What a beautiful country! Our last stop was the Netherlands, my most awaited country. It was especially cool to come here, not only beacuse it was my professors home town (Utrecht) but Den Haag was where my Grandpa Jack was from. Although we did not spend much time there, it was wonderful to be there just the same. 

So, lets start at the beginning; we landed in Amsterdam and right outside the airport was the classic Iamsterdam sign, super cool to see in person, the only difference between seeing this sign in real life and seeing it in pictures... in real life, theres SO MANY PEOPLE. It is near impossible to get an image of it standing alone. 

We hoped on our Contiki bus and headed to Utrecht to where we were staying for our last 3 days. We arrived at the Ibis Hotel and brought our luggage up to our rooms. We had dinner in the hotel and afterwards we wandered the cobble streets of Utrecht for a few hours. We ended up meeting the rest of the group in a large court yard area that was all patio. It was virtually a full block of tables and chairs surrounding a single bar where people were smoking, drinking, and spending quality time with their friends. It was a wonderful experience. 

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We decided to walk back to the hotel. It was roughly 30 minutes. Sam was always the navigator! She kept us on track the whole trip and always knew where we were going.

 

 Utrecht and Amsterdam's main source of transportation is the bicycle. Where we have parking lot buildings, they have bicycle stands that hold hundreds of bicycles. The largest bicycle "rack" is in Amsterdam and it holds up to 50,000 bicycles! 

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Our second day in the Netherlands we visited Interface, a carpet textile company, in the morning, spent 2 hours in Den Haag for lunch, and then took the Contiki bus to our second company of the day, Ampyx Power. Afterwards, the bus took us downtown Amsterdam where we wandered the extremely busy streets full of restaurants, shops and the citadel. 

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We were lucky enough to experience Holland's Liberation Day. Thousands of people crowded the busy streets, many flocking to the podium where the royal family was there to place a wreath on behalf of their WW2 soldiers and the Canadians who liberated them many years ago. For 2 minutes the guard called for silence. It is very difficult to explain this moment as it cannot be written or heard. It truly can only be felt. For 2 whole minutes, thousands of people, shoulder to shoulder stood in silence. The entire city stopped. The only thing you could hear was the sound of birds flapping over head. It was chilling... an experience I will hold close to me forever. 

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Our last day in Amsterdam we started the day off at The Anne Frank Museum. To be totally honest with you it was a very hard pill to swallow. There were tears, anxiety, and a few hours of reflection. To walk through The Annex where Anne and her family hid for 2 years, to look out the window and see what they saw, to touch the walls, walk through the tiny halls and hear their story, it was heart breaking. It was extremely difficult not to put myself in her position. It was emotional to say the least. (I want to thank my professors here for setting this up, it is something I will never forget) In school it was a history lesson, that day was real, and I won't forget it. 

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After calming down and eating the most delicious pancakes I have ever tasted, we jumped on a tour boat and cruised the canals of Amsterdam. After an hour or so, a few of us jumped off and went into the Rijskmuseum. I have always wanted to do a face swap with a life size sculpture. I fulfilled that dream. After the museum we got a Big All American Hotdog, took photos in front of the Iamsterdam sign and then jumped on the train and headed to the Red Light District where we wandered around for a few hours and got all our souvenir shopping done. 

 

Around 8:30 we wandered back to our meet up spot and got on the bus and headed back to the hotel in Utrecht. The bus ride back was full of laughter, thought, dancing and music. That night, a bunch of us sat on the patio outside reflecting on the entirety of the trip. It was bittersweet. For me, it was the end of a journey I had started 3 years ago, and ended it on the other side of the world.