If any of you aren’t new to my blog, you may know that back in January I wrote a post about how I have been accepted into Utrecht University of Applied Sciences. Earlier this month my mum, dad and I took a trip out to the city to explore a bit more and spend some time looking at what we could see of the accommodation.
Amsterdam Schiphol Airport is about an hours flight from my local airport in Manchester, so the commute from my home town to Utrecht is only about two and a half hours, unfortunately, that doesn’t factor in airport waiting times, or any delays that may occur, but it still beats my friends five hour commute down to Bristol. Luckily, it’s extremely easy to hop off a plane and get straight on a train to Utrecht Central so hopefully most of my future commutes will go smoothly, and having done it twice now I’d say I was quite the pro!
We arrived to our hotel on a Wednesday afternoon and the weather was quite miserable and grey with spots of rain every now and then. That afternoon, we wandered around once the rain had stopped and visited a few supermarkets so my mum could reassure herself that they sold foods that I could cook and enjoy and that I wasn’t going to live off pasta for the rest of my life. I think I’m going to do most my shopping Albert Heijn as they seem pretty affordable and they sell lots of different types of pasta – sorry mum! Although I’m going to spend the next few years of my life as a broke student, I still browsed some of the clothing stores, which surprisingly they had a great selection of, some more high end than others.
On the Thursday, we walked out of the city for an hour to reach the Park where the university is situated, we looked round the temporary building, and walked out to one of their accommodation high rises where we saw students ziplining from the roof. Check back this time next year for a post about me doing that because it seems like a must. Much to my dad’s delight we visited the sports centre where he checked out the cycling club to see if they had future son-in-law potential aka being a good cyclist who knows his stuff but not good enough to beat my dad. That night we ate out at an Italian down on the canal edge and then took it easy as I had an interview the next day and did not want to be hungover.
Friday was the day of my interview so my mum and I caught the bus out to the university and my dad, as usual, walked. I felt the interview went okay but if not it’s not a worry because I’m still accepted in to the university. (Maybe I’ll explain at a later date). After the interview we walked back into the city and due to a recurring foot injury I stayed in the hotel for a few hours and watched the Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants on Netflix (yes I’m like 12 years late on that one) whilst my parents went to explore the markets. That night we went out to Eazie, a stir fry-noodle-rice kind of place that we ate at back in November and I ordered what I’m now calling my “usual” – chicken, rice, broccoli, a double serving of bell peppers with sweet and sour sauce. Afterwards we went to the pub next door and my mum and I got rather drunk and played a very serious game of Guess Who? – she won, don’t even talk to me about it. I later went to the toilet to come back to find my mum crying because she already missed me. It was then my dad decided that we’d had enough to drink and so he dragged us back to the hotel as I tried my best to facetime my brother on the free town wifi.
My dad left early on Saturday morning to come home to see his boys (Preston North End FC) play Reading in the afternoon. Mum and I visited the university open day so we had an opportunity to speak to some international students from world wide which was extremely interesting and useful. We then decided to head back to the airport as we were both getting very tired and I had work the next morning.
I really can’t wait to move out to Utrecht in August and going back made me love the city even more.
Love Georgie xo
Everything After Eighteen 