Kandern – Day 4

We made our way through many small towns in the Alsace region of France. This one was Village-Neuf. If you look closely, you can see our car in the bottom-right of the image.

We spent the better part of the day in the Alsace region of France yesterday. Living in France is one of the options available to us, as some of the closest communities there are about 25-30 minutes from the Kandern area. As such, we thought it would be good if we spent some time there, so that we’d have an idea of what it might be like to live there.

We drove south from Kandern to Basel, passed over the French border into Saint Louis, and then went up along some of the various north-south highways, back toward Mulhouse. We kinda meandered through the area, stopping and exploring along the way, and making photos of interesting things along the way.

One of the interesting things we stumbled across was the Hyper U. The Hyper U is the closest thing to a Wal-Mart we’ve found since we’ve been here. It was huge—larger than most Wal-Mart stores, but maybe not quite as big as a Sam’s or Costco. And, contrary to most of the grocery stores we’ve visited (if you’ve been to Aldi, you’ve got an idea of what a big European grocery store is like), it had tons of different kinds of stuff—clothing, garden supplies, TVs and other electronics, home appliances, bikes, lawn mowers, and, of course, groceries.

We spent quite some time there, exploring and comparing and generally getting an idea of what’s there and what’s not. When we got to the bread section, Phoenix innocently asked, “Where’s the French bread?” Miranda and I laughed, and then told her that, technically, all the bread was French bread. In her defense, she was looking for the low, fat French loaves like they have at HEB. It was still pretty funny.

We spent the remainder of our time in France driving through the little towns that dot the highways along the Rhine. Many of them were very small towns, probably no more than 1000-2000 people, with lots of single-family homes. We found a number of towns that seemed as if they’d be nice to live in there, if that’s where God leads us.

We enjoyed our time there, and managed to get back to Kandern without getting completely lost. We did, however, discover that the highways in Germany have far fewer real exits than do their counterparts in the US—and that sometimes, all you get in an exit is a self-contained rest area/gas station…which we twice mistook for a real exit.

That evening, we had dinner with Bud and Barb, a Wycliffe family who have been instrumental in helping us get sorted here in Kandern. They served us a great meal, and we had a wonderful time talking with them afterwards, discussing all the things God has been revealing to us in the last week. Phoenix even got to beat a few of us at Mancala, one of her favorite games presently. We had a brief prayer time with our hosts, and then we made the short walk back to The Sanctuary, our home for the week.

Prayer Needs Met:

• We were able to safely navigate our way into and around France without difficulty (and we only got lost a few times)
• We have better clarity about what we do and do not need to bring with us when we come back
• We have make significant progress toward narrowing down our options with regard to schooling for the kids
• Phoenix continues to have fun and is looking forward to having more playdates with new friends here

Ongoing Prayer Needs:

• That we will have stamina to finish the week well (we only have 1.5 days until we begin our return)
• That we will be able to get definitive answers to questions about costs of schooling (this has been difficult, especially when interfacing with some of the German partners of the elementary school here)
• That we will be wise in how we spend our remaining time here (meet with more people, seek out more information, or spend time together having fun as a family, etc.)
• That we will continue to get along well together as a family and that we will continue to be patient with each other and with our situation here