After a long (but smooth) day of travel, we finally arrived in Amsterdam bright and early this morning at 6 am. We met our lovely tour guide, Raha, at the airport and quickly made our way into the city. Although we were operating on very minimal sleep, we explored the city center via a ‘Fault in Our Stars’ themed scavenger hunt. Our stops took us around the heart of the city and included the central station, a national monument, the Anne Frank Huis,and a restaurant, as well as a few others.

I really enjoyed this scavenger hunt because it guided us around the most beautiful parts of the city on our own terms. We got to do a lot of sight-seeing while also becoming acquainted with the layout and character of the city. It was a really nice preview of what we’re going to be seeing throughout the rest of the trip.

After the scavenger hunt, we split up for lunch. My group chose a really cute pancake cafe; my Stroopwafel Pancakes are in a picture below! The whole group met back up later to check into our hotel and take a quick nap before dinner (remember some of us had been awake for 30 hours at this point!).

We finished our day with the welcome dinner as a whole group. Some people had a kangaroo burger, but I went with the safer chicken parm option. While taking public transportation back to our hotel, I realized just how far north the Netherlands are. The sun sets about an hour later here than it does in Pittsburgh! At 9 pm, the sky was still bright blue, which was really cool to experience for the first time.

Overall, today acted as a great introduction to the rest of our adventures, and I’m very excited for tomorrow!