We left for the airport at 4:40 from our house. Much to Vance’s chagrin, he wanted to leave a tad later than us but we bullied him in to our departure time.

Carolyn was kind enough to take us out to the airport, so a quick drop off at the departures level and we were on our way.

This flight was a bit easier to handle than either of my Scotland flights, no screaming/crying kids on this one. Or at least none that I could hear from where I was sitting. Cathy, Vangie and Vance were able to sleep on the plane on the way to Amsterdam, I wasn’t. I hate them.  Vance got over 6 hour sleep on a 8.5 hour flight! Me, I watched movies, read and tried very hard to sleep. I must say that KLM has an excellent selection of entertainment on their flights. There must have been 40 different movies to choose from, but none of them sleep inducing.

Once we arrived in the Amsterdam airport, Cathy, Vangie and Vance decided to take the train to the city and take a boat cruise to get a glimpse of the sites. I decided that with no sleep, I would be better off to try to find a comfy chair and get a few zzz’s so I was not a bear later in the day.

I was able to get about 45 min nap in the airport, which helped. The Amsterdam airport is a huge mall that also has an airport attached to it. The shopping is pretty good, electronic stores, a Gadget Store, (That is what it was called, I know, I had to restrain myself) a bulb store where you could buy bulbs for your garden. For an airport, the variety was amazing.

We connected again near our gate and decided we still had lots of time, so we went to the Heineken restaurant and had a pitcher of beer and a sandwich.  Yum.

On the flight to Venice I was able to sleep about 45 min of the hour and 30 min flight, which helped met quite a bit. At the airport we expected to go through customs and immigration, but they just let you get your bags and walk out. No passport check or anything. Weird.

We snagged a cab to take us to our hotel, which was only about 15 min away. We were all looking forward to getting some sleep. The hotel is nice, (thanks Darla for suggesting it) the rooms are clean and it has free wi-fi! So off to bet. We have made plans to meet at about 10 AM for breakfast and then to find a Vodaphone store so we can get our sim cards etc. Always have to be connected you know.

Next update, more photos, promise. (For those of you who are friends with Cathy on Facebook, she has some photos posted there)