amsterdam

Saturday morning I left bright and early for a weekend in Amsterdam. I was really excited as this was my first of hopefully many long weekends travelling in Europe. One of my Deloitte friends, Ondrej, was going to be in Amsterdam for the weekend visiting his girlfriend, Stephany, who is on an assignment there with Deloitte, just like me.

Saturday I had the whole day to myself since Ondrej and Stephany weren't getting back from their trip to Ondrej's hometown in Slovakia until 11pm. I dropped my suitcase off at Stephany's apartment and then headed off immediately to the Anne Frank House. After waiting in line for about an hour, I toured the house. It was really interesting to see.

Next I walked along the canals and through the Jordaan area, taking in the beautiful sites, and making my way to the Noorder Market, where I shopped around a bit. There are bicycles everywhere in Amsterdam! The train station has a four-story tall bike parking garage, that is always full. They have their own bike lane and signals all over the city.

As I walked through the market, it started pouring down rain...again...the entire day was on and off rain with bits of sunshine in between. This is apparently the typical Amsterdam weather. Armed with an umbrella and rain jacket, I started walking towards Dam Square and grabbed a quick lunch along the way. There are many "coffeeshops" like this one located throughout the city:

I made it to Dam Square about the time it started raining again. The square has lots going on and lots of tourists.

Next stop was a quick breeze through the Amsterdam Historical Museum. 

And then a stroll through the flower market. I was able to purchase some tulip bulbs to send back home.



At this point, I was getting pretty tired. I'd done a lot of walking already. I decided to skip the Van Gogh museum and instead head to the Heineken Brewery. The brewery is no longer operation, but they have what they call the "Heineken Experience". It was pretty neat to see and ended with two ice cold Heineken's.

I spent the evening at an improv show at Boom Chicago. My plan was to go to just the first show so that I would be home before Ondrej and Stephany got home. The first show was so great that I decided to stay for the second (for 5 EUR more). I sat across from a guy from Pennsylvania that was there by himself as well. He works in finance and travels to Europe a lot for business. I really enjoyed myself.

I made it home just a few minutes after Stephany and Ondrej. We stayed up talking and drinking more beers for awhile. Sunday morning, we woke up and rented bikes. It was so much fun. I felt like a kid riding bikes again! It was nice that we had Stephany to follow because trying to figure out where we were going and not get run over by trams and cars can be a little tricky. Here's me with the I amsterdam sign. Yes, it was raining again.

Sunday proved to be a little more rainy than Saturday. After getting drenched on our bikes, we made it to Vondelpark. It was really pretty, even in the rain. We sat at a cafe and drank beers to try to wait out the rain. Ondrej was a little upset that he accidentally grabbed a non-alcoholic Amstel Light.

After returning our bikes, Stephany and I went on a canal tour while Ondrej napped. It was really fun to be on the canals. Unfortunately, it was raining for 90% of the tour, so I didn't get great pictures. I enjoyed seeing some of the sites from the canals and looking at all of the houseboats and houseboat decor lining the canals.

Sunday night, we met up with some of Stephany and Ondrej's friends for dinner at a Thai restauraunt followed by beers and dutch apple pie. Monday morning, we had mint tea and pancakes before Stephany and Ondrej dropped me off at the airport on their way to France (their vacation continues).

Amsterdam was so much fun thanks to some great hospitality :) Hopefully I can return the favor soon!



liechtenstein

Check another country off the list...I went to Liechtenstein! It was only a 45 minute drive from where we were staying in Steinach for my client. Daniela, Bart, and I had never been, so we decided to make the drive one night (Daniela had brought her roommate's car for the week). We went right to the capital of Liechtenstein, Vaduz. The one "attraction" in Liechtenstein is the castle nestled in the mountains surrounding Liechtenstein. You aren't allowed to go inside, but its very pretty to see.

After getting the requisite pictures of  the castle, we walked around a bit. We stopped in a tourist shop to buy postcards and a shotglass and the owner recommended a few places for us to go for dinner. 

