Hemer, Germany with the Lewerenz Family

When we left Holland we were not sure what we were getting ourselves into.  One week before our trip we had been talking to Dan and his friend Jan on Skype and then mentioned that we should visit Hemer, Germany and Jan’s family. 

It worked out really well because we arrived on Tuesday night and Wednesday was Labor Day so they had a free day.  It was one of my favorite days of traveling so far.  We have always been in a big city and it was so nice to spend sometime in their home with the family. 

We got to have a wonderful dinner on Tuesday night and then play a game before bed.  After a good night sleep we spent the morning watching Barbie and playing with Jan’s little sister. 

 Then we went to an amazing park with lots of different playgrounds, an observation tower, some animals, wild horses, a skate park and lots to do!  We also went to a cave and got some of Jan’s favorite ice cream.  It was a great day.  Thanks again to Frank and Tanja for letting us spend sometime in their home!

The Netherlands has a new King

Ok I have to be honest.  I had no clue that Holland even had a royal family, much less that it was going to be Queen’s Day while we were in Amsterdam, much less that the Queen had decided to renounce her crown (retire) to her son on Queen’s Day. 

This is the Royal Palace, the balcony behind me a ways is where the king and queen came out to greet the crowd of people waiting to celebrate with him.  

So needless to say we were surprised when we found out.  At first we noticed all of the orange decorations, the royal families last name means orange in Dutch, we just thought it was cool how patriotic people were.  HAHA well we were in for a treat.  We didn’t actually go to the city center where the huge crowd was but there were people everywhere. 

Our first day was great we got to do a walking tour and see all of the tulips and the second day was fantastic as well.  We went to the Anne Frank house and Heineken Brewery.  But our third day was a big puzzle.  It was the day we were leaving Amsterdam for Hemer, Germany (also Queen’s Day) but when several thousand people come to town they shut down many of the tramlines.  In the morning we went for a walk, bought some orange crowns to fit in, and continued to admire people bike riding skills.  We watched the king sign the documents on TV at the hostel and then in the early afternoon we headed for the bus station and were on our way!  

Day Two the Anne Frank House and Heineken Experience

On day two we woke up early and went to the Anne Frank house.  Unfortunately we were not allowed to take pictures but we did make a leaf for Anne’s virtual tree that you can see if you click on this link and type in my e-mail address to see my leaf.

http://www.annefrank.org/annefranktree

Then we went to the Heineken Brewery for the Heineken Experience.  It was a lot of fun; because the following day was Queen’s Day they had crowns for everyone.  We enjoyed walking around and participating in all of the interactive games and exhibits. 

We ended our tour with a Heineken boat tour!  So we got to experience the canals too.  As we headed back to the hostel we got to see even more of the preparations for Queen’s Day, more orange decorations, live bands playing in the streets, urinals everywhere and royal guards around the palace.

   

Keukenhof Gardens and Day One Amsterdam

So as we were thinking about trips we wanted to take earlier in the year Kayla said that she wanted to go to Amsterdam in the spring to see the tulips.  I was unsure of this idea because in my head she wanted to go to Amsterdam and spend several days looking at flowers.  As many of you know I think flowers are pretty but am not the biggest flower enthusiast, so I was a bit hesitant about it.  Later I found out we would just spend some time with the flowers as well as time in the city.  Well now that we are back in Poland and I reflect on our trip I have to admit that the Keuenhof Garden was probably my favorite thing in Holland. 

On our first day in Amsterdam we got off the bus at 6:30 in the morning.  Well we almost didn’t get off, because we didn’t realize it was the Amsterdam City Center and the bus arrived early.  I went up to ask the lady when we would be there and she said, “We are here, but we are leaving now so hurry and get off the bus!”  So there we were at 6:30 in the morning in the middle of Amsterdam and it was empty.  I think we saw 3 or 4 other people milling around in the whole city center. 

We walked around a bit because the trams were not yet running.  Then went to our hostel.  When we had dropped off our bags and asked the receptionist several questions we were on our way to another Sandmans Free Walking Tour!  It was again a good tour where we learned much about the city and history.  We learned that houses are so tall and skinny because there is a frontage tax in Amsterdam.  We learned that because of this the stairs in the houses are more like ladders than stairs so moving things in and out it impossible.  Therefore all of the houses have hooks coming out of the roof and people use a pulley system to move large items in and out of the windows.  Because of the swaying of large objects and they are lifted into a house windows are easily broken so people started building their houses leaning forward to help eliminate this problem. 

See the hooks?

The red house it the narrowest house in Amsterdam.  It is less then 2 meters wide!

Since it was a nice day we decided to also to go to the Keukenhof Gardens.  It was amazing; I had so much fun taking TONS of pictures.  Then we were pretty beat so we went back to Amsterdam walked a bit more and then headed to bed for a good night sleep!