Back to the States...

As Lauren had mentioned, we had to get up really early to make sure we allowed enough time and didn't miss our trains/flights. We showered, gave the hostel our keys and headed for the metro. Now, Lauren and I have this thing: we're either super lucky or SOL. Fortunately, this morning we were super lucky. It was heading into rush hour for the morning, but the Metro was running smoothly, and we didn't have to climb up any stairs with our luggage! YES, it was either escalator or going down..so happy about that, didn't feel like getting sweaty traveling. Gross. We got to the Gare Paris Norde and boarded our high speed train for Amsterdam-Schipol (airport). Everything ran on time, the airport was easy to navigate. We got our tickets, checked our bags (mine was OK, Lauren's was a little heavy so she put some in mine), and did some shopping (1. we had 2 hours to spare 2. We're women)

We sat down before our gate (Note: Here, all security is done RIGHT at the gate...kind of scary, I mean anyone can just be walking around this place with God knows what), and just chatted a little. Some time went by and we checked the monitors to see if our flight was still on time. NOPE. Delayed 2 hours...so we realized we'll probably miss our connecting flight in Dublin to JFK. So we go to the information booth to see if we can change our next flight and learn that several flight have either been cancelled or delayed because of volcanic ash that has spewed as a result of volcanic activity in Iceland. So wierd..thinking SOL at this point but we honestly don't care, we don't want to go home lol. The woman had also told us she couldn't do anything about our second flight only for outgoing flights, we'd have to go through the Dublin airport for a new connecting flight. OK no big deal.

While everyone else's flights to Glasgow, London, Manchester, etc. were cancelled ours was still going apparently so we boarded 2 hours later and our flight was pretty smooth. This 19 year old guy sat next to us, who lived in Connecticut, but was originally from Venezuela and went to UVA who was returning from Kenya! He had taken about a year off of school to work at an orphanage down there and traveled around Africa some. What a life. What a journey. He said he had always wanted to go to Amsterdam so after Africa he went there for a couple days and that's how he ended up on this flight. After talking with him some more we all fell asleep on this flight and woke up and started rushing out of the plane to try and make our next flight, we literally had like 7 minutes!

We get to security, get through fine and look at the board...PHEW! Our connecting flight was delayed 2 hours as well! Which meant it was leaving in about 30-40 min. We think there were several passengers on our AMS flight that needed to connect to JFK so they held the plane. Haha, can they do that?

The flight was a long 7 hours, but again, being lucky today, we asked the flight attendants if there was anyway we could upgrade....no that would be like 1500 Euros. BUT, there were 4 open seats in the middle row, so we took that and spread out. Each getting 2 seats to ourselves. YAY extra leg room. Aer Lingus is partnered with Jet Blue so you know they have sweet features...like moveis and TV shows! Lauren and I watched the 3 same movies (in different sequences): The Fighter, Black Swan (SO WIERD for anyone who has seen it...trippy), and Catfish.

Oh, that guy from Venezuela also happened to sit the same row, different aisle as us, so we talked with him for a while about traveling, books, etc. He seemed really mature and wordly for his age.

We arrived safely into JFK, despite some turbulence (eek!) and got our bags relatively quickly and were greeted by my lovely mom who sharply said, "JULIE!" You never forget your mother's voice.

What a fantastic vacation that has come to an end....incredible...i can't say enough how special this trip was for me, and Lauren too. We surprisingly, are still friends...ok not surprisingly.

We're going to post our top 5 of the places we've been shortly. Thanks for hanging in there!

Love,
Julie and Lauren