Day 3: Amsterdam, Zoetermeer, Delft, & Kinderdijk

If I remember correctly, I once again woke up at 2 AM. I think I drifted back to sleep better than the previous night, but I still woke up far earlier than I would like. Andy and Amy took off on their own side adventure to spend a couple of days in Paris. The rest of us started our day at the Rijksmuseum.

The building itself is amazing and then you add all of the artwork and artifacts it's almost overwhelming all there is to take in. Annie said that she wants to take a week long trip back to Amsterdam just to explore to museum. I think that would be the right pace to take it all in.

I love the realism in this painting. It looked more like a photograph than an oil painting.

Night Watch by Rembrandt van Rijn

Het Melkmeisje by Johannes Vermeer

Fishing for Souls by Adriaen Pietersz. van de Venne

Stern carving from the Royal Charles

Cuypers Library inside of the museum

After the museum, we rented a car so we to do more sightseeing outside of Amsterdam. Our first stop was The Hague Netherlands Temple. Like many temples, it isn't actually located in the city it is named for. The temple is in Zoetermeer which translates to sweet lake. Now I have been to both the Salt Lake Temple and the Sweet Lake Temple.

We hoped back into the car and spent the afternoon in Delft. We had lunch in a cute square.

The schnitzel was fantastic!

After lunch, we visited the Nieuwe Kerk or the new church.

De Nieuwe Kerk

In Europe, new is a relative term. This is the second church in Delft and the construction for the "new" church started in the 1300s.

We didn't realize it before going inside, but William of Orange is buried the "Father of the Fatherland". This church is where his many of his royal descendants are buried.

The ticket to visit the new church included the old church. We wandered around the square in front of the new church and then made our way to the old church.

The City Hall is across the square from the new church.

Over the centuries, the tower has burned in fire and struck by lightening.

We stopped off at an antique store along the way to the old church. The store owner was very excited to find out that Chris spoke Dutch and the two talked.

We found a great photo-op along the way.

We finally made it to the Oude Kerk. 

As we were making our way back to the car, we saw a man park along a canal. We were all very impressed that he didn't fall into the water.

Our last stop of the day was to visit Kinderdijk to see a lot of windmills.

The road getting to and from Kinderdijk is very unusual. It looks like a one way street with bike lanes on either side of the road for cars.

It turns out, it is really a two way street for cars too. When a car comes in the opposite direction, both cars go into the bike lanes to safely pass each other. It was really weird!

After we got back to Amsterdam, I started packing since we were going to be staying Brugge, Belgium for the next few days.

That was day 3.

Day Two: Amsterdam & Arnhem

My second day started at 2 AM when I woke up and couldn't go back to sleep. I was very well rested and thought it must be close to 6 AM. Oh well! Since I was wide awake, I called Jonathan. We talked for over an hour and then he told me to go back to sleep. I rested, but didn't get anymore sleep. It was good because I had plenty of time to get ready for church.

Chris, Annie, and I took a tram, train, and bus to get to church in Arnhem. Chris served there as a missionary over 10 years ago. It was a beautiful morning going through Amsterdam and the Dutch countryside.

A calm morning in Amsterdam.

We saw lots of farms and windmills.

After the train, we got on a bus to get to church and saw a bit of Arnhem.

The bridge out the window is the bridge too far from Operation Market Garden during WWII.

Church was a wonderful experience. A couple of people remembered Chris and the missionaries were thrilled to talk to people from home. 

This is "I Am a Child of God" in Dutch.

After two hours of church, the jet lag caught up to Annie and me. We headed back to Amsterdam so we could take naps. My mom didn't come with us to church because she didn't wake up until 12:15 PM. She and Chris headed out while Annie and I laid down. After our naps, we all headed out together for more sightseeing.

My favorite store was also the most delicious store. Clara told Chris and Annie that only gift she wanted from the trip was cheese, so naturally we went to a cheese store. We went to Henri Willig and tried a lot of different flavors of gouda. I ended up getting the green pesto flavor since I love green pesto so much!

So many delicious flavors of cheese!

The row houses sometimes lean.

These bike bells were so cute and I wanted one so bad even though I don't have a bike.

This day also was baby J's birthday so I had a delicious Dutch pannenkoek at The Pancake Bakery for dessert. It had cinnamon ice cream, chunks of stroopwafel (Dutch waffle cookies), chocolate flakes, and whipped cream all on top of a crepe. Amy had it the previous night for dinner and it was divine!

And that was day 2.

Celebrating Together

Last Thursday, Jonathan and I finally took the time to celebrate my birthday together. It was really weird not being together on the actual day, but it nice to have another special evening. We walked down to Macy's so Jonathan could pick up a present for me. Then we made our way to Whole Foods to check out their bakery.

Jonathan got key lime pie and I got a berry cheesecake. Delicious!

We ate our desserts and enjoyed the sunset from the deck at Whole Foods.

While I had a great time spending two weeks in Europe, it feels so right to be back home in Texas with Jonathan.

Day One: Amsterdam

Even though this is labeled as our first day in Amsterdam, I'm adding a bit of the day before since it was spent in the plane on our way there. Our flight took off at 4:00 PM on Friday and landed in Amsterdam around 11:00 AM the next day. I've never been on such a long flight, but it went alright.

I was able to get some sleep and the food on the plane wasn't too bad. When we landed the excitement kicked in to help mask a certain amount of my fatigue.

After we checked into our hotel, Chris, Annie, and I headed off to a nearby grocery store to pick up some food.

