DAY 7 - Amsterdam, Netherlands / Brussels, Belgium / Paris, France

We couldn't even believe the time was going so fast; It have been already a week since the first day we came to the fantastic euro trip. This morning we left Amsterdam at  8 am then we were on the way to Brussels to see the atomium. The atomium was bigger than what we thought. We were so surprised, and the spectacular made us so excited and amused. We took group pictures in front of the atomium. 

We went to the old town in Brussels. The chocolate there were so cool; they can even make different cool shape with chocolate.  We saw the Manneken Pis; he were pretty small and wearing clothes which was very adorable and interesting.

 We ate the amazing waffle that was super delicious but fat. Cause Vivi wanted to pee so hard, we started finding the toilet;  we went to Starbucks for toilet. Cause we spent a little bit much time to toilet, then we had to run to buy postcards and some gifts, and we saw a very amazing store ''Europe style'', bought a t-shirt with many countries' flags which I thought it was exactly made for exchange student, when I saw that, I feel in love with that:) Because we want to sent postcard from  Brussels, we stand on the street and used the wall as a table to write postcard. 

We started the new buss trip to Paris, on the way to Pairs they sky start to cry, I thought it was very sad, hope it will be happy and sunny tomorrow to go to Disney with us! 

Btw I (Winnie) found out Vivi's clavicle were so funny and cozy to feel with the hand; she have very obvious clavicle. 

by Winnie Chen & Sandy Huang (Taiwan)

DAY 6 - Amsterdam, Netherlands

Hey everybody, we are Luciana and Andrea Forti, we are writting this blog to tell you about our amazing day in Amsterdam. We started with a nice breakfast in the hotel all together, after that we were riding yellow bikes in a groups of 9 people, we were with the bikes in the center of the city. After we were done, we took a tram and then had free time for 2 hours for lunch. Then after that we saw the Anna Frank House/Museum, which was interesting. We then went on a boat ride for 2 hours and it was amazing. After that we had a Belgian dinner and now it is time for bed. Amsterdam is our favorite city so far, it is beautiful and everyone is so nice. Yo amo Amsterdam !!!

by Luciana Forti & Andrea Forti (Bolivia)

DAY 5 - Berlin & Sachsenhausen, Germany; Amsterdam, Netherlands

Today was a little extra special for Darcy as he turned 16 today, he was awoken by five really great kids at 6 o’clock in the morning, who sang happy birthday and gave him a pink princess cake, which was a great start. After another hotel buffet breakfast today we planned to go to Sachsenhausen (a former Nazi concentration camp) and onwards to Amsterdam. 

Entrance to Sachsenhausen

We arrived at Sachsenhausen concentration camp with our fantastic tour guide Rob. The thing that instantly struck me, was the stone map of the camp and seeing the sheer and some of the statistics to the place. 

We were given an amazing tour of one of the most chilling, emotional, eerie and strangely impressive places we’ve ever been. You hear plenty of things about the terrible atrocities suffered by Jews and prisoners alike by the Nazis in a classroom, but being where a lot of it actually happened was incredible. 

What we observed was that the chilling quotes were often made around 30 years after the war as if the prisoners looked back on their life and their suffering was all they could remember.

Luckily it was sunny and everyone was relatively awake. Berlin had plenty of amazing World War II. history, but Sachsenhausen was truly terrifying.

The rest of the day we spent on the bus on the 9 hour long bus trip to Amsterdam. We spent the time chatting, bonding and watching movies. We spent the night relaxing on the hotel, where we ate dinner and gave Darcy another brilliant birthday cake and a card that featured everybody’s native language which made us all realise how lucky we are to be from all over the globe and to be sharing this amazing experience together.

Happy Birthday Darcy!

Heidy, our chaperone

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by Darcy Matthews (Australia) & Emma Catchpole (Australia)

Day 4 - Berlin, Germany

Guten Morgen!

This is Hannah and Luisa giving you todays blog update all about our amazing day in Berlin!

We started off with an AMAZING breakfast buffet at our hotel. 

Then it was off to tour the city! Our tour guide met us at the hotel at 9 o clock and we were off. Although, it was a little rainy outside we were determined not to let it damper our mood – after all we were about to go out and see the most up and coming city in all of Europe! 

We saw tons of amazing sites including the Parliament building, Brandenburger Tor, Memorial of the Murdered Jews of Europe, Hitlers Bunker, Siegessaeule, Schloss Bellevue.

After seeing all of those amazing sights, our tummies were starting to rumble signaling it was time for a much needed lunch stop which came at Checkpoint Charlie. We all spread out and enjoyed a nice lunch and did a little souvenir shopping before time was time to hop back on the bus and go see more sights!        

We ended the tour by seeing the famous Berliner Mauer Gedaenkstaette, Eastside Gallery, Berliner Dom on the Museumsinsel.

We came back to the hotel and took a quick shower before meeting up at the reception desk to go to dinner. We went to the famous Hofbraeuhaus and had a typical Bavarian feast, consisting of pork, chicken, potato salad, vegetables, gravy, and of course a yummy berry crumble for dessert! The waiters all dress up in tradtional Bavarian clothing and we drank from giant glass mugs – how fun!

Our tummies full we all piled back onto the bus, exhausted after our exciting long day. Tomorrow we leave early to go and see a concentration camp, then it is off to Amsterdam!

Auf Wiedersehen, Deutschland!        

Hannah Patzer (United States), Luisa Gartner (Austria)

DAY 3 - Copenhagen, Denmark - Berlin, Germany

At 8am we left Copenhagen to depart to Germany!

We drove 3 hours and then got on a 2 hour ferry and then drove another 3 hours after the ferry (ate lunch on the ferry.)

We came to the hotel at around 4.30pm, and hung out till dinner - swimming, sauna and talking.

Ate a buffet dinner at the hotel and then played “Mafia” with the group.

Looking forward to seeing Berlin tomorrow! Can’t wait 

Ellie (New Zeland) and Emilie (Australia)