Kimmy InAMSTERDAM: April 2010

Schiermonnikoog, Netherlands

Posted by Kimberly Palmer On Friday, April 30, 2010 0 comments

Last weekend, CIEE organized a trip to the lovely island of Schiermonnikoog in the north of the Netherlands. After a 3hr bus ride and a 45 minute boat ride, we arrived on the island Friday night and got our rented bikes and headed towards our hostel. Note: it wasn't just any hostel, the hostel was actually a farm that we had all to ourselves. We got an "American" style feast for dinner complete with cole slaw, spare ribs, potato salad and all the fixings. The Dutch did a decent job - the spare ribs were delicious. That night we just relaxed and played card games in our little attic room that we discovered.

Saturday morning we head to the water. During low tide, you can mudflat hike where the water retreats. We spent about 2hrs hiking - maybe more like sinking into the mud - and learning all about tons of wildlife, currents, etc. All in all, it was a pretty muddy morning being that we were halfway up to our shins in mud, yet fun. We had some free time after that so we took our bikes and went for a ride around the island and ended up at a little lake set within the woods. We had some balls and frisbees so we improved a few games, then headed back for dinner. Just in case I wasn't already amped off of the first night's dinner, it got better. We got a huge BBQ feast with chicken sate, kebabs, stuffed peppers, and steak. Unreal. After stuffing our faces yet again, we made our way down to the beach for a Dutch style bonfire. It was more like a dumpster fire cause the firepits were just steel boxes, but it was still a good time. After the bonfire, we decided it would be fun to hit the town. And by hitting the town in Schiermonnikoog, I mean going to one of the two bars. After the first one, we decided to go to their version of a "club" which was just janky music and designed like the "Smash Club" from Full House. It gets better. Inside, there was a wedding partying using the space as their post-party, a sorority on retreat dressed up in ridiculous costumes, guys from a stag party and us. Good times.

We took a guided bike tour on Sunday morning around the island. The same guide that showed us around the mudflats took us around the island to see the sea salt marshes, sand dunes, a German WW2 bunker, a lighthouse or two, and a seamen's cemetery. After the biking, we took advantage of our free time to soak in the sun a little bit more before we headed home. The island was really cool to explore and felt amazing to do something that doesn't involve a city, bus or metro. Schimonnikoog was actually voted one of the most beautiful places in the Netherlands. Judge for yourself....

The island from the dike

Free tractor rides!

Mid-hike

Lookout by the bunker

Pathway down to the beach

Mudflat hiking!

READ FULL STORY

Paris, France

Posted by Kimberly Palmer On Friday, April 9, 2010 1 comments

I spent this past Easter weekend in the gorgeous city of Paris. It definitely lived up to it's name - "City of Lights". I don't think I've ever seen a more beautiful city at night.

My friend Rachel and I took the bus from Amsterdam to Paris. Which will probably be the last time I ever take the bus. After 9hrs, some traffic and a horrible bus driver who kept getting stuck mid-turn - we finally made it into Paris Friday afternoon. After getting settled in our hostel, we headed out for some dinner and a drink. After a panini and a beer, we spent the night just strolling around the city. We saw Notre Dame, the Parthenon, the picturesque Seine river, and the always entertaining foreign McDonald's menu. It's funny how they try to incorporate each countries own food into the supersize menu or in France - "The Best Of."

Didn't really sleep too well that night considering there were 20 immature French teenage boys staying on all sides of our room. None of them understood English or the phrase "Please shut up, it's 2am and people want to sleep." As they went on with their running, jumping, and slamming of doors, we had to ask the hostel security to please explain to them the need to be respectful. This promptly caused us to ask if we could switch floors the next morning, without having to explain, the girl at the front desk goes "Oh, you're on the 2nd floor with the really bratty French kids?" Most definitely. Hello 6th floor and a decent night's sleep.

The next morning, we checked out the free tour that meet at the Saint Michel foundation. Us and 100 other people decided to show up as well. Since the group was so big (50 people per guide) we stuck around for a bit, then just went off on our own. We checked out the Louve, the surrounding gardens, a church I can't really remember name of and headed up Champs-Élysées to check out the L'Arc de Triomphe right as a storm set in. Once we got to the Arc, we took a few quick picks and headed straight to the metro. For dinner, we decided on a good sushi place. For 17 euro, we got a delicious spread of miso soup, salad, rice, rolls, sashimi, and a variety of meat skewers. We may have not spent a lot of money on the touristy stuff because of the Easter crowds, didn't really spend money on many drinks but we most definitely ate well while we were in Paris! After dinner, we headed to the Latin Quarter to explore the streets and our plan of making it to take pictures of the Eiffel Tower were quickly demolished when it started to pour. So we found a little bar, had a drink and tried to avoid the creepy winks of the bartender and the waiter telling us how wonderful it was that we were American. From there, we agreed it was safe to call it a night and head back.

We took advantage of the first Sunday of the month being free museum day and one tip we walked away with from the free tour. We went to the Louve at 9am, but not to the normal entrance where the line was already wrapping back through the courtyard. We learned that there is another entrance - Porte de Lions - where we were the second people in line to get in right at 9am. By 9:05, we were looking at the Mona Lisa... from about 15ft back. Over the next 4hrs, we made our best attempt to see almost all of Louve's exhibits. This was definitely a daunting task but we got a very wide range of all that the Louve holds within it's walls. My favorite wings were the Louis XIV apartments and the Egyptian artifacts. After our morning tour of the Louve, we headed towards the Eiffel Tower as the clouds began to part and blue skies started to show their face. We snapped some good pictures of the Eiffel Tower and laughed at all 5,000 people waiting in line to go to the top on our way to lunch. Rachel was on a mission to try some French delicacies. We found a streetside cafe and ordered some escargot and two salads. I've had escargot before so I was excited, maybe a little two excited. As I grabbed the shell to extract the snail, it went flying and hit Rachel in the chest. We had a good laugh about flying snails and she loved the escargot and wanted to order more. That night, we had dinner at restaurant where Rachel dived into the fixed price menu featuring duck mousse, some steak dish and flan for desert. I had chicken and cheese crepes, just enough to hit the spot. After dinner, we checked out a popular bar street/alley, Rue des Lombard, where we found a cool Jazz bar and a fun Irish bar. At the Irish bar, some French guy who now resides in Dublin decided it would be a great conversation starter to go off about the lack of cheese in Ireland and how much he loathes cheddar. Once again, we decided it was about time to head back home.

We spent out last day in Paris exploring the gardens. We started out at the Luxembourg Gardens (which were absolutely gorgeous and full of joggers) and made our way down to Plantes Garden which hosts the Paris Zoo. After seeing the kangaroos out in the open, we got excited that the zoo might be free. Negative. The line of strollers confirmed that we would have to pay to see the rest of the animals.

After another delayed 8hr bus ride back to Amsterdam, we were barely able to catch the last metro into the city central. I made it back to my place and crashed. Here are some to document my Parisian weekend :)