We spent 30 hours on planes and at airports between Friday and Sunday. THIRTY HOURS. The first night we tried to sleep at the Denver airport, which wasn’t too terrible thanks to the two seats we found with the broken armrest between them. We flew to Detroit early yesterday morning and spent the day sitting in the airport before our red eye flight to Amsterdam. The flight was just 7 and a half hours so not too bad, but they kept trying to feed us and I can’t say no to food, so I didn’t sleep through as much as I was hoping. Instead I (finally) watched Crazy Rich Asians (so cute!!) and snacked all night. I did get a little bit of sleep though. I am super blessed, I know, to actually sleep pretty easily on flights.
It was a long 30 hours but you do what you gotta do for those cheap flights (we paid $660 total for the two of us, round trip!!) to say that we were relieved to finally land in Amsterdam would be an understatement!
It would have been nice to check right into our Airbnb but it was 8am and check in wasn’t until later this afternoon. So we stored our baggage at the airport (so nice that that’s an option!) and headed to one of my very favorite places. Keukenhof!
Last year we were a little too early for the tulips. We decided that one day we would have to come back to see them in full bloom. We didn’t mean the very next year but somehow that worked out! Except they weren’t in full bloom haha. They were gorgeous and so nice, but many had already been cut down for being on their last leg. It didn’t bother us though - there were still many left and there’s so much to see there! We took some extra time exploring the wooded area that we weren’t able to hit last year. It was seriously like a fairytale forest, it was so magical. And coming here first thing in the morning worked really well, we had plenty of time to enjoy having the gardens practically to ourselves before the tour buses showed up.
We did some exploring and I did some twirling. Gardens are my thing!
It rained a little bit but there were plenty of greenhouses to duck into. They were always full of beautiful flowers and interesting setups. This year’s Keukenhof theme is Flower Power and it was definitely interesting to see their take on it.
We ate lunch at the park before heading back to the airport. We still had a little time to kill so we hit Hema and Primark, our favorite European stores, before checking in. We were EXHAUSTED! We slept for several hours before getting some Italian food. Our Airbnb is the cutest historical house. I love the view from the window and I appreciate the typical Dutch stairs - but I can't imagine carrying babies up and down these things!
I often think I don’t like Italian, then I remember how much better the real stuff is. Dinner was delicious and we sang happy birthday many times with the servers to various guests! Well, at least we tried to sing it... it was in Dutch.
The night ended up with Fanta soda (America seriously lacks on the good flavors!) and baklava from a random convenience store. Cheapest and best baklava I’ve ever had!
Even though we spent most of the day being exhausted, it was still a great first day of our European trip. We are so excited to see more of Holland and to hit a new country while we are out here!
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