Our first full week spent completely away from Bonn has been quite the experience. I never knew how much you could see in such a short amount of time and how tiring traveling can also be. Hopping around and seeing new places has definitely stimulated a travel bug within me and has encouraged me to look into traveling more.
Our expectations for Norderney were certainly high, but I would definitely say it met the expectations and was worth the hype. It is such a beautiful and quaint island, with beautiful scenery and so much wildlife. It kind of reminded me of coastal towns down in Florida my family likes to visit. Everyone on the island was extremely friendly, making the experience that much better. I found it quite funny how many of the people on the island found it so interesting where we were from and how we were traveling as such a big group.
After getting to Norderney, we spent the rest of the day walking the island dunes, following various paths to interesting landmarks on the eastern side of the island. This was a great way to get to know a little bit about the island wildlife and what we could expect for the rest of the week. For dinner that night, we went to Restaurant Mai where we met Bernie (or Bernd), who was the owner and chef, and had an amazing fish meal. Bernie might have been as excited for us to be there as were were to be there too because he eventually brought his wife out on facetime to meet us as we enjoyed the restaurant. The next day in Norderney, we biked all over the island and saw everything from the lighthouse to the mudflats. After a long day of biking, we spent the next day in the badehaus, the most relaxing experience I have endured to this day. I spent time in the pool, the hot tub, the salted pool, and most importantly, the mud bath. Going into the mud bath, I was quite nervous about what we were to experience, but it ended up being so refreshing and a unique experience that I wold definitely do again. The barbecue we had that night was also exceptional, as everyone spent some quality time together as Rike and Dr. Wasser cooked an amazing dinner for us all. On our last full day in Norderney, we had some delicious East Frisian island tea, where the tea house volunteers showed us the proper way to drink the tea like a true Norderneyer. Last but not least, we spent the latter part of the afternoon on the watt (or mud flats), where we experienced the expansive amount of wildlife of the mudflats. There were tiny shrimp, clams, worms, worm eggs, crabs, and jellyfish to see and learn about. We also got to see the spot where schlick, the mud used in the mud bath, is gathered from! Overall, my Norderney experience was relaxing and unique and interesting and I hope to make it back there sometime in my life.
After Norderney, we were off to Amsterdam for our long travel weekend. Our first full day in the Netherlands, we took a guided tour for Edam, Vollendam, and the windmills. i would recommend this to anyone because you get to see a beautiful and interesting side of the Netherlands you won't always see in the hustle of Amsterdam. We also got to witness the making of clogs on this tour and tried a bunch of cheese, something I would love to do again. Amsterdam has so much to offer, with a beautiful museum district, extensive canals, beautiful architecture, fun street markets, an amazing food scene (especially Indonesian food), and an exciting culture overall. Amsterdam is one of the places I have always wanted to travel to, and now having been, is somewhere I would travel to again.
The past week may have been exhausting, but it was one filled with many new experiences and memories that will last me for years to come. Can't wait to see where the next few weeks will take us as well.
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