We were in search for WARMER WEATER

and we found it....

DOWN SOUTH IN SOUTHERN EUROPE!!

The temple is closed for it's 2-week regular maintenance. President Haikkola has given us permission to visit Germany and Italy during that two week 'break'. It has been soooo COLD in Finland we were hoping for some warmer weather!

As we headed out to the Helsinki Airport this morning, this is what temps we were going to leave behind! Just too COLD for human consumption too long!

This is more like it.....but the funny thing is that people are bundled up down here like they were in Finland!! Funny to see.....We were glad it was sooooo WARM!

We flew into Munich Germany and picked up our rental car. We headed 'south'. We drove through Germany and Austria and Lichenstein and Switzerland and finally made it to ITALY.

We saw lots of CASTLES all along the way.....this is only one of the many we saw. The weather was not the greatest as we drove. Snowy, rainy and lots of clouds so we couldn't really see those gorgeous ALPS much until........

we got into Switzerland and Italy......and then the sun started to come out! AAAAHHHH..we knew they were hiding there somewhere!!

Worth the drive to see them again.

We made it into LAKE COMO before dark. It was nice to look around and see some things before we couldn't see things well.

It is a beautiful place. Our Hotel overlooks the southern part of the lake. Our wrap around balcony is actually the ONLY ONE the hotel has and we totally lucked out to be able to get it.

Our BellBoy took this picture of us on the 3rd floor landing.

We walked around the 'plaza' after we had traditional Italian dinner.....our Hotel is in the background.

And we topped the evening off with some ITALIAN GELATO ice cream. The best stuff......totally delicious.....

TOMORROW: We drive down to VENICE ITALY for the next 3 days. Should be even warmer there.