We've always had family bring us to the airport so we didn't have to leave the car in longterm parking, but that wasn't an option this time. My FIL has parkinsons, and my MIL had a stroke in March and shouldn't really be driving. She has no short term memory since the stroke and won't remember where she parked, or possibly even where she's driving. We won't fit all of our stuff in our car. I had been really frustrated with my husband because he hadn't helped me with the planning and I was feeling really overwhelmed. A couple of weeks before the trip, he asked to check the hotels I had booked, which he hadn't wanted to help with, because he wanted to see if he could get better deals with his "genius level 2" on Booking.com. He wanted me to book the CHEAPEST hotels and I refused most of them because I didn't want to stay in a hole. Then he says "So have you figured out how we're getting to the airport with all our stuff yet?" I was getting really tired of his attitude and lack of helpfulness. The only way I could think of was to take the train. It runs directly to the airport, but you have to carry all your luggage with you. Not ideal. The upside to my lack of options was that it finally motivated him to look for an alternative. He found us a taxi bus. We decided to stay in an Airport hotel the night before our flight because the news was saying you weren't allowed in until 4 hours before your flight and because of a shortage of workers, people were still missing their flights. There were also farmers protesting against environmental laws by driving their tractors on interstates and blocking traffic. We wanted to be on airport property to avoid delays!
I could not sleep the night before. The last time I looked at the clock it was 6:35 am. I woke up again at 7:25. The dryer kept telling me the water reservoir was full even though it wasn't, so it kept beeping every few minutes and I'd have to get up to pull it out and put it back in, then restart the dryer. I just gave up and got out of bed and cleaned out the fridge, cleaned the stove and counters, cleaned the toilets, and then finished the last minute packing things like toothbrushes and the now clean and dry laundry. I had some leftover KFC for lunch, and our taxi came at 2. It was really nice!
Especially nice that I didn't have to fight over who was going to drive. I am not comfortable driving in a city and I JUST got my Dutch licence in November. No way was I ready for Amsterdam, but my husband was not really wanting to take on anything for this trip, so it was nice not to have the anxiety. Let someone else drive!
The rooms at the hotel are definitely not meant for vacationers. They are meant for a quick stop over between flights. Small, not much room for luggage, very basic. We got 2 rooms because they didn't have rooms with 2 double beds. I stayed in one room with E, and my husband stayed in the other with A.
There were no drawers to put anything in or USB outlets to plug a phone into. But it was ok for a night.
We went to the restaurant in the hotel for dinner. The service was terrible! When we got there, there was no one else there and the hostess just kind of pointed us in a general direction of the table. What she was doing that couldn't wait for 30 seconds to seat us, I don't know. The server forgot to take our drink order so we had to call her back. E doesn't really like soda, so she ordered orange juice and they brought her a bottle, already opened, no straw, and it was completely separated because they had forgotten to shake it. I had ordered a Pepsi max, but she brought regular pepsi. It took FOREVER to flag someone down to get us new drinks. I don't remember what my husband ordered, but E and I had ordered steaks, medium, and when the server brought our food, she just set everything randomly on the table without asking who had what, so we just had to all reach across the table to grab our own plate. I honestly hate the tipping system and wish the US would get rid of it, but this is the downside to that. In Europe, there's not much incentive for servers to be really good.
We cut into our steaks. Mine is RARE. E's is well-done, like....shoe leather well-done. My husband went ahead and started eating while we tried to flag someone down to send our inedible steaks back. He was done before our food was fixed, so he took A to McDonald's next door while we waited for our meals. At least we got veggies with our meals.
I got up at 5 the next morning to shower and get ready to go. A had a terribly stuffy nose, so we did a quick self test to make sure he didn't have covid, and then checked out and headed to the shuttle bus stop to go to the airport! Let the vacationing begin! We hope.
