go out - there's life out there

[sitkaland]

Firework Show

So it's like 10:30pm, the night before Aug. 1 (Switzerland Day? National Day of Switzerland?) and there are fireworks going off everywhere. The town that I'm in just put on this HUGE - like humungous - show. It went on and on and on. We were all just standing there in awe. Fireworks seem to bring pure joy to people. I heard one of my friends ask herself "Why am I laughing?". I wonder if there will be more fireworks tomorrow.

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Chäserrugg

We took the train and then the gondola up. It was really cool, you could see the whole valley and the Säntis. Also, there was a cute guy beside me, but nevermind. Once at the top, there was a restaurant (duh) and lots of trails. We did a loop trail around the plateau. The cute guy was actually going paragliding with his dad and we saw them later gliding around. It's a known spot for paragliding, we saw a couple other people throughout the day. We didn't take the gondola down, we opted to walk. It took us about three hours and it was literally all downhill. Sometimes we had to walk easy bits backwards to give our feet a rest.

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All the Way to Switzerland

We started out the day by walking around Colmar. We bought some pain au chocolat and they were delicious. French baking cannot be beaten. We spent about two hours in Colmar. We drove to Basel, about one and a half hours. We visited with some more family friends. Their son is a producer/dj. His music is really good. His name is Herr Vogel and here is his soundcloud. We spent a couple hours there and then we continued on past Zurich to a tiny little town where some more family friends have a house. We're staying here for a few days. We'll most likely go hiking.

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One Day, Three Countries

We left the beach house and drove towards Bruges. It was a longish drive and we went through the most terrible thunderstorm. The rain was so hard that the windshield wipers couldn't clear the water fast enough. It stopped raining once we got to Bruges, thankfully. We met an old Ph.D student of my dad's and we wandered around and got Belgian waffles and fries. He also gave us a gift of Belgian chocolate and my dad some Belgian beer, so we got everything covered. After two hours in Bruges, we continued down to Bonn. There was a big barbecue and family reunion, though technically not our family, it was with very good family friends. We stayed up late and everything got funnier and funnier as they had more and more beers.

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Beach, Beach, Let's Go to the Beach

Two nights at a Dutch beach house owned by family friends. It was wonderful, but there was no wifi. We spent a long time at the beach, swimming in the ocean and lying on the beach. We all got sunburnt, some worse than others. On the flip side, now I am tanned. Kind of. The ocean is not too cold, a lot warmer than where I live.

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Amsterdam Day 2

This morning we started out at the Rijksmuseum. We spent a good couple hours there. We saw most of the stuff there, but near the end it got a bit long. We saw Rembrandt's famous The Night Watch, some Vermeer and quite a lot of Frans Hals. There was a lot of silver dishes in the museum. When we were done, we went outside to the Museum garden. It's very nice and has this really cool fountain. It's a circle inside a square and the jets go up at different intervals so you can go inside and be surrounded by a wall of water.

After that, we walked around Amsterdam looking for some lunch. It was a while, but we found this really nice sandwich place, Broodje Bert, on the Singel canal. It was delicious. From there we walked to the Anne Frank house. We didn't go inside, because the line was extremely long. We continued towards our apartment, going through the Dam square. It was very crowded, but that was only to be expected. We had some really good ice cream on the Nieuwendijk. Unfortunately, I don't know what it's called, but it's purple. After that we walked back to the apartment. We had Indonesian take-out.

[sitkaland]

are you sterdam?

because i amsterdam

[sitkaland]

Amsterdam Day 1

Today we woke up early to get to the Van Gogh museum before the crowds. It worked. We walked through the Vondelpark. The museum was wonderful. Van Gogh is my favourite painter. We were there for maybe a bit more than two hours. There was a great exhibition showing his techniques set up in a timeline. Last night, I rewatched the Doctor Who episode Vincent and the Doctor, because it's my favourite. It made it easier to connect with the art displayed.

After Van Gogh, we went to the Coster Diamond factory. It was pretty much a place to buy expensive watches tax-free. To go in the actual Diamond museum costs money, that we didn't want to spend.

We continued wandering through Amsterdam, past the Apple store. Naturally, my brother insisted we go in. My brother and dad wandered around looking at stuff, while my mother did research on Amsterdam on an iPad. I played games.

We went to the Begijnhof and looked around. It's a sanctuary type thing for single Catholic women. It's been around since the early 14th century. It's amazing that women still live there.

