26 Days

It has been raining...26 days.  I think I should buy some boots and build an arc.  I wish I could remember what the sun felt like.  Right now it is only 50 degrees, I saw that Texas was 90.  It really seems a lot longer since I've seen the sun.

Deutsch Dienstag

See the little stork hanging from the window?  It has a baby hanging from its beak.  This is how they "announce" the birth of a baby.  You will see them hanging off a window, a balcony, or by the front door.  Some storks are small stuffed animals with a little package hanging from the beak.  The storks usually hang up for about 3 months. 

Cute little German tradition.

Brugge, Belgium

Beautiful Brugge  was were we ended up after our time in Amsterdam.  It is a darling, medieval town filled with canals, bridges, and churches near the Belgium coast.  It seemed so small and quiet after the big city of bikes and people.  We  spent 2 days wondering, taking a canal ride, eating chocolate, Flemmish Fries, and Belgium waffles.   We checked out churches and looked at swans (Jag's favorite part of our entire vacation was looking at swans.).  Brugge was wonderful. 

Yum, Belgium waffles!

Bell Tower (Belfort)

Brugge has at least a 100 chocolate shops each containing Belgium's finest chocolates.  I enjoyed and enjoyed.

City Hall

Markt square

Church of Our Lady
Michelangelo's statue, Madonna and Child, said to be his only statue to leave Italy in his lifetime. 

Active Nunnery

Basilica of the Holy Blood
This church is famous for its relic of the blood of Christ, which according to tradition, was brought to Bruges in 1150 after the Second Crusade.
No pictures were allowed inside.  Every surface was painted.  It was really a neat church.  The vile of blood was interesting.  It looked old.  It almost looked like either cloth or sand was inside the vile.  We have a post card that I may try to take a picture of. 

Keukenhof

Amsterdam is a great city, but the real reason that we came to Holland was to see flowers!  We weren't disappointed.  For only 3-4 weeks all the flowers are in bloom.  It is a very crowded time, but the only way to miss the crowds is to miss the tulips.

Of course!  We were able to go up the windmill as well.

Fields full of colorful stripes.  You could get a bunch of 30 flowers for only 5 euros.  I wish that we lived closer so that I could have grabbed some for the table.

Notice the height on these ones.

Darin says that my leg looks funny.  I like the picture, he is almost grinning.

No funny leg here.

I have at least a hundred more pictures I could post, but I'll spare you the beauty.  We loved seeing the flowers.  I also loved that my allergies didn't bother me a bit!

Amsterdam

The city of Amsterdam.  A city in which there are more bikes than people.  No kidding!  It took some fancy driving for Darin to avoid an accident.  With the buses, bikes, cars, trams, bridges, and canals I was happy to be a passenger on this trip.

Every bridge and street looked like this.  There are almost as many bridges as bikes in Amsterdam.

Everyone was riding bikes.  Old and young.  Men in suits and women in dresses and high heels.  People talking on their cell phones and texting while riding.  Couples holding hands on bikes, side-by-side. A Mom with a front carrier on biking with newborn. I didn't see anyone putting on make-up while riding, so I'm not sure my mom would be able to live there.  Then again, I am sure she'd be able to figure it out.  Love you mom!

These are the bikes for moms.  They just piled the kids in the wheelbarrow in the front and off they went.  The most I saw was 3 in a "bucket."  That could pose a problem for a mormon mom.  Then again, 3 was as many kids as I saw.

I loved the cute canal houses that were everywhere. 

All the bikes looked like old, rusty, beachcomber bikes.  Darin and I were thinking that it is because they didn't need to worry about someone stealing something nice.  Also, it rains all the time, everything is bound to get rusty.  No need to really worry about your bike.

The Anne Frank House/Museum

Anne Frank House.  The "front" house.

It stayed light for quite a long time at nights.  We loved just wandering down the streets and by the canals.

This square always had musicians playing at night.

Our hostel.  Amsterdam is expensive, especially when trying to find a place for 7, so we opted to go the hostel route this time.  Notice the name, "stayokay" not "stay great,"  just Okay (gotta love truth in advertising).  It included a breakfast each morning and was filled with travelers from all over the world. 

We were on the fourth floor.  Without a lift.

No pot smoking in the courtyard of the hostel.  Darin convinced me that I am the only one who didn't know that marijuana was legal here.  You could smell it everywhere.  Cannabis lollypops, gum, souvenirs-anything you could have wanted.

Our room (on Christian's birthday) had 3 sets of bunkbeds.  European mattresses are terrible and narrow! Every morning at about 730 the fire alarm "accidently" went off.  I think that they wanted everyone up and out for the day.