When Miguel and I first traveled to Amsterdam many moons ago (circa 2009), the most vivid memory was the multitude of “coffee shops” on nearly every street corner + the smell of weed wafting through the air (it truly is a beautiful city as well!). In planning our first weekend trip away in Germany, we wondered to ourselves, is this a smart idea to bring Joseph into this type of environment? “But, the laws have changed”, we told ourselves… besides we’re going to a much smaller city called Groningen, chosen because it was just a 2 hour drive from our home in Bremen, Germany.
We drove into the city center and were immediately accosted by a herd of bicycles (typical, Holland). Without having done the proper due diligence of looking up the driving signs in Holland, we figured it best to immediately ditch our car and planned on not getting in it again until the drive back home.
Groningen did not disappoint – it has all the charm of a larger European city with the cute shops & restaurants in the city center, and the sprawling piazza along with a huge beautiful church. The part that makes it feel like Holland, are all the winding canals & bridges (which were Joseph’s favorite part, of course).
We awoke early Sunday morning to the sound of fire engines outside of the hotel. A quick glance outside and we saw plumes of dark smoke coming from the casino directly across the street (not a good sign). All of the fire fighters appeared to be strategizing on the best approach. After waking up Miguel we decided it best to pack up all of our stuff in the case that there was an evacuation at the hotel…. there was no chance of the flames reaching the hotel but it was turning into quite the scene outside and we got the feeling that this was, well, pretty serious. And then we realized….. OUR CAR! Oh shoot we parked it in the garage attached to the casino. Well, what do we have in there? AHHHH – the car seat!!! At this point realizing that the car was probably a goner (even if it wasn’t incinerated, it surely had to be badly smoke damaged)….. so what does any level headed parent do? Go drink coffee, hop on Amazon Prime, and order a new one. And then arrange some transportation home…. lucky for us, the “only” ride available was in this Tesla SUV. All’s well that ends well, right?
