Pregaming to Amsterdam

In my previous entry, I mentioned taking an overnight ferry from London to Amsterdam. We were all pretty tired and worn out from London, and most us agreed we were going to take it easy on the boat in preparation for Amsterdam (or as Darren calls it, Amsterdamage).

Well I don't know what happened between leaving London and boarding the ferry, but we were all drunk on the bus ride TO the ferry. By the time we had all boarded the boat, we all went straight to the deck to drink some more. The boat hadn't even left the dock yet and we thought we had been out on the open water for hours.

I'm not going to get into specifics, but it was probably the sloppiest group of people I've seen in a long time. And I've been to my fair share of Buffalo St. Patrick's Day parades, Bills, and Sabres games.

We completely took over the deck, with many of us buying drinks at the bar, but mostly us buying bottles of liquor at the duty free shop on board. We were all sitting on the center of the deck with tables and chairs and were roaming around, while others on the boat sort of surrounded our area and watched us. The best way I can describe it is when you see a large group of zoo goers watching an exhibit at the zoo.

The viewing area, AKA the boat deck.

We were out there for a LONG time and needless to say, things were getting more and more ridiculous by the minute. I was rooming with three other girls, and we ended up all making it back to our room despite each of us losing our room keys on separate occasions (Megan was issued a new and incorrect room key at the front desk and walked in on some guy sleeping).

The early morning after was...rough. We all had to be packed and ready to get off the boat by 8 AM. Every single one of us were feeling pretty miserable, and I can't even imagine the feeling of everyone else on board when they saw 30 hungover American tourists stumble into the customs line.

Between one of us getting sick in the garbage can, a few setting off the fire alarm after running out of the fire exit to be sick, my friend's beaded bracelet breaking and beads going everywhere, we were a force to be reckoned with. The cool thing though was everyone else in the customs line looked more amused at our antics than anything. Even men working customs were chuckling at us as we each made our way up to them to get our passports stamped.

Our bus driver to Amsterdam took one look at us and immediately started passing everyone a sick bag. Darren also had to reassure him that we weren't normally like that. 

We made it to Amsterdam before we could check into our hostel, so we were dropped off in the city to hang out for a few hours. Those few hours were one big blur. I was pretty much wearing my pajamas from the night before and I still felt like we were still on the boat. A group of us immediately booked it to a coffee shop for some much needed rejuvenation.

Darren also arranged us to take a boat cruise down Amsterdam's beautiful and plentiful canals, and a few days prior we had all been talking about how we were looking forward to it. Fast forward a few days later after a night of hard partying and sitting out in the baking sun and we were NOT okay. I've never seen a group of more miserable people on such a lovely outing in my life. The boat cruise would have been interesting and enjoyable if we weren't hungover, but instead we were all too tired, sick, and hot to enjoy the experience.

We eventually made it back to our hostel where we all immediately went straight back to bed for a few hours and then showered. A lot of us were feeling a lot better after and decided to head out to explore Amsterdam.

Looking back at our crazy night and day of the ferry and getting to Amsterdam and I think it was one of the funniest and best moments of my life. We've all been looking back and crying tears of laughter at how ridiculous it all was. From the actual partying on the ferry, the morning after at customs, and the boat ride in Amsterdam, it was just all so outrageous. I keep hearing new stories about what happened to people on the ferry or I would remember something and I'd just burst out in a fit of laughter. I had to stop from writing this a few times because I just keep laughing at everything.

After that rough day in Amsterdam, the evening and the following day and night in the city was phenomenal. I'll save that for its own entry, but the people in Amsterdam really know how to live life. I am entirely in awe of that city.

I can't believe we are about halfway through the trip. Part of me is a bit sad that we're already this far in, but the rest of me is really excited because if the final half of the trip is anything like the first half, well...