My Most Excellent European Adventure, Part 3. Day 8: Tiptoe through the Tulips (and windmills)

Thursday, April 14, 2011
Kinderdijk/ Keukenhof, Amsterdam

Today was another extremely busy but amazing day. We left early (about 9:00) and drove to Kinderdijk in the Netherlands, about a 2 hour drive. This is a town built on a dijk that has 19 windmills.

Creepy Ducth girl in a windmill kitchen

How about these stairs?

After navigating these each day - do you think you'd get use to them??

I particularly enjoyed the groundsworker who took a break to do some texting
(notice the proper wooden shoes!)

Very cool and interesting to see how they work. I didn't know much about the Netherlands before today - or windmills at all. Here are some fun facts:

- 40% of the country is below sea level
- The Dutch lived in the mills
- The workers were called "millers"
- 16 of the 19 mills in Kinderdijk are still inhabited
- The mills were used to pump water out of the dijks when it got too high

It was a gray, cloudy, and cold day to be walking around the mills. Very cool to see. We even got to walk around inside one of them to see how they lived.

After Kinderdijk, we drove about an hour to Keukenhof. This is HUGE tulip/flower garden. This was just beautiful and stunning. So many flowers, colors, arrangements. This was probably one of my favorite things we have done so far. We spent a couple hours there wandering and taking lots of pictures. Here are just a few.

Notice all the professional photographers... They are capturing this area below.

As Betsy and I were trying to catch this shot, we were suddenly surrounded by a hoard of professional photographers and their very fancy, and very big, equipment. Our very small, and very ameteur camers suffered by comparison.

We sadly tore ourselves away since we had an appointment at the Ann Frank house in Amsterdam. We drove the 30 minute drive to our hotel just outside of Amsterdam (appropriately named the Tulip Inn). It's actually pretty nice and more like an American hotel than any of our previous hotels. We rested in the room for about an hour then walked 10 minutes to catch the tram to downtown Amsterdam. We bought a 24 hour pass - and the interesting thing about it is you have to scan it on the tram when you get on and off. It was about a 25 minute ride to Central Amsterdam, walked around a bit to get a feel of a new city. It is a very interesting if not different city than we have seen so far. 

Can you guess the mode of transporation of choice in Amsterdam???

This is the church tower next to Ann Frank's house. We saw this XXX synbol all over the city and were very curious about it.

we made our way to the Ann Frank Haus. We had reserved tickets for 7:45. That was truly amazing to see.

It is unbelievable what she and her family had to go through for almost 2 years in hiding. There wer video clips of some of the people who knew and helped them. Even one of her father speaking which was very touching. Very sad, because she died in the camp just weeks before the liberation not knowing her father was still alive. I can't imagine what it would be like being the sole survivor of my family, especially for a father. I am so glad to I got to see that house and think about that time in history.

After the Ann Frank Huis, we went to dinner just across the street. We all got Dutch pancakes. SOOO yummy!

I got ham and cheese.

And of course a Diet Coke. No ice though...

It was such a cute restaurant and we all enjoyed it very much. We realized it was only the 2nd or 3rd time we sat down to eat with just the four of us at a restaurant on the trip. We have done so much eating on the run. So nice to enjoy the food and atmosphere not being rushed. After dinner we waited a LONG time for our tram in the cold. Finally it came and we made it back to our hotel. Such an interesting and enjoyable city despite its reputation. Although, Heidi did see someone rolling a joint in desperation while we waited fot the train. Don't worry, it's legal here. It's kind of a dirty and trashy city like Vegas but with a lot more charm and history. I love the buildings on the canals. So unique and different than anything we have seen yet. The people seem very nice and friendly and most speak very good English. Very exhausting yet exciting and interesting day.

