AAA sending Lake Crystal teen on European cruise

LAKE CRYSTAL — While her classmates only get to read “The Diary of Anne Frank,” Annabella Simonson will get to go inside the Secret Annex.

Annabella, 13, soon will leave on an all-expenses-paid trip to the Netherlands and Belgium. The eighth-grader from Lake Crystal won a AAA essay and selfie contest.

The AAA-The Auto Club Group sponsored the contest for eighth-graders in the 11 states in which the company operates. Annabella was among more than 50 students selected for an eight-day cruise filled with educational opportunities. 

The stops will include the Amsterdam annex in which Anne Frank hid during World War II. Annabella’s language arts class just happens to be reading the diary Anne Frank wrote while in hiding.

Annabella will give a presentation to her class about what she saw and learned during her time in the annex, which is a museum. 

Annabella said she’s also most excited to tour a chocolate factory and take a bicycle ride to see Holland’s famous windmills.

Other destinations include the Belgian Parliament building and one of the largest flower gardens in the world.

The travelers also will visit two schools and get a taste of European educational systems.

“We’ll get to see how they learn differently and similarly to us,” Annabella said.

Denise Simonson will accompany her daughter on the trip and is especially interested in the school visits. She is a teacher in the Futures program in the Mankato Area School District.

Annabella’s parents saw the contest advertised in a AAA magazine and encouraged her to apply. 

In her winning essay, Annabella wrote that traveling and hosting a foreign exchange student has helped her appreciate new cultures.

“I think that traveling and learning about different nationalities is very important,” she wrote. “I’d like to continue learning and traveling because it is so much fun and it makes the world a better place.”

A teenager from Thailand stayed with the Simonsons two years ago. Their visitor was shy at first. But once their guest got comfortable, Annabella said she enjoyed learning about her family and routine in Thailand.

While the European cruise is the grandest travel prize Annabella has won, it is not the first.

Last year she was nominated by a teacher and a counselor to participate in a leadership conference in Washington, D.C. And she earned a top prize at the state science fair, the prize for which was a trip to tour a biotechnology company in the Twin Cities.