The beautiful flowers along the trail.

The trail was very pretty with all the colorful Colombian flowers. Notice the green rolling hills in the background. Colombia is a beautiful green country with spectacular scenery.

Now this is a beautiful mushroom.

This mushroom was growing along the side of our trail. It was so beautiful that it looked artificial.

A large slice in the mountain.

The Spaniards, in their attempt to drain the lagoon had two thousand slaves with cups working day and night to try to scoop out the water so the Spaniards could find the gold that had been thrown into the lagoon by the native Indians. With little success, they then took out a large slice of the side of the lagoon to try to drain the water to get to the gold. They took it down several feet, but there is still a lot of water in the lagoon.

Reaching the summit.

We had a lovely climb to the top and heard the story of the legend of El Dorado. There are many legends of El Dorado, but this sounds like it was the real thing. The guide told us the Spaniards took out about 10 ton of gold from this Guatavita lagoon. Some gold pre-Columbian figurines were found in the water and are now in the Gold Museum. The legend is that the Musca tribe felt this lagoon was sacred. Every year right before the harvest the people of the tribe would climb up to the lagoon with their gold offerings. The lagoon was sacred, so the common people could not look at it. They would stand around the edge of the lagoon but looking away from it. A man would be sellected and he would put honey all over his body and then they would put cold dust on him. He would jump in to the water and swim around while washing off the honey and gold. When he was clean, he would climb out and they would blow a horn and then the people would throw in their gold offerings into the water without looking at it. This went on for several hundreds of years. The story has it that some peple have died in the lagoon trying to get to the gold. It is now protected by the government and no one can get in the water.

Tis the season to decorate the Christmas tree.

Luckily, our two assistants came to help me set up the Christmas tree. As usual, there was problems with the lights. Bogota is coming alive with the Christmas decorations. We have ornaments with the photos of all of our 17 grandchildren. We love looking at their angelic faces. President Hacking is sitting in his chair directing the work.

Local Garbage collector.

We have the normal garbage collectors in the big trucks, but before they arrive, many people go through the garbage to see what they can use or sell. This man had his cart full of things he had scavaged. Many times they leave a very big mess all around the garbage bags.

Choir concert from Bucaramanga choir.

Two stakes from Bucaramanga join together to form a wonderful choir. Part of the choir came to Bogota to attend the temple, and while in Bogota they performed a concert in the Alhambra chapel. Alhambra is one of the oldest churches in Bogota.

Folkloric dancers from Bucaramanga.

After the choir concert, some of the group from Bucaramanga performed some forkloric dances. Of course we enjoyed being in the photo as well.

A visit from President Juan Uceda.

We had a short visit from President Uceda from our area presidency. He lives in Lima, Peru, but he paid us a short visit while in Bogota. He always has this pleasant smile on his face.

The new entrada.

We have remodeled our office space and are very happy with our use of our space in our offices and waiting room. We more than doubled our entrada, and two of our zone leaders, Elder Chacon and Elder Huaita, were waiting for the President when I snapped the photo.

Administrative Secretary.

Elder Calton, from Mesa, Arizona, is the perfect financial secretary. He prefered being called the administrative secretary and so he changed his title. We doubled the size of his office, and he has a great window to help his day be successful.

Executive Secretary.

Elder Morris, from Salt Lake City, is serving his second term in the office. He changed his title from mission secretary to Executive Secretary. He helps things keep running smoothly, and is a big help with out medical problems. He is really good here, because he has had all the problems.

Elder and Sister Boulter are great help.

Elder and Sister Boulter are our newest office secretaries. They are great. We wonder how we managed without them. Sister Boulter designed and decorated our offices, and they keep things in line when we are gone. They had been in our ward when we lived in Colorado.

The office of the two assistants.

Our two assistants, Elder Centurion from Argentina, and Elder Williams from Las Vegas, enjoy their new office space. This space was half of our conference room before the remodeling.

Four stake dance festival.

We attended a four stake dance festival in Bogota. There were hundres of YW and YM participants. Our maid, Nidia, had invited us to attend with them. The youth were doing folkloric dances of Colombia.

Colorful dresses.

Nidia's two youngest daughters.

Nidia, our maid, invited us to the dance festival. Her two youngest daughters were at the dance festival waiting for us. They are the two on the right. Cute little girls. Camila is in the middle, and Daniela is in the blue.

Mission President Seminar 2010.

Once a year the area presidency will host a mission president seminar for all the mission presidents in the area. This was a conference were we learned many new techniques to help our missionaries be better in their teachings. We got up early and went to bed late, but we felt a wonderful spirit while we were there. This year the seminar was in Cusco, Peru.

The youth of Cusco.

On our second night we had a colorful performance of the youth of Cusco dancing many native dances. The costumes were extremely colorful.

Machupicchu

One of the days at the seminar we were taken by train to Machupicchu. This was the site of an old civilization that lived many hundred of years ago. No one knows for sure why they built this community upon the high peaks of this mountain, and no one knows why they abandened it as well.

The Inca bridge.

This wooden plank is the spot of the old Inca bridge. It leads to a trail that goes up the side of this sheer cliff. I can not imagine anyone crossing this bridge right next to the edge of the cliff. These were amazing people that lived here hundreds of years ago.

LLamas were part of the scenery.

These llamas were enjoying the tourists. I am sure they were brought in to help the visitors enjoy the beautiful scenery.

A visit from Sister Berrios.

After a fun day at Machupicchu, we returned from the train to Urubamba and we had a surprise visit from Hermana Berrios. She lives in Urubamba and came to visit with us. She had been one of our wonderful missionaries. Unfortunately, we only had a few minutes to visit with her.

A time to enjoy Peru.

We enjoyed our time in Peru, and the spirit of our mission president seminar. We had a beautiful resort we stayed at and enjoyed every minute of the seminar.

Alpacas for the scenery.

We enjoyed the alpacas that were grazing on the grounds around the hotel grounds. What fun they were to watch.

A surprise is coming.

President Hacking was trying to lead the little dark alpaca up closer to the larger alpaca to get a photo of them together. Sortly after this photo, the little alpaca came up right next to President Hacking and looked at him in the face about two feet away from his face and then spit him right in the eye. What a surprise. I was laughing so hard that I could not take a photo.