My Most European Adventure, Day 7: Touring Brussels

Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Brussels, Belgium

Today, we got to sleep in! My alarm was supposed to go off at 8:45 so we could be ready to go at 10:30, but for some reason (international phone difficulties, perhaps) my phone thought it was half an hour later so I didn't get up until 9:15, Betsy and Beth went to a local flee market early- nonw of us wanted to go for very long and we knew they would want to spend a long time. Beth was kind enough to come back and pick us up at 10:30 after she had to drop someone off at the airport. After spending some time at the flea market (Betsy and Beth were very successful!)

Beth played tour guide and took us around Brussels around the afternoon. First we went to lunch at a cute little restaurant. 2 words to describe this place: sandwiches and dessert!

Angela and Heidi shared a Chocolate Bomb and a strawberr tart. Is your mouth watering??

A little dark... but you can see the cute restaurant.

After lunch, we walked around downtown Brussels. The square is called Grand Place. It's truly grand and amazing to see.

We then walked down a street called Butcher Street. It reminded me a lot of Little Italy in New York. It was full of restaurants (mostly sea food, though) with waiters standing outside to talk to you as you passed by.

On to a shopping mall. In fact, we learned, one of the first, if not the first, covered shopping area ever. It was very fun! I bought some lace and a couple of other things here.

No self respecting Belgian tourguide would have us miss this:

The Mannekin Pis. Yes, the name is literal. He is quite famous and legendary in Belgium, Apparantly there are a few stories and legends about him, not one of them being 100% certain. The Belgians are quite proud of him, and he is often dressed in fancy costumes. You can see him anywhere - candies, cards, chocolate, calendars, corkscrews. Quite interesting.

Then, because we hadn't eaten in a couple of hours, Beth took us to her favorite chocolate outlet: Neuhouse. Just amazing! It was a very small shopped and very packed. But yummy, yummy, yummy chocolate to look at

The best part of this place, aside from the beautiful display,  was that you can sample the chocolate. Beth gave us fair warning to take only a bite of each piece and get rid of the rest in order to power through. It was a rough job, but I think we did well!
Well, then we discovered the back of the store: lucky corner.

 Here, you can buy three boxes of chocolates for 30 euros. What a deal - you cannot beat that.

After a little more sampling (you can see the open boxes for the tasting!), we all decided to buy 3 boxes of single flavored chocolates and trade them later to mix and match. Thank you Beth and Neuhaus Chocolate Outlet.

After stuffing ourselves with chocolate, we went back to the Passey's home to hand out and relax for a bit .Beth and Betsy went to the grocery store and the rest of us stayed back to work on our journals, read, email etc. I got to call home and talk to home and talk to mom. Glad to hear we missed some snowy weather back home. Then we had dinner with the Passey family including lettuce wraps a la PF Chang and a trio of different European lemony sodas. They have been so helpful and generous. We are lucky to have such a great family to stay with.After navigating cities on our own for the last several days,  I appreciate Beth's guiding us around Brussels so much today. We didn't have to worry about where we were going or what we wanted to see. Another great day!!

My Most Excellent European Adventure, Day 6: Cold weather and castles...

Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Rothenburg/Rhine Valley Germany

Today was the first bad weather/ cold day we have had. After almost a week of beautiful clear, sunny skies, we woke up to gray skies and rain. And cold. It was only about 50, quite a change from our 70+ sunny weather. We have been so lucky so far, so our luck was bound to run out. After breakfast at the hotel, we drove the 5 minute drive back to Rothenburg a d did some more shopping... once the stores were open. Most stores didn't open until 10:00. We made sure to stop at the Kathe Wolfhart store. It was amazing and huge. It's like a never ending maze through a Christmas winter wonderland. It's covered with Christmas trees, lights, nutcrackers, villages, ornaments, etc. etc. etc. Very impressive to see. Unfortunately, impressive prices. Hence, I didn't end up buying anything there. Just managed to get this contraband photo:

I LOVE the cobblestone streets throughout the entire city. Not sure if I'd like driving on them in this car though...

