Travel to Maastricht

May 22, 2018

Travel to Maastricht

Saturday & Sunday May, 20 & 21 2018

We had a different strategy for this year's trip to Maastricht. We decided to cut out "fun" time beforehand and just get to Europe before Pearce's school started so we could spend more time on the back end on our actual vacation and while we weren't jet lagged. Our flight from Denver didn't actual leave until 4:35pm MNT so we had almost all full day to get the final things done for our trip. I also planned to get the kids to the gym so I could workout and they could expend some energy while not destroying the clean house.

At Doctor's Office

Alas, things are never that easy. When Hendryx got up in the morning he was burning up with a 104.4 degree fever. No bueno. I got on the phone with the doctor and we rushed over for the first appointment at 8:00am. His ears checked out good, as well as negative for flu, and there was only a small chance he had strep so the nurse chalked it up to a run of the mill virus and cleared us for take off. Phew! We headed to Target to gather our arsenal of medications for him to be as comfortable on the trip as possible and to preventively buy the meds for strep just in the outside case that he got it.

At 1:50pm our friend Beth came to drive us in our Expedition to the airport. Despite only having packed a backpack for each of us our bag situation greatly expanded when we decided to bring our travel tent and a set of Colorado flags that could only be packed in a large checked bag. I then just started tossing in anything I could think of since we had all that extra space. Blow up baby pool...yeah we definitely need that. I basically took up so much of the room Pearce than had to pack an entire extra bag in order to get his school books there - oops!

HDK is getting some fluids in

Bye Beth- thanks for the lift!

Even with all the bags we can get around really well having pretty much perfected our system last year. We stack the adult backpacks in the second seat while one of the kids bags hangs by the handle by a giant carabiner. Lucille has finally graduated to rolling her own bag. Parenting win achieved! Pearce carries his carryon and rolls the giant suitcase. And sometimes Lucille's when she reverts to be a typical 5 year old. We love love love our stroller. We have put it through so much, but it has always come through for us. RIP Mountain Buggy, I have no idea why they discontinued you because you are THE BEST!!!

Our flight to MSP went smoothly and we had time enough to grab dinner at one of their swanky restaurants. The kids were showing signs of wear since it was already past their bedtime, but we were able to keep them up and board the flight scoring 4 seats in a row. Our travel luck ended there though as for some reason our row was the only one with arm rests that did not go up. As you can imagine this not make for a very comfortable situation. Still our kids rose to the challenge and managed to grab about 4 hours of shut eye during 8 hour flight. Pearce and I both were out in in of sleep for about 3 hours. That sounds horrible, but last year we got 0, so we are making progress. I definitely think getting a night time flight is the way to go so everyone is already tired and then you "wake up" at some point in the flight that is the morning at your destination and actually arrive there their mid-day. I think doing this kept us from having the killer jet lag we had last year .

Let's do this

We breezed through customs, got our updated rail cards and new ones for the kids and felt really great about how well it was all going. We should have known better. Maastricht is a few hours from Amsterdam and train travel there is a breeze. Well, it was last year. This year we arrived at Amsterdam Central Station and looked all over for the train to Maastricht. Finally, we cornered a worker who told us we should get on train to a city nearby there and we would have to connect. He didn't really provide too much detail, but we figured he was right. Four more trains and a bus transfer later we finally arrived in Maastricht. We learned halfway through our journey that the lines were under construction into Maastricht and so you had to go this really convoluted way. It was a very long day- 22 hours to be exact - and harrowing day. We lost a jacket, HDK's water bottle and our minds. Well, almost. iPads are a beautiful thing.

When will this day end?!

iPads for the win

She's so happy with us

It was so wonderful when we finally arrived to our familiar train station. They had finished the remodeling from last year and it looked great. Since we moved to the other side of the river from last year's hotel, we decided to take a cab which took about 10 minutes. It was such a lovely drive and immediately started calming us down. The house was so adorable and a definite upgrade from the "hotel" we stayed in last year. No more dorm style rooms, no more surly employees, no more smoke drifting into our rooms. We were overjoyed and so excited to have finally arrived. All of our travel trials were worth it.

Loving Life

Having not eaten in quite a few hours, we pretty much dropped our bags and headed up the hill behind us and walked along the countryside road with greenery and flowers and fields blooming all around us. After about 10 minutes we arrived at a small intersection of four restaurants where we were able to grab a table and grab a delicious Limburger meal. I'll bring back a chocolate bar for the 1st person who guesses what is in the picture below.