Day 12: June 19,2026 Amsterdam to Johannesburg, South Africa

We had about three hours in Amsterdam. Not enough to really do much of anything besides have a little snack and stretch our legs. But, we definitely got Netherlands vibe with tulips and lots of art everywhere. We were sad to hear that the fantastic art museum, the Rijks Museum, which often has displays at the airport, didn’t have anything currently. So mostly we just hung out in the airport getting ready for the next long flight.

When we got on board are very large airplane, we were relieved that indeed we did have seats next to each other. The next 10 hours we spent snoozing and reading. Watch the second Wicked movie well Patti watched Song Sung Blue about a Neil Diamond tribute band. And, mostly we just tried to get through the hours. Getting a little sleep as we could.

We were both surprised at the number of people traveling with small children, including babies and toddlers. A South African vacation or safari seemed an unlikely choice to us for such small children, but there were lots of them on our plane.

We landed without incident and spent about 40 minutes going through passport control. We felt very welcomed to South Africa. 

Then we believed we were following directions to get to the place to catch the shuttle bus for our hotel.  However, with some help from the workers at the airport, it quickly became clear our hotel did not have a airport shuttle. And we confirmed that with the hotel. So then the nice guy at the airport helped us find an Uber driver, Gabriel. He drove us a half an hour to the hotel, where they were expecting us. And they said our tour host had called, hoping that we had checked in. Maybe they were there to meet us with signs at the airport, which we didn’t see. Anyway, the hotel was counting on us being there. There was a rainbow colored rhino greeting us in the lobby.

And we got to our room unpacked, and then found one of the light switches was broken and it was stuck on. After some help problem-solving this to no avail,  we finally threw her stuff back in the bags and moved across the hall in a couple rooms down where the light switch was working. Then we fell into bed around midnight happy to at least have arrived in South Africa.