European Adventures: The Netherlands

Hi Bloggie,

In my last post, I mentioned an update on adventures with T and I'm here to deliver. Shall we proceed?

T and I hadn't gone on a long trip together since spring break of 2010 so when she sent me a screenshot of tickets to #Europe (for the price of domestic flights), I immediately said yes! It's no secret that I love to travel. My secret dream job title is "global traveller." Europe has always been very high on my list so I was more than pleased but for reasons unknown to me, afraid and guilty. My sisters supported my adventuring and made sure I booked my flight :). T and I didn't really plan where we would go to before buying our tickets. We just knew we wanted to attend Oktoberfest so, Germany and decided to plan our intracontinental journey after getting our tickets. We decided to arrive in Amsterdam and fly out of Munich. We were gone for only 10 days but I guarantee you, they were the busiest (and fun!) 10 ten days. Our entire trip spanned The Netherlands, Italy, Luxembourg, France and Germany. There's so much to talk about so I'll fast forward to the country this post is for, The Netherlands. Side note, I was writing during portions of our trip so I'm going to have some direct quotes as they captured the experiences.

We met in the morning in #Amsterdam. Getting into the country wasn't stressful they were very friendly and navigating the train to our hostel wasn't too bad. But once we got off the train, walking to the hostel was an unexpected journey. But we made it! We arrived well before check-in and so left our suitcases to begin exploring. We were exhausted from travelling but were only spending one night in Amsterdam so we had to be really brave.

"Starving and tired, we decided to go to an Australian restaurant down the street. Lunch isn't important because... T's having a baby!!! 💃💃😊. Even though when she told me, I was immediately worried about how she would feel while travelling and so, I missed out on embarrassing her with my happiness 😞. Like a bestie boss, she probably knew my antennae were up. Next baby news, it doesn't matter if we're hiking, travelling, dancing, name it. My crazy is coming for her! I'm sure I'll make it up. Fingers crossed.
We went into the city (totally missed our way to the train station, found another train stop, thought we could catch the train in front of us but discovered we were on the wrong side of the tracks, crossed over, but still missed that train!) and we saw the iconic "I Amsterdam" sign! We got tickets for a canal ride which wasn't for another couple of hours so the guy at the ticket counter suggested we visit a nearby museum and park to kill time. It was a lovely idea and a great way to pass time. We came back in time for our ride and got to see and learn a lot about Amsterdam. After the ride, we navigated back to the hostel, checked in, and crashed. We both thought we were going to nap but exhaustion got the better of us. When we woke up, we were hungry but it was pretty late. I was nervous about walking around at night but T reassured me we would be fine. She was right 😊. We went to dinner around 10ish to some bar-ish place. We had great food and REAL Fanta!! :) " Here are some photos...

One of the fun facts our canal guide mentioned was "there's a higher chance of your bicycle being stolen long before your car." I thought that the funniest thing! I mean a car is obviously worth more right? Wrong. When waiting for transport, T accidentally stood in the bike lane. Hehn, the anger and shouts were realer than those of angry motorists. We confirmed then, the seriousness of the cycling culture.

Overall, a great start to our adventure!

Day 2.
Initially, we thought we might wake up early and explore a little bit before our flight to Milan. The spirits were willing but the bodies were definitely weak. We even missed our free breakfast. We concluded it would be best to get to the airport early instead of squeezing out time for tourist actions. After all, we had days of exploring ahead.

"We definitely left early and still missed our way to the train station... thank goodness for Google maps! We made the wonderfully confusing trek with our luggage and of course our airline's counter was the last one so we had to drag for a while. Luckily, we had stopped by a local bakery and gotten some breakfast and Fanta before leaving. Well, T got actual breakfast and I got baked goods 😀."

Ending note: The smell of medicine is very alive in Amsterdam 😣.

All posts about my trip with T will end with songs she has made me listen to on repeat. This one is "Iyawo Mi" by Timi Dakolo. Enjoy!

Ciao,
Tonia