A Weekend in Idar-Oberstein

Somehow I pushed or tapped the wrong key so posted the pictures before I wrote the text.

Helmut's cousin Dorla and her husband Herrmann welcomed us in their home and kindly entertained us on Sat. & Sun. Both of them are pastors in different parishes so they are very busy on Sundays. Dorla has five village churches along with another pastor so she goes to a different one than the other pastor and they rotate around from Sunday to Sunday. Herrman has three churches in Idar-Oberstein and shares the responsibility with another pastor.

On Sat. when Herrmann had some spare time he took us to see the famous Felsenkirche which is built right into the side of a mountain - It is the white building in the mountain. It was built between 1482 and 1484. It is not accessible by road any more so all the visitors, congregation and workers have to climb up about two hundred steps. Herrmann is one of its pastors and he goes there about once a month. I walked up all those steps and that was quite an undertaking for me. I was glad that there was a bench where I could rest just before entering this tunnel.

The tunnel was constructed as the entry way to the church more recently because of things falling down from higher up the mountain at the original entry way.

There are houses built on the side of the mountain and the only access to these houses is by foot. You can see the banister of the walkway in a couple of the pictures. In one picture Herrmann and I are descending the stairs and walkway.

Many years ago precious stones were mined in the mountains of this area so the town is famous for that and jewelry.

We had a very nice visit with H. & D. and Helmut really had lots of good reminiscing with Dorla about Grossmutti Rauhut. Dorla was fairly young when Grossmutti R. moved to Canada so D. felt cheated out of her Grandmother. However, Helmut's Grandmother Zimmermann went to live with his aunt (her daughter) about the same time and they were the next door neighbors of Dorla's family so she adopted Grandmother Z. for her own. Rauhuts and Hasselhofs are related to Helmut on the second Mother's side. (Dorla was a Hasselhof.) Probably Dorla knew Grandmother Zimmermann better than Helmut knew his own Grandmother.

Hopefully this separated blog post won't be too confusing to anyone. Just scroll down and you will see the pictures.