 Here is the Liechtenstein flag:

Kind of made me feel like I was in London with these cool phone booths...but they were yellow!

That was about the extent of our trip. I don't think one needs more than a few hours to "tour" Liechtenstein.

second trip home

That's right, second trip home in a three week period. This trip was thankfully a little longer since I took the entire week of work off before Jared & Jenae's wedding. I was able to squeeze lots of activities into the one week.

Immediately after leaving the airport we met up with my friends Becky and John and drove to the St. Leon Fireman's festival so that I could get a fried chicken dinner - so yummy! It was great to see a bunch of friends at the festival and catch up.

Sunday we went to Christian Moerlein Lager House and then to the Reds game.

It doesn't get much more American than this! 

Tuesday, I got to take my niece Kaylynn for a little playdate with her Aunt Jenna. We went to Jump Zone and she loved it! 

We followed Jump Zone with Skyline for lunch. This picture just cracks me up: 

The highlight of the week was my brother Jared's wedding. Friday morning we drove to Portland, Indiana for the wedding.

After rehearsal and rehearsal dinner, a group of us had drinks at the Buffalo Wings & Rings by the hotel.

Mom, Me, and Dad

The Whole Gang

The wedding was gorgeous and I couldn't be happier to welcome into our family a new sister!

Me escorting Grandpa Blasdel down the aisle

The bridesmaids (yes, 10 of us) and flower girl Kaylynn  

The amazing couple 

On the bus afterward - me and my cousin (best man) Curits

Me and the boys 

The official Blasdel/Lutz Picture 

Grandpa and his granddaughters (minus 3)

My favorite nephew Eli

 Mom and Dad

Kaylynn

 So, in line with tradition, if your younger sibling gets married before you, you have to dance in a hog trough at their wedding. Thanks to some of my friends, they made sure that I didn't break tradition. Here is me and Jared dancing with our cousin Hayley:

 Thankfully the boys didn't leave me hanging by myself

The week went by so quickly, and I think it took me a full week to recover and catch up on sleep since my plane landed at 7:45AM Monday and I had to go immediately to work. I would not have missed this wedding for the world.



bern

Alright, so most of you (like me) have never heard of Bern, Switzerland and would have never guessed that it is the country's capital. Also, I was completely surprised when a public holiday popped up on my calendar on August 1st for Swiss National Day. It definitely made up for having to work on the 4th of July! My friend at work, Daniela, is actually from Bern and knew that the Federal Building opens its doors to visitors one time each year on the national holiday. So, I decided to make the trip to Bern on August 1st to see the sights and go inside the Federal Building (something a lot of Swiss have never done). Daniela and her roommate came along as my tour guides.

I started my holiday by going to Burkliplatz in Zurich and watching the parade which was complete with flag throwers, alphorns, and plenty of traditional Swiss costumes. Sausages were being sold everywhere and I almost fit in since I'd happened to wear a red shirt.

They really play these things - so cool!

Look closely to see all the smaller Swiss flags being tossed in the air.

After the hour long train ride to Bern we stopped for lunch and then after waiting only 5 minutes in line walked into the Federal Building. The building was really pretty. After wondering around a bit, we made it to the best part of the visit--free Swiss chocolate! We each had our choice of a full size bar of Toblerone, Cailler, Lindt, and more!

After the tour, we walked around a bit, saw the river we would later swim in and had a beautiful view of the Alps.

We then we went to the bear park. The bears were so cute!! Unfortunately, I somehow didn't get a good picture of them up close.

We then walked along the river and laid out for a bit. This was definitely a more popular activity for everyone's day off than visiting the federal building - we barely found a spot to lay out our towels! I then had my first experience swimming Bernaise style. We walked barefoot up the river along a path for about 20 minutes, we then jumped in the COLD water (river comes from snow melt from the mountains) and floated down the river. It was fun and let's just call it refreshingly cold :)

After dinner at Daniela's friend's apartment, we headed back to Zürich and ended the evening with beers on my rooftop terrace watching the fireworks which were being set off all around the lake and on top of Uetliberg.