It seems like the months go faster and faster. April was another eventful month and flew by! Curious as to why that happened? Then read on!
We quit our jobs!
In the first week of April, we do something exciting: we both resign our jobs. Maybe you have already read it, if not read this blog, but we have decided to make a second trip around the world! So good to finally be able to be open about it and I notice that I am suddenly looking forward to it! The first destination is Madagascar and we are already flying there on 31 May!
Preparing for our world trip
After our announcement, April is dominated by preparations for this trip. For example, we test the malaria drug Lariam during the first three weeks of April. Lariam is known for the many side effects such as nightmares and psychosis. Fortunately, we are not bothered by that, but we are troubled by a rushed feeling in the first week as if ten cups of coffee were drunk.
We also find nice tenants for our apartment. They will live in our house in Amsterdam for ten months from June. In the meantime, we are already starting to pack and clean up some things. We also enjoy the last moments with our baby niece. She is five months now and will have grown a lot when we return.
Going out for dinner
To celebrate our engagement, we are treated to dinner by the parents of Ries. At the restaurant ‘de witte zwaan‘ (in the Bilt, the Netherlands) we eat a five-course dinner with matching wines. Very tasty! The highlight is served with the coffee: a trolley full of pastries and cookies. You can pick whatever you want so Ries loads his plate full.
Bachelor party
For us, the Easter weekend is all about bachelor parties. Our good friends Thomas and Christine are getting married in mid-May, by chance, their bachelors take place on the same sunny day. Ries goes kayaking, barbecuing and camping in Leuven (Belgium) with the guys. Together with the girls, we go to Eindhoven. First, we do an escape room, next we enjoy the beautiful weather and then we go for dinner and parties to the city centre!
On Sunday we travel from the south back to Amsterdam, both a little tired. However, there is no time to rest, because in the evening we board the plane to Scotland!
10 days road-tripping through Scotland
We spend the last ten days of April in the Highlands of Scotland. We start with beautiful sunny weather in Edinburgh. Then we get to know Agent Dunham: a silver campervan from Spaceships that we take on a seven-day road trip. In December we already visited Glasgow and Glen Coe, now we are driving north through the Cairngorms National park.
After a short visit to the Inverness area, where we make several attempts to spot dolphins (spoiler, we didn’t see one), we drive straight through the rolling countryside to the rugged west. Here Ries gets 12 thicks during an evening walk with the best view ever. We drive down the entire coast via narrow roads, after which we finally make the crossing to the famous Isle of Skye.
Cursed by the “fairies” on Skye
On Skye we are confronted with a real fairy curse … this results in car trouble, a lot of rain and ultimately missing the ferry back to the mainland. Soon a whole blog about our time on Skye will follow, in which I will explain everything. In the end, we still have a good time on Skye. On our way to the mainland, we pick up Jur and Fenna (in-laws) with whom we drive to Fort William.
After two more days full of hikes, we say goodbye to our silver spaceship, a nice campervan with which we have covered more than 1000 kilometres. And then on April 30, it is really time to fly back to Amsterdam.
May will be our last month in the Netherlands, filled with goodbye dinners and parties.
Blog
This month we wrote a guest blog for Josephine from Circum Navigate. I have known Josephine for a long time through Instagram and because of her beautiful blogs I have become enthusiastic about countries like Sri Lanka and Tanzania. We wrote a guest blog for Circum Navigate with five reasons why Finnish Lapland should be on your bucket list (in Dutch).
Top 3 best read blogs this month:
1. Itinerary Belize: one week in Caribbean Paradise
2. Big news: we quit our jobs because…
3. Itinerary for two weeks on Palawan (the Philippines)
Discoveries in April
Series: The Good Fight
After the strong law series “The Good Wife”, there is now the sequel “The Good Fight”. This is also about the legal profession, with a good dose of humour and sometimes some insanity (just watch one, then you will know what I mean).
Book: The Bradt Travel Guide
I am not a big fan of the Lonely Planet travel guides, a feeling I don’t hide. However, I recently discovered a travel guide that I do like: the guides from The Bradt. I am currently reading their guide on Madagascar. It’s more detailed and gives a lot of information about the history and culture of Madagascar. Highly recommended!
Sports: ClassPass
Okay, I have to admit, I haven’t had the chance to try this out but it has been downloaded and back in the Netherlands, this is the first thing I’m going to test! With this app, you can work out at many different locations (just like with the OneFit app). The first month is completely free, perfect for our last month in the Netherlands.
My favourite moments in April
- Having a private lunch with my parents. Normally my brothers and or Ries are always there, so it is extra special to be ‘alone’ with my parents for once. Something that I really want to do more often!
- I sometimes have “fun ideas” which Ries doesn’t really find that fun. Usually, I also have these ideas when it is quite busy and my schedule is overflowing anyway. Similarly when I wanted to paint one of our bedroom walls white again, in anticipation of our new tenants (there were stains of dead mosquitoes on the wall). Extra sweet so that when I got home from work, Ries had already painted the wall as a surprise!
- Drinking wine and have a cheese tasting with friends Susie and Nicole. We were in Amsterdam Noord, at Fromagerie Abraham Kef. This is the first cheese farmer to import French cheeses to Amsterdam in 1953. With the tasting came a very extensive explanation of all its flavours!
- The beautiful weather we had in April. From the sun-drenched bachelor party from my friend Christine to waking up in the sun with a coffee on our balcony and warm evenings with rosé. Can April always be like this?
- Waking up in our campervan and lying in bed looking out at a clear blue Loch with the mountains behind it. How incredibly beautiful Scotland is!
