Since now contiki tour was now over we were
able to go sightseeing in Amsterdam. Amsterdam is a cute city but theres not tons of things to see. We planned to go and see the Anne Frank house, the heineken factory and the I AMsterdam sign. The both of us are not exactly sure why this sign is so famous but its apprently soemthing you have to see while your there. Out first day by ourselves was spent changing hotels, and then going to the Anne Frank house. But before leaving for these advetnures we first went out searching for a box big enough to send 10 kilos of belongs home. It had only been 1 month and we had already run out of room in our suitcaes and backpacks. It didnt take long to find a post office that sold boxes, but of course they were sold out of the biggest ones and our search contiuned. We were lucky enought to find a shop owner who spoke english well enough to understand what we were looking for and he gave us one. Unfortunatly the box was just the slightest amount too small, but with no other options we carried the box (overflowing) to the post office and got packing tape. Twenty minutes and 1 entire roll of packing tape later we were finally ready to send off our stuff. The next task of the day was the Anne frank house. Like usual we got lost on the way. After walking around in a long circle for roughly an hour we finally made it to the Anne Frank house. The house is now a museum where you can walk into all the rooms where they lived and you even entre the secret annex by walking behind the secret bookcase. On the main floor (the old factory) the rooms have mini movie theathers with videos of people that knew here sharing stories about the family. One of these stories was from one of her neighbours before she had to go into hiding. They had actually ended up at the same concentration camp, however her friend was a lot better off in the camp then she was. They were in two different sections of the camp and one day her friend tried to throw her a package of socks, bread and a couple other things she had collected on the "good side" over the wall, someone else caught it all though and stole it. That was the lat time she got to talk to her. Each room and all the hallways have quotes from the diary on the walls, and they are filled with poictures that were taken while they were in hidding. At the end of houseyou enter a black room with a video screen, this is the last video that playing in the house. Its her father sharing stories of anne, and how he worked so hard to get her diary published after the war. He said that after reading her diary he was surprised to find out how mature his daughter was and how you dont really know your children as well as you think you do. After you have exited the house you entre the museum portion. Here you find more videos, pages for her diary ( not real ones but photocopies) and more pictures. Our favorite video in the museum was from her neighbour. She shared a story of how she use to go sit on the other side of the concentration camp and talk to anne. She also occausionally brought her food when she could gather enough. This was one of our favorite museums that we have been to yet. We then headed back to our hotel and went straight to bed, we had lots of sleep to catch up on. 

Day two by ourselves was spent sleeping, and going to the heinekien bewery. We werent too sure what to expect, but everyone from our contiki group said that we had to go before we left. We can now say that it was our favorite part of Amsterdam. When you walk in you get your enterance ticket, which is actually a braclet, that has two small buttons on it. You then entre the bewery. The first room has a tv with a video of the man who started the beer, he explains what he wanted to model his company after and how he wanted to have the best tasting beer in the world. You next walk up about 50 stairs and come to a couple of other small rooms with more videos, pictures and awards. After the museum part is over is when the really cool part starts. Your greeting at the doors by a man who explains how the beer is made and how much of each ingredient is actually in the beer. He then leads you into a room with huge metal barels where they keep the wheat. Along the way you get to sample the beer at each stage of the production starting with the water and wheat mixture ( i dont suggest trying this one). Next is when you get to pretend to be a bottle of beer (allison's favortie part!!!!) You go into a room and stand on a platform in front of a huge tv screen and it begins. A video starts and our of nowhere your platform starting moving as if you were a bottle on the prodcution line, you also get sprayed with water when its time to fill the bottle with beer. Learning how to properly drink beer was the next stop on the tour. We learnt how to look at beer properly and also slip it with out getting to much foam. After we were done our beers we got to watch all the commercials that heinkien has ever had, some were better than others. Next you could make videos of yourself singing a traditional dutch song and then e-mail it to yourself ( we tried this but it didnt work :(). The rest of the bewery is all videos and games you can play. Before leaving you learn what they buttons are for on your braclet, 2 free beers! You have ther option of either using both tokens and learn how to pour the perfect beer or have the 2 beers. We choose to learn how to pour the perfect beer. Kirst is very proud to say that she got it on the first try, while mine had the slightest amout too much foam on the first pour. We then headed to the gift shop where we learnt that they there was a free boat ride through the cannels and you recived a free gift. Once again we headed back to our hotel to go to sleep early, beacuse the next morning we had to be up at 530 to head to dijon.

We hopped on our bus at about 8am, little did we know that our 14 hour bus ride was about to turn into an excruitiating 19 hour one. When we stopped at the french border they pulled us over to check the bus because we were going from amsterdam to barcelona and theres usually drugs on buses in that route... sure enough there was. but not just a couple grams of weed, a whole huge brick of cocaine. they had dogs search the whole bus and everyones stuff and they couldnt figure out whos it was so we had to go to the police station and they took everyones finger prints. after 3 hours they let us go.. were not sure if they found the person or wat cuz no one on the bus spoke french or english, they only spoke spanish. after those shinanigans our stupid bus driver got lost and we finally got to dijon at 345 am (wed been up since 530, it sucked) ronnies exchange student from gr 11 (gaelle) was supposed to pick us up, but our bus was so late and we had no way of contacting her so obviously she wasnt there. so we started walking down the street with our lives in our suitcases trying to find a hotel. we went to 7 and they were all full (by this time it was 440) and we had just decided to find a park to go sit in till 6 when things would open when we heard a honk and there was gaelle. she had been driving around the streets and asking hotels if theyd seen us and somehow found us. it truly was a miracle; we had no where to go,we didnt know her address and the phone number she gave us didnt work. she saved us; we were soo happy!!! So we loaded our stuff into her car and headed to her house where we all instantly fell asleep.

