Five countries, three hotels, a train, a boat and a zoo

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After the thrill of the fish, it was time to head across four countries in a day and get to Germany to buy cereal bars (no joke, it's the only reason for visiting Germany this year, yes, I know, we need help.....) an easy first half of the journey saw us in Luxembourg. The plan was to park, have lunch, buy a magnet and leave. In reality we drove around, struggled to find a parking place with high enough barriers, got stuck at two miles an hour behind the tourist 'express' train ( they seriously need to reconsider the name of the train) for a good twenty minutes and decided to call it a day and head on out back to the motorway. They say every cloud has a silver lining and the one to this very small cloud was that we got to have lunch in 1986. The restaurant we stopped at was a total throwback to an age gone by and the locals clearly weren't used to incomers judging by the looks (although that may have been due to my filthy top and wild hair) but the food was good. After making our way through Belgium we arrived in Aachen. Visiting the same supermarket we've been in before (disguise next time for sure) we bought thirty quid's worth of corny cereal bars, corny, the actual best cereal bars in the world and the single best reason for visiting Germany. We found Mrs Triebels (Doris to her friends) apartment, piled our stuff in, put the boy to bed had our by now traditional silent bed based picnic.
The next day was zoo day. The zoo in Heerlen is just amazing. Happy animals, clean, spacious, just lovely. We left Aachen in the rain. We got to the zoo twenty minutes later...in even more rain. So much rain we couldn't really get out of the car. There was lightening, thunder and rain. So we sat, we played with inappropriate things (hair brushes, spray cans and visors) and eventually decided to go for it (after Jason Donovan came on the radio to give us a sign all would be well). To start with Seth was not convinced but as soon as we got to the pigs, his eyes lit up and he didn't stop grinning. He laughed at the meerkats, cooed at the goats and charmed people as we ate lunch. Ash yet again got scared by the choice on offer for lunch and bought a very random selection. The rain held off and I managed to persuade Ash again not to take a capybara home. Such a lovely day ?. After buying yet more cheese and meat we got to the hotel, walked the twenty miles to get to our room (always, always we get the room furthest from reception) Seth and Ash had a bubble bath, then bedtime for the boy and Ash and I put the world to rights over better wine and a lovely sunset on the terrace.
Next stop was Amsterdam, I love the Netherlands, it feels like a better version of home. We had a good journey with a stop at perhaps the poshest motorway restaurant. And got to the hotel. It was only once here I realised that we were literally staying in Ajax's home ground. And they had a match today. And our room was the closest and Ajax fans like to make noise...... but the hotel is posh and lovely so who cares!
This morning we dined like kings at the hotel breakfast then headed to get a train to introduce the baby to the sights and sounds of Amsterdam. We went on a boat across the river, Seth charmed all the people with lots of smiles and waving (suspect if he could talk though he'd be asking them to help him escape his ridiculous parents!) We bought bulbs, went on a tram and in theory ate lunch in leidsplein. However after waiting twenty minutes to be served and then the food still not appearing after close to an hour, we left. I stomped a bit, we found food at the station and headed back to beat the football crowds. The noise started at six with drums and chants but fortunately we suggest to have a baby who likes noise. Fingers crossed for later!

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