On Friday, we slept in a little bit, then left for the next leg of our journey. Before boarding the train, we made a stop at the Dom, where I got to play the organ. This organ is not historic…. It isn’t even 10 years old. I must confess…. The acoustics were awesome and it was fun to play in such a large space, but I did not get as excited about this organ as some of the others. Also, since it is a huge tourist spot, there were LOTS of people milling around downstairs while I played, so that was a little funny. The organist took us up to the tower and we had to go through 3 sets of heavily locked doors. The organist explained to us that they must keep the tower locked tight because of liabilities. Apparently if one wishes to commit suicide in Magdeburg the easiest thing to do is to climb to the top of the tower and throw oneself off of it. Yikes. I had no intentions of suicide, and the only way I would have died was from over excitement, so I felt pretty safe going up. Unfortunately, I did not get any pictures here (woops) but we saw where Otto is buried… from the year 900 or 1000. Can we say old? Holy bananas. This city is OLD and VERY important to Germany’s history.

After this we caught a train to Hannover, where we will be spending several days. While Hannover is a sort of organ desert, we are taking some time to do shopping and tourist stuff. Plus, the SELK have a festival on Sunday we will attend. When we arrived in Hannover, Heidi introduced me to the people who are hosting us for the next several days. This nice older couple immediately won me over with their sweet and gentle ways and soon we were talking and laughing together. They are totally your typical German Lutheran couple and I hope I’m just like them when I grow up. After taking our bags upstairs (we have this whole suite to ourselves) we joined them in their beautiful gardens for coffee, apfelschorle, and cookies. After a long leisurely break, we went to see the gardens of Hannover. I had no idea this place was so big. We spent a few hours and still didn’t see anything. I took a million pictures, but will post only a few of my favorites to give you an idea.

After this, we returned to the house for dinner and the conversation had Heidi and I laughing at every corner. Walter reminds me very much of Pastor Niermann in his mannerisms and facial expressions. He is also hilarious and as we quickly discovered, a huge kidder. He likes to make lots of jokes. You can tell that he is quite wise, really enjoys life, and just has that calm knowing and understanding that older people often have and that I envy. I hope one day I will be old enough to just calm down and not always be wondering about things. I think good times are in store for us in the great village of Hannover!