During the day on Monday our group traveled to the town of Annecy, Switzerland, which is located in a spectacular setting beside an extraordinarily clean lake and the mountains. We enjoyed the afternoon strolling throughout the quaint streets and walking alongside the canals and the lake.
Upon our return to our lodgings it was time for the World's Greatest Chocolate competition. Each missionary brought one bar of dark chocolate and one bar of milk chocolate that was made in their country of ministry. Two panels of four judges evaluated each chocolate according to aroma, texture, taste, and aftertaste. The women took their work very seriously! The teenagers helped Larry get everything ready for the competition. Here are the results:
Best Dark Chocolate:
The competition for this title was very fierce, but in the end the Primola chocolate from Romania beat out Cote d'Or from Belgium by one point! One point behind the Cote d'Or was the Roshen 56% chocolate from Ukraine
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Best Milk Chocolate:
There was a tie for first place in the milk chocolate competition, shared by Ion chocolate from Greece and Hershey's chocolate from the USA. Tied for second place were the Primola chocolate from Romania and the Cote d'Or from Belgium!
Spring Arbor University, Roberts Wesleyan College, Greenville College, Heritage Ministries and Health Care Center generously donated promotional items that were distributed to all retreat participants. Here are the teenagers displaying their Spring Arbor University t-shirts!
Following the activities we settled down to a time of praise and worship, led by Julie Allman. Mark VanValin then spoke to us from his heart, sharing of his own need for renewal and inviting us all to join him. We concluded with an extended time of prayers of thanksgiving and praise.
In the afterglow time Larry, Mark, Stephen, and Caty played a very fierce game of Settlers of Catan. We discovered that everyone had their own home rules, but we worked it out and in the end Caty pulled off a stunning victory!
Marcie Huson arrived in the late afternoon and was able to participate as one of the chocolate judges. Josef, Lynette, and Simon Sykora arrived during the night, having taken an late-night flight from Budapest. It is great to finally have the entire group together on site!