08/01/24 Anne Frank Tour

Thursday, August 1, 2024 - our last day in the hotel!!! On our way to the River Cruise!

But first, we enjoyed the delicious breakfast in the hotel again before heading to the Anne Frank House. It was 4 levels of skinny stairs to go up to Anne Frank's portion of the home. It was sobering to think of the family having to be up there in complete silence with little food and no entertainment for so long. It was really a good reminder of how blessed we are and I hope our country never goes through what they went through.

We walked quite a bit before and after the tour and enjoyed seeing Amsterdam.

Amsterdam is an interesting town. There are canals everywhere. Some people even live on house boats. Some seem nice, others quite small and not nice.

Everyone rides bikes. They said there are 1.8 million bikes in Amsterdam. That's twice as many bikes as people!

The bikes have the right of way and people really zip around on their bikes. The little tiny cars are allowed to be driven by people 16 or older without a driver license and they are allowed to park them on the sidewalks or wherever they can find a place.

The streets were very narrow. It was amazing to me that they didn't have accidents all over the place as people were seemingly everywhere - on foot, bike and in vehicles - and they all seemed to move at a pretty good pace!

Eventhough we arrived at the boat today - and they fed us two awesome meals - the boat just remained there in the port over night and we continued to explore Amsterdam Friday morning as well.

Funny sign - someone put some dudes
face on it!

Outside the Anne Frank house

Walking all over Amsterdam

Amsterdam

Front door of Anne Frank's house

Katie Johnson, Grandma Carol & Jenny Wayman

One of the many canals
in Amsterdam

Fancy lunch upon arrival
at the ship

Our room

Our bathroom

Angle 2 of our bathroom

Around the boat

Larry Gelwix talking about our cruise

Our group

Diane and Eldon

Our food was not always something we could identify...but mostly it was tasty and it was super fun to try all kinds of interesting and fun new dishes! And they were always BEAUTIFUL!

Jerry Sorenson

Comments

06/14/25 Pre-Yellowstone

Last year for Christmas I purchased a vacation to Yellowstone for the kids and us. The dates for the Yellowstone cabin were June 16-June 20. We decided to break the trip up a little and drive up the weekend before and drive home the weekend after. Also, because Katie got married, and Dallas has limited time off, he was unable to take his family on the trip. We stayed at his house and got some twin time in before we continued north. Aspen and John moved to Pennsylvania and are in Utah for the summer. On our way up north we stopped at Becky's house to see them and their sweet new baby. Erik recently got a new job so he was also not able to join us on our trip. Holly became our little girl again and traveled with us. Holly and Millie My dad's been in the care center so we stopped by to visit him. He's being well cared for. He is struggling to put sentences together. We came and went to church with him at the care center. He's been asking for a really good pizza. So we w...

07/10/2025 Dad's Passing

Dad's stay at the care center ended up being 35 days. He had a care giver that really connected with him named Michael. Michael cared for him when he was living at home and then came out a couple of times to the care center before he died. He really appreciated those visits and lit up when Michael came to visit and help care for him. I'm thankful that I was able to see him the two weekends about two weeks before he died. He was still able to smile and sit and eat at that time. I'm so glad that Ruth and Becky were able to take the time and spend quite a bit of time with him the last couple of weeks before he died. His condition continued to deteriorate and it was not easy to see him that way and spend so much time there. But my sisters and Suzanne did what they could to make him comfortable at the end. He was found dead in his bed on the morning of July 10. Rest in peace, Dad. I love you!

06/16/25-06/20/25 Yellowstone

We had a really great week on our Yellowstone trip. We stayed at a VRBO cabin in a remote cabin in Ashton, Idaho. It was just right for our group. We were able to go to Yellowstone, Grand Teton, Mesa Falls, the Yellowstone Playhouse, Lava Hot Springs Pools and Slides. We drove lots, played games, did puzzles, roasted hot dogs, made s'mores, enjoyed picnic lunches, ice cream at the frost top, dinners together made by each lil family and so much more. Loved it! (There are lots more pictures in our shared Yellowstone google album. Also, these pictures are not in order of happening. )

Griffin Family

Search This Blog