View of the city from the wall

You can see part of the wall that surrounds the city here

After Rothenburg, we drove to Weisbaden to see my friend Lindsey. Yeah!! It turns out she was on the way we needed to go. I'm so glad I got to see her. I really miss being able to talk with her. She had her two kids with her. Eva is 4 and Gabe is 3. They were adorable and so excited to see the castles. I rode with her and the other girls followed while we drove along the Rhine river to look at all the castles. We wanted to to a boat cruise, but we couldn't work out the timing and the weather was cold and windy. But, the drive was spectacular! We saw about 10 castles over the course of our 40 minute drive. So green and well maintained. I believe this must be some of the most picturesque land in the world. Some of the bigger, more well-maintained casltes have been turned into hotels. That would be a fun place to stay! There was a small castle on a tiny island in the middle of the river. Apparantly a kind wanted to live there so he could tax all the boats that went by. After we saw the castles we stopped at a cool little town and walked around for a bit.

Our car!

This was someone's house... apparantly they like Easter

 After we left Lindsey we set off to drive back to Brussels. About a 3 hour drive. WOW! What an amazing exhausting few days. I can't believe how much we have done in so short a time. On the way home we drove (for a very short time) through the Netherlands. That makes 5 countries we have been in: Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourh (we drove through shortly on the way to Germany) and the Netherlands. A lot of miles and territory. So amazing. Once we made it back to the Passey's, we had dinner, planned out our hotel for Amsterdam, did some laundry, and went to bed.

My Most Excellent European Adventure, Day 5: Guten Tag

Monday, April 11, 2011
Trier & Rothenburg Germany


Today was a beautiful day. Lots of driving through beautiful German countryside. We had breakfast at our German/Spanish hotel (it was called the Casa Verde). It was actually very nice. We drove into the city of Trier and walked around and shopped. Such a cute little town! It is the oldest town in Germany.

The Porte Nigre (the Black Gate). The oldest standing Roman gate.

While shopping in Trier, I found some jeans! I spotted a store that looked like it had plus size clothes so I jumped in and 5 minutes later I had a pair of new German jeans! If you're ever in Trier and need some plus size clothes, check out Ulla Popken! After shopping/walking around we took off for Rotheburg- about a 4 hour drive. I drove today. Such a beautiful drive through the countryside. Green, rlooing hills, small villages with churches in the center. Not a bad day to be driving. We made it to our next hotel - another pretty nice one.

Our hotel outside of Rothenburg

We have been lucky to find all of our hotels, mostly on the first try and have all been pretty decent. This one is a little smelly, almost like the sewer backed up. We have opened all the windows and door to try to air it out... Then we were off to drive into Rothenburg to see the nightwatchman tour. This is such a beautiful, medieval city. We learned a lot about its long history on the tour.During medival times it was  avery rich, independent, imperial city. The during the 30 year war when they were invaded and overcome by enemies and the city was basically shut down until the 1890's. When tourism revived things for a while. It was on the verge of being completely destroyed by Americans at the end of WWII. When it was spared at the last minute by an American General whose mother had once visited Rothenburg and he had always loved to hear her stories about it so he offered them a chance to surrender. At that time the Germans were under orders not to surrender or negoriate but the particular German general who was assigned to Rothenburg was away so his substitute surrendered. This saved  the town from being destroyed. Since then, tourism has helped keep it so well preserved.

Our night watchman tour guide

After the tour, we walked a little on the wall the surrounds the city and then went back to the hotel around 10:00. It's been nice to spend more time in the cities we are in. We all LOVE Rothenburg and agree it might be our favorite place so far.

 I got to talk to my friend Lindsey today and we might be able to see her tomorrow, but unfortunately it may be too far out of our way, I'm  really quite sad. I was hoping for a chance to see her. I haven't seen her in about 3 years. Not sure what will happen tomorrow, but it's Heidi's birthday!