, Annette, Elisabeth and Rudolf, arrived for the evening meal featuring their home grown Rainbow Trout! They had been soaked in brine for several hours and then smoked for several hours and were delicious!

The pigs!

Billerbeck August 19 and 20

On Sunday morning August 19 we drove about one hour north of Remscheid to Billerbeck (near Munster) to visit Mickey's relatives. After all Ken's Norway relatives, it was finally her turn. Ruby stayed in Remscheid to spend more time with Claus, Heidi, Britta and Juan. Here is Mickey with August Greving and 4 of his 5 children - Katharina, Arndt, Johannes and Maria. The family lives on a farm outside of Billerbeck. They raise pigs and rainbow trout. Mickey's great grandfather Henry Greving was a brother of August's grandfather Max Greving. Henry Greving emigrated to America in 1879 to avoid being drafted into the Kaiser's army. He established himself as a farmer in Kansas and went back to Germany in 1883 to take a German bride (Pauline Osterholt). They lived in Hanover, Kansas for a few years where Mickey's grandmother was born. In 1892 they moved west to Keuterville, Idaho (near Cottonwood) and eventually to Stites, Idaho where the Greving store supplied the miners taking part in the Thunder Mountain gold rush.