Amsterdam, Holland, The Netherlands

Amsterdam!

Amsterdam at night, Friday, October 3. There are a ton of canals running through the city.

Andrea and I waiting to go into the "Anne Frank Huis," or house. This was the actual place that she wrote her diary in. We saw pictures that she had put on the walls, walked behind the bookshelf that was hiding the family's abode, went up the steps she used and saw the few rooms that the eight people who lived there for about 2 years were confined too. It was incredible, and made me want to read her diary again. They also had testimonies from people who hid them, other Holocaust survivors who were family friends, and the most moving one was from her father, who made it out of Auschwitz alive, only to find that his entire family had passed.

The I AmSterdam statue!

Me, Jessica, Andrea and Lauren chilling on some letters.

Andrea and I in the M!

Whatcha got in there Dutch clog?

A "hotchpotch," the traditional Dutch dish!

The four flat-mates dressed up for a night on the town - Andrea, Amy, me and Veronica.

Our last morning in Amsterdam. There were literally thousands of bikes in this one little area in front of the metro station we always used. I have so many more pictures showing just how many bikes there were, and these types of HUGE bike areas were all over - biking is definitely the main form of transportation in Amsterdam. It made the bike racks at the U look so tiny...This is Lauren, Jessica, Ali and I who had all just gone to the store to get a few more Stroopwafels before taking the long bus ride back through four countries to get home.

On our way home, we had a serious security check at the French border. Every single one of us had to get off of the bus, take all of our belongings with us, go through security where a ton of people had to get searched, and then get back on the bus. There was also a drug dog who went through our entire bus and sniffed all of our bags. Oh, Amsterdam. After all of this, we then had to go through the British security! It took so long - much longer than any airport security I have ever been through. Well, that is the end of that trip, finally!