Trip to Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania

On May 12th we flew to Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania to pick up a vehicle to bring back for Elder and Sister Rydalch, a new missionary couple who will be serving in Arusha, Tanzania. We took advantage of this opportunity to stay with our good friends President and Sister Burgener. To list all of the things that they do as part of their missionary responsibilities would take a page or more. We are glad that many of their responsibilities interface with us in our office, so we are in contact with them almost every week. And because he serves as a councilor to President Broadbent in the Kenya Nairobi Mission Presidency they come to Nairobi for meetings fairly often. On several of these visits they have stayed with us in our flat. But this was the first and probably the last time that we will ever have a reason to be in Dar. So we extended our stay for a couple days and visited with them before starting our long drive back to Nairobi by way of Arusha. They took us to see all of the missionary flats and all but one of the four church buildings in Dar. And they took us to CoCo Beach which is the site in Tanzania where Elder Russell M. Nelson dedicated the country of Tanzania for the preaching of the gospel. And because it is a port city we had to see the ocean and Friday we spent a day in Zanzibar (which is in the previous post).

This is an early morning shot of the port of Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, obviously from our boat as we left for Zanzibar.

As we stood on the very point on Coco Beach, where Elder Nelson dedicated Tanzania, this is the view in one direction and the next image is looking in the opposite direction from the same point.

This is looking the other way on Coco Beach. Since this is their "winter" it was only 85ºF with a humidity to match, however the sea breeze made it very pleasant. I am glad our visit was timed during their cool time though.

This is where we attended Church Sunday the 15th. It is the Kinindoni Building. That Sunday they were realigning the two Kinindoni Branches that have been meeting there. Mbezi Beach Branch was created from part of the Kinindoni 1st Branch. The rest of Kinindoni 1st joined with Kinindoni 2nd. This new branch will no longer meet at this building. They have rented a large home in which to meet for the time being. The handsome young men in the foreground wanted to be in the picture. The one without a tie is Leon, the Burgener's neighbor. He rode with us to church. The other young man is his good friend. Unfortunately after the realignment they are now in different branches. In the background you can see Sister Burgener introducing Sister Nevin to one of the pioneer members of the branch. His conversion story is truly inspirational. He currently serves as a member of the District Council.

This is us with the Burgeners in front of the restaurant where we had lunch in Zanzibar.