Sneeuw Alert in Amsterdam

Our Introduction to Winter Rail Travel

The days before departure for my winter expedition were filled with the usual pre-trip chaos. I packed and repacked my bag about 10 times. I scrolled through my hotel bookings ensuring they lined up and we were not double booked. I also kept an eye on that sneaky Eurail pass to ensure it didn’t magically activate itself.

Checking my flight tracker app in every spare moment became my past time. I needed to reassure myself that amidst the sea of red cancelled flights into Schiphol Airport my flight’s status stayed green.

Tracking flights in the week leading up to my international leap was nerve wrecking. It had felt like clever planning when I routed myself through MSP, the hub of Delta, and an airport that knows how to handle harsh winter conditions. Minnesota is the kind of place that would see a blizzard and shrug “ eh what’s a little snow to us?”

I felt confident that if we could get to Delta’s hub, they could glide us into Europe through most conditions.

My potentially clever planning could not account for Amsterdam experiencing its first heavy snow fall in five years.

Travel in and around Amsterdam had ground nearly to a halt. Days prior to departing Sky Harbor. Flights weren’t making it to Schiphol, and even the train running between the airport and city center was infrequent at best.

Two days before we departed I was on Ns.nl the website for Nederlandse Spoorwegen which is the Netherlands rail service. I was trying to turn NS.nl into a crystal ball to reassure myself if we landed in Amsterdam we could actually get to Amsterdam Centraal by train.

  During my futile search on the rail service website I was fully and gleefully distracted by the scrolling top bar.

There was a Sneeuw alert.

Yep, the Dutch word for snow is sneeuw. A beautiful combination of snow in English and Schnee in German.

“Sneeuw” is just a fun word.

Try saying it out loud “Oh, I stepped in Sneeuw”.

Now, Tell me you didn’t laugh.

The sneeuw alert explained that many roads were closed, and freezing temperatures were disrupting the physical mechanisms that give trains important signals. About half an inch of snow had really impacted Amsterdam.

Maybe the sneeuw alert should have filled me with dread.

Maybe I should have started rethinking Amsterdam entirely.

And maybe ,for a flash of a second, I think I did.

Then I started laughing. I imagined poking snow and dramatically proclaiming “Sneeuuuuwww!’.

The unexpectedly amusing disruption announcement settled something in me. Replacing anxiety with a sense of adventure. There is a freeing giddiness because in my winter adventure some things would go smoothly and some wouldn’t. Trains and airplanes are entirely out of my control. I’m just along for the ride.

Sat in the window seat, headphones set to my favorite audiobook, snack in hand.

It’s not an adventure until something goes wrong.

I was ready for adventure.

Our flight went stubbornly smooth.

It was the first in days to make it from the USA to Schiphol airport.

Our transatlantic leap gave us one of my favorite airport beer stops ( and I’ve been to Munich Airport). It provided smooth passport entry, even if the process had sounded intimidating from across the ocean.

According to reports that day trains between the airport and Amsterdam Centraal were very infrequent and a hassle.
For my dad and I? The train pulled into the platform just when we needed it.

We found the start to adventure slipping and sliding our way over the half cleared pathway toward our hotel across the road from Amsterdam Centraal.

I quickly learned about black ice.
Counterintuitively, I learned to stay on the visible white snow instead of the partially cleared equally icy path.

My snow boots I splurged on before the trip were already proving their worth in the very first city!

Despite all the anxieties in the days leading up to departure arriving to snow and sludge on the ground was a bit amazing.

It really felt like we’d arrived to a proper Winter Rail Expedition.