Organ pipes of the White Church or Wieskirche, Steingaden, Weilheim-Schongau district, Bavaria, Germany

 

The White Church or Wieskirche is located in Steingaden, Weilheim-Schongau district, Bavaria, Germany and it is one of the most important places of pilgrimage in Southern Germany. Here is a description of the place from Wikipedia: Wieskirche. 

The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (German: Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by brothers J. B. and Dominikus Zimmermann, the latter of whom lived nearby for the last eleven years of his life. It is located in the foothills of the Alps, in the municipality of Steingaden in the Weilheim-Schongau district, Bavaria, Germany.

It is said that, in 1738, tears were seen on a dilapidated wooden figure of the Scourged Saviour. The legend of this miracle resulted in a pilgrimage rush to see the sculpture. In 1740, a small chapel was built to house the statue but it was soon realized that the building would be too small for the number of pilgrims it attracted, and so Steingaden Abbey decided to commission a separate shrine. Many who have prayed in front of the statue of Jesus on the altar have claimed that people have been miraculously cured of their diseases, which has made this church even more of a pilgrimage site.

Construction took place between 1745 and 1754, and the interior was decorated with frescoes and with stuccowork in the tradition of the Wessobrunner School. "Everything was done throughout the church to make the supernatural visible. Sculpture and murals combined to unleash the divine in visible form".

There is a popular belief that the Bavarian government planned to sell or demolish the rococo masterpiece during the secularization of Bavaria at the beginning of the 19th century, and that only protests from the local farmers saved it from destruction. Available sources, however, document that the responsible state commission clearly advocated the continuation of Wies as a pilgrimage site, even in spite of economic objections from the abbot of Steingaden.

The Wieskirche was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1983 and underwent extensive restoration between 1985 and 1991.

Neuschwanstein Castle, Hohenschwangau, Germany

 

Neuschwanstein Castle, Hohenschwangau, Germany. Here is a brief explanation of the castle and its background. See Wikipedia: Neuschwanstein Castle.

Neuschwanstein Castle (German: Schloss Neuschwanstein, pronounced [ˈʃlɔs nɔʏˈʃvaːnʃtaɪn], Southern Bavarian: Schloss Neischwanstoa) is a 19th-century historicist palace on a rugged hill above the village of Hohenschwangau near Füssen in southwest Bavaria, Germany. The palace was commissioned by King Ludwig II of Bavaria as a retreat and in honour of Richard Wagner. Ludwig chose to pay for the palace out of his personal fortune and by means of extensive borrowing, rather than Bavarian public funds. Construction began in 1869, but was never fully completed.

The castle was intended as a private residence for the King, until he died in 1886. It was open to the public shortly after his death. Since then more than 61 million people have visited Neuschwanstein Castle. More than 1.3 million people visit annually, with as many as 6,000 per day in the summer

I think that this, and other hilltop castles in Germany and other places are the basis for the idealization of castles by Disney and other movie producers. Obviously from the description, this was not a castle with a moat and all the other military accuments that go along with the real purpose for castles.

Kappelbrucke (Chapel Bridge) in Lucerne, Switzerland

 

The Kapellbrücke (Chapel Bridge) in Lucerne is the oldest wooden bridge in Switzerland. Here is a short explanation of the bridge and its history. Wikipedia: Kapellbrücke

The Kapellbrücke (literally, Chapel Bridge) is a covered wooden footbridge spanning the river Reuss diagonally in the city of Lucerne in central Switzerland. Named after the nearby St. Peter's Chapel, the bridge is unique in containing a number of interior paintings dating back to the 17th century, although many of them were destroyed along with a larger part of the centuries-old bridge in a 1993 fire. Subsequently restored, the Kapellbrücke is the oldest wooden covered bridge in Europe, as well as the world's oldest surviving truss bridge. It serves as the city's symbol and as one of Switzerland's main tourist attractions.

We enjoyed our walk across the bridge. You can see where the original wood has been replaced from the fire.  

Two large Agave plants

 

When I was quite young, we had huge agaves in our front yard. They were sharp and not friendly to small children. I remember them being huge, much higher than my head. These are similar agave plants from the Desert Botanical Garden. They are just as big and unfriendly as when I first say them as a child. However, they are quite useful to those who know how to process them. 

Cereus forbesii "Spiralis" Cactus

This Cereus forbesii "Sprialis" Cactus is one of the most unusual cactus plants I have ever seen and I have seen a lot of cactus plants. Apparently the plant comes from Peru but no one seems to know a lot about it. This nice flower was in the Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix, Arizona. 

Young Boojum Trees

 

The Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix, Arizona has a huge collection of desert plants. It is a lovely place to visit especially in the cooler parts of the year. Over the past few years, the garden has been improved and beautified. One addition that I noted was that there are now several boojum trees growing in different parts of the garden. Here is a short explanation of these plants. 

Fouquieria columnaris, the Boojum tree or cirio (American Spanish: [ˈsiɾjo]) is a tree in the ocotillo family,(Fouquieriaceae) whose other members include the ocotillos. Some taxonomists place it in the separate genus Idria. It is nearly endemic to the Baja California Peninsula (both the northern and southern states), with only a small population in the Sierra Bacha of Sonora, Mexico. The plant's English name, Boojum, was given by Godfrey Sykes of the Desert Laboratory in Tucson, Arizona and is taken from Lewis Carroll's poem "The Hunting of the Snark".

 

A Flock of Ducks

 

We made a short visit to the Riparian Preserve at Water Ranch in Gilbert, Arizona. It was a lovely, warm, sunny day in the Fall and the ducks were in abundance on the ponds. There were some children throwing bird feed into the water and the ducks were frantic to eat each piece. The Water Ranch is one of our favorite spots in the Salt River Valley. It was respite from the cold and snow of our home in Provo, Utah.