We went on a canal cruise. It's was very hot inside the boat, but it was still really cool. It's a great way to see a lot of the bigger sights in Amsterdam in a short time. After that we went home and chilled.

[sitkaland]

Muiden - Amsterdam

This was the final leg of our bicycle journey. It was not a particularly long or hard ride, only 15 km. We dropped off our bikes at the Fietspoint at Amstel Station and then dropped my brother's bike off at the place where we rented his. We then took a tram to Vondelpark and had a picnic lunch. We stayed there until 4 pm, when we could go to the apartment we are renting for the next few days. It's quite nice, on a canal and very close to the Vondelpark.

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Nieuwerbrug - Muiden

This was the second longest bike ride today, somewhere between 50 and 55 km. It was really hot out and we had a headwind. We left towards 11am, a bit after breakfast (which was delicious), so we ended up cycling in the heat of the day. We stopped for lunch at 2pm, at this place on the water where you could rent boats. Later, at around 4:30pm, we stopped by this lake to go for a swim. I didn't go in, just dipped my feet in, but my dad and brother did. We got to the B&B towards 6pm and then went for dinner down the street. The B&B is called Studio Armuda and is in a great place, near the centre of town and really nice. Tomorrow we go back to Amsterdam.

[sitkaland]

Rotterdam - Gouda/Nieuwerbrug

Today was the longest bike ride, almost 60km. First we biked around Rotterdam, mostly for the architecture. After that, we continued to Kinderdijk  with a ferry and visited the windmills. Taking another ferry, we kept on going. All the way to Gouda. There was a very strong headwind in certain places, which slowed us down. We really didn't stay long, it was very busy and touristy. Our B&B is in Nieuwerbrug, past Gouda. It's a really nice place, cute little brick buildings and canals. The B&B is called Het Kleine Huisje and is in one of those red-brick buildings. It's really in a wonderful spot.

There will be pictures coming soon. The pictures are not on my camera because I can't access it easily while biking, so they will be uploaded when I can get the other ones.

[sitkaland]

Den Haag - Rotterdam

First thing in the morning, we went to the Escher museum. It was really interesting, with all of his famous prints. Pretty much everything is an original print. After that we kept biking, through Delft. It's a really nice town. We stopped for ice cream and kept going until Rotterdam. I love the city. There's amazing architecture everywhere you look. There's even an architecture walking tour you can do. I'm staying in the Cube House. We walked around a bit after dinner and saw lots of really interesting stuff. There are still crazy cyclists, but it's not as... exciting as Amsterdam in that sense.

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Noordwijk - Den Haag

Today was another hot day. I got a bit sunburnt on my arms and my face. We spent about an hour on the beach in Katwijk. We played in the surf and it was really nice. We continued on through the sand dunes to The Hague. We spent a long time getting through the city to our hostel - which is very close to the downtown - because we had trouble finding our way. We also didn't bike very fast, especially by Dutch standards, because we needed to find the hostel. After that we went to dinner, at a very nice restaurant in the middle of downtown.

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Haarlem - Noordwijk

Now I'm in a hostel outside of Noordwijk. Today we spent some time in Haarlem and then biked to Noordwijk. In Haarlem we went to the Teylers Museum and spent quite a lot of time there. It's really interesting and has all sorts of things. Scientific instruments, fossils, minerals, paintings, coins, medals and more. Even my little brother found it interesting for quite a long while.

Biking to Noordwijk was through the sand dunes. They aren't actually sandy, but covered in grasses and shrubs. It's like a desert. We have the typical Dutch bike, very upright and heavy. There are also some really nice fixies (fixed gear). We also stopped at a beach to get some ice cream. It's very busy, but also seems quite nice. It would be fun to spend some time relaxing and playing in the water. Tomorrow we might go back to that beach or go to another one. I did get somewhat sunburnt today. Awkward tan lines FTW!

[sitkaland]

Dutch sounds like drunk German.

My Dad

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Amsterdam - Haarlem

Today we went from Arnhem to Amsterdam by train, but the track was blocked so we had to change trains, go back to Arnhem and take another train to Amsterdam. We picked up our bikes and started biking.

All the way to Haarlem. It took us four hours, but we stopped a few times and got mildly side-tracked. I am now at the hostel and waiting for take-out pizza to arrive.

[sitkaland]

Holland

I am now in the Netherlands. Updates and more pictures will come soon. I will be on a six-day bike trip, so who knows how the wifi will be.