Our flight was a little late boarding and a little late departing, but we made it to the airport and got through security with plenty of time to spare.
This has probably been the most turbulent flight I’ve ever been on. I can’t remember a more bumpy ride on any of my flights.
In spite of the Ativan and Ambien that I took and the capability of using my CPAP machine, I couldn’t fall asleep as people were wandering the aisles bumping into me and talking and making noise even after the cabin crew turned the lights down. It’s only 10:43 EST, but in 2 hrs and 25 minutes, we will be landing in Amsterdam at about 7AM local time.
Mom has some type of weird pain in her ear that doesn’t seem to be going away no matter what we throw at it; but Dad, Jac, and I are doing alright. I imagine I’ll be pretty cranky our first day in Inverness from lack of sleep, but that’s probably true of all of us. I’m grateful that we weren’t seated near any small children or infants.
We will have a four hour and forty minute layover in Amsterdam, but that’s really not enough time to leave the airport since we are fairly certain we have to go through customs as it’s our entry point into the EU.
Update: We didn’t have to go through customs in Amsterdam. We probably could have risked leaving the airport. We have been waiting here for almost four hours. Jac may have slept for about an hour and a half on the flight from DC, but none of the rest of us got any sleep. We will arrive in Inverness in a little over two hours, where we can drop our luggage off at the hotel and explore the city a bit. Mom and Dad are grateful they don’t have to immediately get on a train for three more hours to go straight to Edinburgh, and I’m honesty ok with relaxing a bit tonight since I’m running on fumes, caffeine, and stimulants (prescribed to me!) at the moment.
We got to Inverness, dropped off our luggage, and went exploring! I went to the Victorian Arcade while Jac and Mom did some shopping and Dad walked down the street. I went to Milk Bar and had a salted caramel milkshake and Dad met me there. We all went back to the hotel, checked in, then went out walking. We are walked down to the River Ness and saw Hootenanny then crossed the bridge and walked down the River farther.
We ended up eating dinner at The Filling Station, which has American food, because we wanted to eat somewhere close to the hotel. I had a chicken sandwich, Dad and Mom had burgers, and Jac had fish and chips. We went back to the Royal Highland Hotel where we were staying, Mom and Dad went to their room and Jac and I went to our room, I took a shower, and we all crashed after having been awake for more than 24 hours.
“Stay afraid, but do it anyway. What’s important is the action. You don’t have to wait to be confident. Just do it and eventually the confidence will follow.” 
1 thought on “Day One: IAD to AMS (October 1-2)”