Amsterdam

Our hostel...

Our EuroTrip started with our first stop in Amsterdam. We arrived at the airport excited for this two week adventure, but also a little nervous about what we were going to do. We got to Amsterdam on March 25th and left early on the 28th. Our flight was not until late Friday night so we did not get to our hostel until 11ish. The nice thing was we were able to catch the train right at the airport and our hostel was only a 20 minute walk from the train station. This being our first stop, we weren't really sure what to expect from our hostel or the city. Well lets just say our hostel was not exactly what we were all expecting. Some of the people we go to school with stayed on a boat called the Intersail, so we thought it would be fun. Well...our room was probably 10ft by 6 feet, with two bunk beds, a sink and standing room for only one person at a time. Now I understand what it must be like for all the crab fisherman on the Deadliest Catch...I barely could make it through two nights; how in the world do they do four months?

The third building from the left is leaning

The house right in the middle

Saturday being our first full day we got up early in the morning to start our adventure around the city. It was kind of cloudy and a little rainy in the morning so we decided to take a boat tour around Amsterdam. The tour was called Lovers and it just went through the canal and the captain told us about the city. We found out that each year they pull out about 20,000 bikes from the canal. In Amsterdam the cars, buses, or the metro are not things you have to worry about while walking, it are the bikes. The bikers have more rights than anyone else on the road. Therefore, it makes since that they pull out so many bikes from the canal. He also pointed out some of the buildings are leaning and the smallest house every built...it only wide enough for one window.

Later in the day we split up and Alexa and I just walked around the whole city. We ran into the I Amsterdam sign and the Heineken Brewery, which we were going to the next day. After walking around for awhile we all met up at the Anne Frank House, where we had tickets to walk through. It was pretty cool to see the attic where she and her family hid for so long. The attic was left unfurnished by the request of Anne's father, so they had small models of what each room looked like. After we toured the museum, we headed to an Ice Bar. The Ice Bar was -20 degrees Celsius and really cold! We had to wear these big Eskimo like jackets, and mittens, but we were still cold. You can only go into the actual Ice Bar for 30 minutes at most. It was just enough time to look at the ice sculptures, and have two drinks out of cups made out of ICE!

Alexa, Katie, Cahrissa and me after the Ice Bar experience

Lex and me getting our picture taken

After the Ice Bar, we were pretty exhausted and decided to head back to the Intersail for the night. The next morning we woke up early and headed to the other side of the city. Alexa and I had signed up for the Heineken experience, which was pretty cool. We were able to walk around the whole brewery, see the different rooms, have a virtual experience of making the beer, get the opportunity to brew our own beer, and then at the end have two beers. I am pretty sure our tour lasted for about 3 hours, so afterword we got some food and then met up with the other girls to walk around the city some more. Sunday we literally spent the day out and about because we did not have a hostel for the night so we all decided it would be best to just walk around and then around midnight head to the airport where we could "sleep" and then catch our flight to Berlin. Well, we got to the airport around 2ish, found some benches and tried to get some rest; only to be awaken by airport security at 5 to them saying "Wakey wakey". This was by far the worst part of the whole trip. Being up for 24 hours, catching a plane and then staying awake all day Monday was extremely hard, but we did it!

Amsterdam was really cool. I had no idea what to expect from this city, but overall I was really happy we went there first. It slowly got us ready for all the walking we would be doing in the other 5 cities and prepared us for all the bikers in Berlin and Munich. Everyone was really helpful and city was clean. If I have the opportunity to go back to Amsterdam, I totally would.

Haley, Alexa, Cahrisa, Katie and me

Me and Alexa and the city of Amsterdam!