Before I Go

March 26, 1910, my great-grandparents Adrianus and Rynno Smit, along with great aunts and an uncle,  left Rotterdam on the sailing vessel "The  Noordam".  Ten days later they arrived in New York with $96 in their pocket only to continue their journey to Lafayette, Indiana, to join Adrianus' brother, Theodore.
I've wanted to go to Holland for as long as I can remember, mainly to see the beautiful fields of colorful tulips, but also to experience where my ancestors once lived.  Kloosterburen, a very small coastal town, is about 2 hours north of Amsterdam.

104 years later, on April 7th, 2014, excitedly I will make my FIRST trip to Europe with my boyfriend, Craig.  Luckily he's been all over the world so at least I'll be with someone who knows the ropes. We're staying in Amsterdam for a few days before we get on the river cruise.   Our travels will take us to Amsterdam, Horn, Arnhem, Antwerp, Kinderdijk,  Ghent, Bruges, Rotterdam and back to Amsterdam on a Viking River Cruise.  We'll be cruising on the Lif, which was christened March 2014.

I've cruised all over the Caribbean, Mexico, and Alaska on luxury cruise ships, but I've never been on a river boat before.  Everyday there will be excursions to different places; we'll be seeing museums, Ann Frank's house, The Red Light District, tulip fields, and sampling cheese, Belgium beer and chocolate.  We will also be learning how the windmills of Holland once served as a power source, and how the familiar Holland wooden shoes are made.  My mom said my great-grandmother actually wore wooden shoes.

Doei, Tot ziens (goodbye, see you later),
Mom/Cyn

I'll try to post as much as I can, supposedly the boat will have wifi.