Travel day setbacks

Flight was scheduled for 1:40 pm out of Seattle so my parents and I drve down Monday afternoon and stayed the night to avoid an early rushed Tuesday morning. We arrived at the airport in plenty of time and having checked in online I lined up to check my bag straight away. When I got to the counter I put my bike box on the scale and it weighed in at a whopping 74 lbs which is apparently 4 lbs over the limit and the lady said "we can't put that on the plane". Um what? The whole purpose of this trip is to ride my bike. So I had to openly bf and remove some weight so it would only weigh 70. In the end it weighed 68.9 lbs. Phew.

Next I had to drop it off at oversized baggage. There the officer looked at the strapping which I had just undone by hand to take out some weight said "you can't have these straps". Yikes, day is not starting out so well. I stayed to watch him unstrap my box and take everything to swab it and check for radiation. He finally finished and then started putting the straps back on. All good.

Next I had to clear security and obviously this is where I said goodbye to my parents. I had to admit there were some tears, I've never been away frommy parents for this long and across the world on a different continent.

Advice from my dad "don't do anything stupid". Thanks dad! Love you guys!

Everything else went smoothly, got on the plane and arrived in amsterd no problem. Picked upmy bike and then headed outside to find the shuttle to my hotel. Of course it was late so I had a minor panic attack but then it showed up and I was all good. Then I pushed my cart towards the shuttle and the driver was like I can't take that box, and I was like what? And in my head. Was thinking you are a freaking shuttle bs what do you mean you can't fit my bike on the bus. I must admit the compartments underneath the bus were quite small but he didn't even offer to try. I had to convince him it would fit. The first compartment did not but the second one fit no problem. He said I was the exception and if he had more passengers with baggage he would not have been able to take me. Bullshit. I'm a hotel guest and have just as much of a right t ride that shuttle withy extremely large box as any other smuck. I didn't want toake a big scene and I got on the shuttle and kept mouth shut.

And now I sit here inky hotel waiting to meet up with Katie, Julie and Gabe and think back on all the advice I have been given:
Don't do anything stupid
Don't die
Have fun
Take lots of pictures
Go to all the places they tell you not to
Don't forget me
Buy me something nice(I guess that's more a request than advice)
Stick to the buddy system.

Thanks everyone for the advice, good or bad.

Signing out from Amsterdam for the first time,

Nicole