The Netherlands May 31st - June 5th

Our last day on the cruise was a day at sea, between Stockholm and Copenhagen. We did a few cruis-shippy things including trivia, souvenir shopping, watched a talent show and NCL's famous "Fountains" show, saw the brilliant band Sol Play again singing a "Tribute to Divas" show, watched the beautiful Marianelle singing, went under a massive bridge, and played an 'adult' game show called the Quest!

Approaching the Great Belt bridge.

 Going under...

and out the other side!

Playing the Quest...!

After we departed the cruise we flew to Amsterdam where we were picked up by Adrian's Mum and partner. We had a lovely visit from family on our first night there - Adrian's sister Josje and her husband and 2 children, and his auntie Margot and her husband and 2 adult sons.

On our first day we had a walk around Steenbergen and went to Josje's. We had lunch in a cafe and then later on had dinner at Josje's house.The next day was our trip to the Efteling, the Netherlands' biggest amusement park. I have to say I was quite impressed, I thought it was going to be aimed at children more than it was. We had fun, and got to ride all the big rides we wanted to.

On June the 3rd we attended the birthday party of Adrian's dad Paul in a nice cafe in the middle of the bush somewhere near the Belgian border. In fact, we were so close to Belgium that we drove into it by mistake trying to get home (Belgium is the opposite direction to where we needed to go, haha!). Adrian and I were tickled with that... let's just say as Kiwis it is not often we drive into another country by mistake! Apparently on this day it was as cold as Christmas day 2011. On June 3rd!

The next day it was raining a lot (again) and Adrian and I took the train to Antwerp in Belgium. It seemed like a nice city, but it was so cold and wet that we were discouraged from walking around and seeing things that we would have otherwise liked to.

The very cheap beer in Belgium (actually a lot of Western Europe). This was just over the Dutch border in Essen, Belgium where we had coffee and free wifi while we waited for the train to Antwerp.

The famous (apparently!) Antwerp railway station. We arrived, walked out of it into the town. We found free wifi to look up what Antwerp's best attractions were. Top of the list: Antwerp Railway Station. We'd already been!

But since we were in Belgium, we sought out waffles, beer and frite. And we found all three! Yum. Adrian had a beer at "Bier Centraal" which had over 300 beers. On the way to the bathroom you could see into the cellar - chock a block with premium beer which you cannot find in New Zealand (and many other places, I'm sure).

 Bieer!!!!

 Frite!!!!

Waffels! With cherries!!!

June the 5th was Adrian's Mum's birthday so we had some yummy cakes that Josje bought around from the bakery. After that we boarded the train to Brussels, to get the EuroStar to London.

Our next step had begun!

On the train to London.