Hey! I know I have been slacking majorly on posting so I plan to catch up on the weekends I have missed!
Amsterdam, Netherlands March 19-20
We left Landstuhl at 6:11 am. Quite the early train but worth it! We started off our trip by finding out hotel. That part was easy. Figuring out how to get back to the tram station, was not. After crossing a very busy highway, we found it! We then decided to go for a walk and find the I AMsterdam sign! Tons of people around as we took lots of pictures. It was so much fun and a wonderful place to do some people watching. After that, we walked by the rivier (EVER city has a river running through it. It's amazing!) and decided to do the Heineken experience. They taught us how it was brewed and told us the importance of the foam on top of the beer. The foam holds in the Carbon to keep the beer from tasting flat and bland. You should also never sip beer, it's for gulping so you can get all the flavors together. After drinking our two free beers, we went and picked up our souveniers and decided it was time for dinner. We tried to go to Hard Rock Cafe but decided a two hour wait was a little too long so we decided on a place that was called Pancake Corner (I believe) and ate a delicious dinner. Ironically, I had a cheeseburger! After dinner, we walked around some more and decided to go relax at our hotel before exploaring the night life. Of course we had to go see the red light district and what a culture shock that was. To see all the women in the windows was insane! That is something I could never do! We walked around and found a nice quite pub called "Lord Mike." We had some delicious strongbow and ended our night there. The next day, we went to the Anne Frank house. Unfortunately, we were not able to take pictures inside. I must say, all the history there and being where such an inspiration little girl lived was quite amazing. Reading about their struggles and life was amazing and I can't imagine what they went through! We started our walk back to the train station to catch our train. And those people are so rude! We asked what the train times were and the lady told us like 4 hours from when we were there. Luckily we had looked them up and she just didn't think we would make our short connections (one connection was 4 minutes but the platforms were RIGHT NEXT TO EACH OTHER and the other connections were 20 minutes long). We do think she cursed us though. Our 6 hour train ride turned into 9 because our train thought it would be nice to break down in some random town so that we would have to find our own way home! We did find some cheap and delicious ice cream there though. And we found our way home just fine!
Here are a few pictures from my weekend in Amsterdam!
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| The sign! |
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| lol |
Anne Frank House
And I thought finding my car was hard..
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| Our delicious ice cream! |
Interlaken, Switzerland. March 26-27
We started off this trip with the 6:11 am train again! This country stole my heart. I took so many pictures of the mountains. It became quite ridiculous! We stayed in the coolest hostile with the best workers. Any question we had, they sure knew the answer! It was amazing and the people everywhere were so nice. This is where we all decided to go Canyon jumpin! We jumped into a canyon from 85 meters up with a free fall of 4 seconds. It was an amazing rush and I loved every second of it. After we made our jump, we walked around the gorgeous town of Interlaken and did some souvenier shopping. We walked around some more and decided to go back to our hostile for dinner. We thought they served food but this weekend, they didn't. We went next door and had some amazing pizza! After dinner, we went back to our room and talked with the people that were sharing our room. They were nannys and were very nice! We decided that it would be fun to go to the bar by our hostile for happy hour. It was fun but we were all so exhausted we called it an early night. On Sunday, we walked around and had breakfast at a cute little bakery. We also found a chocolate shop that was open (most places are closed on Sundays because they spend time with their family) and we were thrilled. The woman working there gave us free samples and we fell in love. Of course we had to buy some! We walked around some more looking at the beautiful mountains and then we had to catch our trian. It was an amazing weekend!
Here are a few pictures from my weekend in Switzerland!
Brugge and Brussels, Belgium. April 2-3
We left on the 7 am train. We had already had this trip planned before my granddad passed so I figured it would be the perfect place to go to on the weekend of his funeral. He love this place. I'm sure it's because of all the delicisously sweet things around! He was with me the entire trip. We started our Saturday in Brugge. At the first souvenier shop we went into, there was a pillow that said "Grandfathers are for loving and fixing things." What a great way of him showing me he was there. We walked around and found a great place to get some waffles! The man that worked there was very rude but the waffle was still delicious! Mine had whipped cream, chocolate, and caramel. It was amazing! We walked around the river (that ran through the middle of the city) and ate our waffles. We finially decided on one chocolate shop (they were literally every other store) and bought some truffles! We found the shopping area and did some shopping! I didn't buy anything but some of the other girls did! We found the square where they were having a free concert. The band was warming up so it wasn't going on yet. We decided to sit at one of the resturants and have a drink. Ironically, one girl ordered a diet coke and it was the most expensive drink. We then deicded that we should go catch a train to go to Brussels, where our hotel was. Once arriving in brussels, we had to ask THREE cab drivers to take us to our hotel. The first two claimed they didn't know where it was. We later figured out they probably didn't want to take us there because of the location. It wasn't dangerous or anything, there was just a lot of women on the streets. If you get what I'm saying! We had a gorgeous hotel though! A huge king size bed and a pull out couch! The next morning we got up and exploared Brussels. Walked around a lot and had another waffle. We found the statue of the peeing kid and were a little disappointed by it. It was rather small but had a huge significance to the city. We also found a market for jewelry! Of course I bought some. I bought four pairs actually! It was such a great price, I just couldn't pass it! In all fairness, they all aren't for me! :) We found another place to have a waffle. This time mine had strawberries, whipped cream, and chocolate. It was delicious! We walked around the city a lot and found the royal palace. It was gorgeous! After walking around some more, we figured it was time to catch our train back. It was a very succesful weekend!
Here are some pictures of Belgium!
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| Brugge. So pretty! |
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| The pillow that made me have tears in my eyes. |
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| Yes please! Whipped creap, chocolate, and caramel! |
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| Yummy drinks! |
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| Love that the flowers a blooming! It was a gorgeous weekend! |
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| <3 |
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| Not as good as the first one, but still delicious! Strawberries, whipped cream, chocolate! |
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| The peeing kid! |
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| The Royal Palace |
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| Mmmmm Belgian truffles!!!! |
Strasbourg, France. April 9
We decided that it would be fun to take a somewhat random trip to France. Our program coordinator has a car and was willing to take us. It was less than a 2 hour drive so it was perfect. On our way there, we stopped and took pictures with the France and Germany signs. It was so much fun and hilarious to see the looks that people gave you as they drove by! It was a cute little town that we didn't know much about. We did a lot of walking around and found the cathedral. we also learned that this is apparently where the story of the stork bringing the baby home comes from. They had stuffed storks everywhere with pictures of the baby on the front. It was funny and cute! We did a lot of walking along the river (that ran through the middle of the city) and sat along the river for awhile. It was such a beautiful and relazing day. We enjoyed each others company, ate some gelato, and had some burgers for dinner! There wasn't much to the day, but it was perfect!
Here are a few pictures of our day trip!
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| The cathedral! (note that it's NOT symetrical!) |
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| It was HUGE! |
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| Yum! Cafe and chocolate gelato! |
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| A family of ducks on the river! |
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| They were so cute! |
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| Love the colors of spring! |
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| This was our view for about an hour. Sitting along the river was great! |
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| So so pretty. A view of where we sat! |
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| Yummy dinner! |
Wow. Sorry for such the long update but I hope you enjoyed! It's been a LONG time since I've updated about my trips!! Glad to finally have it up here though!!
Jessica
