We ate lunch at ChiChis, a Tex-Mex restaurant. We sat outside and there was a crazy bachelor party at a table next to us. Mark ordered 2 XXL margaritas. Mindy and Ashley met up with us there. We didn't really know how to get to the scuba place, Nemo 33. It was about 4 miles from the city center. I looked up directions but my directions were walking directions from Midi Station, our original plan but not very helpful from where we were. We knew the general area of the center and decided to buy an all day bus/tram/metro pass. It took us about 3 hours walking and on trains, metros, and buses to finally get to the scuba center.
At first, we thought we wouldn't be able to scuba without being certified. (Alex is certified and Mark was able to use his military ID) The rest of us could have signed up for a lesson, but we didn't book in advance. Luckily, we made friends with the receptionist and she asked the scuba instructors if they could stay one additional hour and give our group a private lesson. Exciting! Our lesson started at 6pm, so we were waiting in the bar area of Nemo 33 for a while. We napped and watched the Mexican soccer team win Olympic gold.
Scuba diving was awesome! Our instructors would only allow non-certified divers to go down to about 15 feet, but that was plenty deep for me. We could see Alex and Mark in the tunnels below us. The pool is 130 feet deep, but you have to be really experienced to go down that far. We had fun swimming around and Andrew and Rene took lots of pictures with their underwater cameras.
We left the scuba center around 7:30 and took the buses and trams and trains to Mark and Alex's hotel. They stayed at a super nice Hilton-owned hotel in the business district. They welcomed everyone to spend the night, but we all wanted to get back to Leuven that night.
We ate dinner together at an Italian place near the train station. We left Brussels at 12:10 and we were back at the dorms by 1. Because of Market Rock, we had to take different roads home. Andrew and I went out when we got back to check out the concert, and we heard the last song of the night. We were so exhausted so we just went back to the dorms and went to sleep.
Yesterday, Cherish and I went to Amsterdam. We bought a hop-on, hop-off bus pass, which worked out so well. We stopped at a diamond factory (Amsterdam is known as the City of Diamonds) and learned how diamonds were cut. We got to see a 55,000 euro diamond up close. The tour was free with our bus pass. Sales gimmick, but it was actually super awesome. We booked it over to the Van Gogh museum, and then went to our appointment at Anne Frank at 3:15. So glad we bought tickets beforehand and didn't have to wait in line! One of my favorite museums ever. We had dinner at a little steakhouse, and they charged me for salad dressing, BBQ sauce, and ketchup.... cost half as much as my meal!
We left Amsterdam around 6:30 and we were back in Leuven by 10:15. People hadn't left for Market Rock yet, so I jumped in the shower and got ready really fast. We went to the main stage for a while and then went to 2 other clubs in Leuven. Great way to spend our last Sunday night in Leuven!
Today I'm studying and finishing up my field trip report. I planned to sleep late, but the workers fixing our sewage line arrived around 6:30 am and started their jackhammers! Hopefully it will be fixed soon.
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