During the summer of 2019, Mr. Kost and several RIHS students, parents, grandparents and students from surrounding schools spent two weeks visiting several European countries.

The trip was organized by Mr. Jim Melvin, a social studies teacher at Bushnell-Prairie City Jr. High.

Below are pictures and some other highlights from the trip.

We began our trip in the Dutch capital of Amsterdam.

After landing at Schiphol airport, we went into the city and saw the Museumplein, a square in Amsterdam surrounded by museums. We saw the Rijksmuseum, a museum of important art and other items from Dutch history. The Van Gogh Museum and a modern art museum are also located at the square. For dinner we had pannenkoeken, a Dutch pancake with different toppings.

On the second day we visited the Anne Frank House and took a boat tour of the canals of Amsterdam.

On the morning of July 11 we packed our bags and drove from Amsterdam to the German city of Cologne (known as Köln in German). We made a brief stop for lunch and the see the Cologne Cathedral, the second tallest church in Europe and third tallest in the world.

After leaving Cologne we travelled to Heidelberg and visited the Heidelberg Castle. Heidelberg is a small city in the German state of Baden-Württemberg that is known for its university, the oldest in Germany, and considered one of the best in Europe.

We also travelled to the state of Bavaria and visited the city of Munich (München in German). We took a walking tour of the city and saw the Glockenspiel.

After leaving Munich we made a quick stop in Austria before heading into Italy. The going was slow because it was the day after school ended in Germany and lots of Germans were heading down to Italy for their summer holiday.

We finally made it to Venice (Venezia in Italian) where we saw a glass blowing demonstration, toured the Doge's Palace, and took a gondola rides through the Venetian canals.

On the way out of Italy we stopped in Verona to see the Romeo and Juliet balcony.

On July 15 we drove from Italy into Switzerland. After delays because of traffic and being pulled over by Italian police to check that our driver was meeting European Union rest time requirements, we made it to our hotel in the village of Einsiedeln.

The next day we toured Lucerne where we were able to buy souvenirs like Swiss knives and watches, ride boats on Lake Lucerne, walk across the Chapel Bridge and climb the towers of the old city wall.

After leaving Switzerland travelled to France. Our first stop was the town of Besançon in region of Burgundy. After a brief lunch break we continued to the city of Dijon, followed by our hotel in the French countryside (which was surprisingly similar to that of Illinois).

On the morning of July 18 we drove to Paris where we got our first glimpses of the Eiffel Tower and said goodbye to Floran, our Romanian bus driver. We went for a ride on the Paris Metro, saw the Notre Dame cathedral, and some of the group even tried escargot.

The following day we took a bus tour of Paris. Our part of the group travelled to Versailles to tour the palace, while the other part of the group (from Iowa) toured the Louvre. That evening we saw the Eiffel Tower up close and took a boat cruise on the Seine.

The last country on our tour was the United Kingdom. We left our hotel early to get to the Gare du Nord train station to catch the Eurostar train to London. After a couple hours on the train and a trip through the Chunnel we arrived on English soil.

We met our bus and drove down the left side of the road to our hotel in the neighbo(u)rhood of Feltham near Heathrow Airport and then took the train into central London to check out Trafalgar Square and the area around the Palace of Westminster. There we saw some paintings by Claude Monet and Vincent van Gogh at the National Gallery and encountered a Brexit protest, complete with a Boris Johnson impersonator. We were also able to see 10 Downing Street and the scaffolding surrounding Big Ben. On the way back to the hotel an intoxicated gentleman boarded the train to share his enthusiasm for Brexit with our group.

The next day we took a bus tour of London and saw Tower Bridge, Buckingham Palace and the MI6 headquarters.

On our last day in London we made a visit to the Lower of London to see the Crown Jewels. The line was long, but it was well worth the wait to see the Imperial State Crown at the end.