All good things must come to and end...

We're on our way home! Sitting in the Heathrow Airport at the moment, the dreaded Terminal 5, no less (crossing our fingers our luggage follows us). We've just spent about two weeks with Stephanie's family - first visiting her dad's relatives in Normandie, then off to Brittany to visit her mom's side. It was great to see familiar faces and have home-cooked meals again!

Our trip was everything we could ask for and so much more. It has been...exhausting yet exhilirating; so short yet so very long; frustrating yet eye-opening; stressful yet relaxing; travelled so far yet barely explored the rest of the world. We're excited to be coming home, yet dreading the thought of going back to reality. Sadly, we can't stay in la-la land forever.

We kept joking that we might just kill each other along the way but how many people can stand being around just one other person 24/7 for 4 months? But we've survived and have truly tested our marriage for the better. Not too bad for being newlyweds. ;)

Traveling truly gives you another perspective on life and the memories we'll keep forever can't be replaced.

**update**
We finally made it home and we have our luggage with us!

Amsterdam

The bad weather followed us from Brussels to Amsterdam and sadly it rained for almost the entire 4 days. Again, Steven had previously been to the city so he was familiar with almost everything except for the Anne Frank house - the line was too long each time he tried to visit.

The sun finally did show it's face one afternoon we rented our yellow bikes and rode around town, up and down the little streets and canals.















Bicycles are absolutely everywhere in Amsterdam, some of them even have nifty contraptions for carrying other people or large items.







And everyone has heard about the Red Light District in Amsterdam - it was just interesting to see the red curtains and lights mixed in with other restaurants, coffee shops, apartments, etc. No big deal, right?

Photography, obviously, is not allowed near the windows so this is the best we could do. And, judging by what we saw in the middle of the day, it's probably best we couldn't take photos as it wasn't pretty. :/

We did manage to make it over to the Anne Frank Museum on our last day and toured the house where her and her family hid for so many years. It was difficult to understand how 8 people could live in such a small space and never leave, much less see the sun, but that is the power of the museum. Pictures were not allowed, although there isn't much to see inside as all of the furniture was removed by the Nazis and never replaced. There was one quote at the end of the museum we thought was moving:

"Anne Frank has become a symbol for the millions of Jews whose lives were cut short and whose potential was never realized. It is hard to fathom six million Jews being murdered by the Nazis, but Anne Frank has made it easier for people today to comprehend the concept of one Jew being killed six million times."

Brussels

We didn't have much time in Brussels after spending the entire day traveling from Prague. Let's just say the 5 hours in the Budapest airport lounge was not the most interesting;(

After checking into our hotel, we wandered down the alley with tons of restaurants all offering the same thing - moules frites (mussels and fries). Brussels isn't known for too many things, but moules frites and beer are two things so we weren't going to question it.

This is basically what moules frites looks like - a huge bowl of mussels and another huge bowl of fries are brought out and there you have it.

By the time we finished with dinner, it was well close to 11pm so we called it a day and went to sleep.

We woke up the next morning and walked through the Grand Place, the main square:

Then over to see the statue of the Manneken-Pis (aka the Pissing Boy):

And we had to try a Belgian waffle to compare and make sure it tasted ok. It tasted just fine, albeit quite messy when chocolate and whipped cream is added.

And staying with the food theme, we wanted to pick up a box of chocolates for Stephanie's aunt and uncle who we were visiting in a few days. There were so many chocolate stores, fortunately we asked the hotel for a recommendation and were not disappointed. We picked up a few pieces for us while we were at it.

With about an hour to spare before catching our train, we walked over to the Tintin museum. We didn't have enough time to go into the museum, but they had a big gift store that we checked out and this Deux Chevaux (literally translated meaning "two horses") in the courtyard of the museum. Stephanie's dad used to drive one when he was younger and it always reminds her of him.

We picked up our luggage from the hotel and barely made it to the train station before it started pouring rain.