After a bit of food and rest, we made our way to the Van Gogh Museum. I found a new favorite Van Gogh painting.

Wheatfield under Thunderclouds

A nice Dutch man offered to take a picture of my mom and me in front of the painting. A group of guys came up behind us and he tried telling them to move, but they didn't realize he was talking to them. He then walked in front of them and forced them to move for us. After the picture he asked if we were Scottish or Irish. Apparently we didn't sound like Americans. When we told him we were Americans, he started talking about President Trump. Mom diverted his attention and we parted as friends.

After the Van Gogh Museum, we walked to the Anne Frank House. I couldn't help but stop and take as many pictures as I could along the way there.

Before going into the attic space Anne Frank lived in, there was a presentation to give context to the rise of the Nazis and why the Frank family went into hiding. They don't allow pictures inside of the rooms and so that's why I don't have any.

This is a replica of Anne Frank's diary.

It was amazing to see how small the rooms are that they lived in. Anne Frank's father is the only person that lived there that survived the concentration camps. When he came back, the rooms were emptied. He decided to leave them that way so the visitors could have that same experience he had. There was a peaceful reverence in the rooms as we went through.

The windows are still blacked out in the upper rooms.

We went down the street for dinner at The Pancake Bakery. I got the pannenkoek spek en kaas or the bacon and cheese pancake. Dutch pancakes are thin like crepes. We also shared an order of poffertjes. Those are little bit sized pancakes that are fluffier than American pancakes.

Dinner was delicious! If anyone ever plans on going to Amsterdam, you will want to eat there. There are tons and tons of options and we went there two days in a row because it was so good.

Instead of walking back to our hotel, we decided to take the tram (light rail) back. We ended up having to wait for quite some time because the ones that we could take back wouldn't stop or would somehow get delayed. Eventually, we shoved our way in and made it back to our place for the night.

That was day one!

The Journey Home

Last Friday, I got home from Europe. It maybe weird, but I'm going to start with that crazy day before the rest of the trip. I woke up in Rome and finally laid my head down in Austin after four flights. It was a long day with more than enough stress.

Chris and Annie picked out excellent places for us to stay in.

We woke up around 5:00 AM to finish packing and take a shuttle to the airport. We had to check our carry on luggage because the weight restriction for our first flight of the day. (We were all 2 - 7 kilograms over the maximum.) Andy tried to have them transfer our bags to our second flight, but they couldn't because it was a different airline. We now had to change planes, print out our boarding passes, pick up our bags, and go through security for the second time of the day all within an hour.

Yet another miracle on this trip happened and everything went smoothly. I was chosen by the computer to go through additional screening at the gate.

This is the machine that tested the samples from my clothes and luggage.

Don't worry, I passed the additional inspection just fine. Ten hour flights are no joke. It was made a bit easier by watching a movie and a few TV shows on the flight.

The layover for me was no joke. I had just over an hour to get through customs, change terminals, and go through security for the third time of the day. I was really worried that I wasn't going to make it. The line for customs wasn't too bad, but it was rather slow. I only had about 30 minutes to make it to the other terminal and security. Naturally, I barely missed the tram to go to the other terminal. It was tough waiting and watching the minutes tick away. Apparently, the terminal that my flight used is one of the least busy terminals at SFO. There were just a few people in front of me in line. I didn't take my camera out of my bag and so it needed to be scanned separately. Even with that delay, I made it to the gate with time to spare. It was a miracle!

During the second hour of the flight, I took a nice nap. The first real sleep I had all day.

My last layover was also my longest one, but it wasn't too bad. While I was trying to figure out what snack to get, I found a familiar statue.

I saw Michelangelo's David at the beginning of the week in Florence so it was extra funny to find this card in Dallas.

By this time, I was done traveling and being stuck on airplanes. Luckily, the flight was under 40 minutes long.

Blurry Austin outside the window.

It was a crazy long day. I traveled over 8,400 miles in just over 24 hours. It was physically exhausting, but I was so glad to be home again!

I plan on posting about each of our days on the trip. It's going to take quite awhile to post all of them, but I will be glad to have all of the memories written down so I can look back and remember this amazing trip.

You Belong To Me

I am flying off to Europe today. Chris and Annie have been wanting to visit their mission's for a number of years and a few of the family are tagging along with their visit. We'll start in the Netherlands and Belgium where Chris served over ten years ago. We'll be able to go to church in one of the wards he served in. Then we'll make our way to Italy where Annie served.

With Jonathan's unexpected job change, he won't be coming with me. I'm so grateful that he's excited for me to go even though he can't. (Though Chris suggested that he just quit and come with us!)

This song will be stuck in my head during this trip.

The blog will be neglected while I am gone, but I will be taking tons and tons of pictures and will have stories to share.

Marble Falls, TX

Spring started blooming here in Texas last month. Naturally, I've been on the lookout to see fields of wild flowers. We went for a drive out in the country. While we didn't find fields of flowers, we had a great time.

There was a strong spring shower and a massive double rainbow. As we drove through Marble Falls, we saw a sign that said Mormon Mill. Naturally that peaked our interest and we drove down it.

There is a Mormon cemetery, but unfortunately it's on private property. Since our drive, I've done some more research and the area was settled by a group of 20 Mormon families that were led by Lyman Wight. All that is left is the cemetery.

As we drove down Mormon Mill Road, we saw a group of very happy longhorns. I get so excited every time I see longhorns.

Hopefully, we can find some fields of wildflowers soon!