The next day Gaelle let us sleep in and around noon we left her house to go explore Dijon! We walked a couple blocks and found le centre ville which was full of great shopping! We also found MacDonalds and ended up grabbing a coffee there and stealing their wifi for a bit. After our day out we went and picked up some grocerries with Gaelle and then headed back to her house for a get together with her friends! It was really fun, everyone was so nice and made an effort to speak a little slower than usual for us.
Gaelles apartment was really cool, it was much different than a Canadian one, obvisously.. To get there you had to go through a garage then down a bit then up two steep flights of stairs. She shares her apartment with three other girls and they each have their room then theres a kitchen/ dining and a double bathroom. It was very cute and were so happy to finally be in a house and not a hotel!
Our second day in Dijon Gaelle skipped school for us and showed us around! We went and saw their Notre Dame Cathedral, which we found out most cities in France have. We also saw le hotel de ville (where the mayor lives), a really nice fountain and of course Gallerie Lafayette (a huge french department store). That night we packed up our things and jumped on the bus to a town called Les Greys which is where she used to live and where her Mom still does. When we got there we were greeted with one of the best meals to date! Her mom had baked a deliscious fish/casserolish dish and we had a great salad and fresh bread as well. Afterwards we had what I'd been waiting for our entire trip, more bread, wine and an assortment of french cheeses! I was in heaven, I literally had been waiting for this since we decided we were going to Europe. Cheese in North America doesnt even compare to cheese in France. Allison on the other hand, being gluten sensitive, lactose and having acid reflex tried a bit but wasnt as overjoyed as myself. That night was the most luxurious sleep we'd had so far. We had an awesome guest room all to ourselves (the same one ronnie had when she was there) with the comfiest bed that you just sunk into and a really good pull out couch, we had so much room too it was great!
When we awoke the next day we went into town and Gaelle gave us an awesome historical tour. We learned that the symbol of the town is three torches because it was burned down three times. After our tour we went back to her house and had lunch. Meals are really important in french culture. They are a time for family to come together and missing one is unheard of, its pretty cool. That afternoon we went to another larger town called Besancon with Gaelle and her brother Louique. We saw a castle, went shopping and had a couple of drinks at this little cafe. Allison got some fruit juice that tasted sooo real and I got tea. My tea came in the hugest tea pot it was so funny. On the way home we stopped at their Dads house. He was a really funny guy, he started discussing Anglophone vs Francophone Canadian politics with us. Politics are neither mine nor Allisons forte, but discussing them in french was even more difficult! That night we hung out with her brother, boyfriend and neighbour and had a chill night exchanging stories and laughing at French and Canadian stereotypes. Apparently french people think that all of our police wear RCMP uniforms, they also think we say eh all the time (obviously) and that there are beavers everywhere.


The following day we went to Gaelles Moms boyfriends house for an amazing last meal together and then her Dad picked us up to head back to Dijon to catch our train to Paris! After saying our goodbyes and Gaelle promising she would come visit us soon we headed downstairs to our gate where we found out our train was delayed undefinetely. Furthermore, to add yet another twist to our travel plans we had accidently booked a hotel with a reception that closed at 9pm. We were supposed to arrive in Paris at 820 and catch a cab to our hotel which was a 25minute drive away, and were worried about cutting it close, but as soon as we saw our train we late we knew we were in trouble. We sat down at a cafe and started to discuss our options, eventually we came up with a plan to book another hotel for that night with 24 hour reception and just suck it up and pay the price. After our night in Dijon we did not want to risk wandering around with no where to sleep again. So we sat in this cafe for a couple of hours looking for cheap places to sleep that night and just as we were about to book our hotel Allison noticed that our train was no longer on the screen anymore. Panicked, we packed up and sprinted towards our gate. I climbed up the stairs as Allison waited below with our suitcases and found no train awaitng us. Luckily we were in France still so I asked one of the men working what had happened, he had no clue but said there was another train going to Paris in three minutes and he would try and put us on it. I ran downstairs to get Allison and we made it up just as the train was arriving, luckily there was room and we hopped on! When we got on the train we realised we hadnt had the chance to book our hotel yet and instantly went into trouble solving mode again! Thats when the conductor made his welcome announcement and told us that we would be arriving in Paris at 830 but at a different train station, a little further away from our hotel than the original one. Relieved we started making our game plan and decided that we would just have to book and do our best to make it there on time. So when the train stopped we were the first to jump off and we started running at full speed through the train station and to the taxi pick up zone. We hopped into the first one there was and told the driver we needed to go fast or we wouldnt have anywhere to sleep. He said he would do what he could, changed the radio to some latina racing music then floored it. We whipped in and out of traffic on the freeway, noticeable speeding and by yet another miracle we made it to our hotel with only 8 minutes to spare. We made it to our room and both stood there looking at each other in disbelief, we had yet again just barely escaped a lot of trouble.