Advertisement
Published: August 1st 2009
Edit Blog Post
P7290544
Early morning at the airport DAYS 1 & 2 - July 29-30 - Arrival and Fina World Championship Games
Hello from Italy! Sorry it’s taken me a while to write but we’ve been quite busy since we got here. Both the flights from LAX to Chicago and Chicago to Rome went very smoothly with no problems. Everyone’s luggage made it all the way through. Most of the guys slept on the plane and played cards and video games. We did not have our own video screens so we were unable to choose which movies we wanted to watch. Instead we had to settle for the two movies the airline was playing - “Hotel for Dogs” and “Ice Age 2 - The Meltdown.” Danny was happy.
Upon arrival in Rome we picked up our luggage and met up with our coordinator, Fabrizia. She took us by bus to our hotel and gave us some valuable information along the way. We won’t see her again until we go back to the airport on Tuesday. Our hotel is very centrally located with a major Metro station directly across the street making it very easy for us to get around. The hotel is nice and has air conditioning
P7290546
Waiting for the plane which is a necessity right now. It has been at least 95 degrees during the day and very humid.
We got into our hotel around 11:30am but unfortunately only two of the rooms were ready, so we dropped our luggage off and went to the bank to exchange our dollars for Euros. We then found a nice sit down pizza place around the corner and ate there. They had about 50 different kinds of pizza and the guys really enjoyed it. Everyone was very hungry after the “continental breakfast” on the plane of yogurt and a croissant.
After lunch we went back to the hotel to check into the rest of our rooms and relax for a bit before we headed over to the Aquatic Village for the FINA World Championship water polo games. We took the subway and then a bus to the general area where the games are being held. The “Village” as they call it is very impressive. All of the pools are temporary and there are separate pools for each activity - swimming, water polo, diving and synchronized swimming. There are also many vendors there and restaurants.
We went to watch the first
P7290547
Playing cards, some sort of slapping game, I don't know game featuring Canada vs. Germany in a 5th place semi-final. Our seats were directly in the sun so we quickly found open seats in the shade and moved. Germany easily proved to be the better team outplaying Canada for most of the game and advancing to the 5th place game on Saturday. Immediately after that game Croatia took on Serbia in the first of the 1st place semifinals. Apparently there is a warm-up pool somewhere else in the Village as we don’t get to see the teams warm-up for more than three minutes before the games begin. This turned out to be an excellent match going back and forth all game with Serbia coming out on top. The Serbian fans were much louder than the Croatian fans which made the game fun. All of the guys, including Brian and myself are extremely tired and it has been a challenge to stay awake during parts of the game. The plane ride and of course Junior Olympics (for those who went) took a lot out of us. Staying up until 10pm tonight to see the US play proved to be very difficult. I even allowed Ramsey to go get a soda to
P7290548
Hi Mommy...no it's not Will, it's Danny...hello?...hello? help keep him awake.
The Croatia vs. Serbia game ended around 5pm and the USA vs. Spain game wasn’t taking place until 9pm so we had some time to kill. We walked around the Village a bit and sat down in the food courts to eat dinner and get some Gelato.
When it came time for the USA game everyone was pretty exhausted but it was exciting to see the US play on the grandest stage for water polo in the world other than the Olympics. This was also a great game with both the US and Spain trading goals throughout the game. The Spanish fans were vocal and outnumbered us US fans by many. Unfortunately the US failed to convert late and lost by 1. There were also a few very ridiculous non-calls at the end of the game favoring Spain. I don’t think the US played their best game but the officiating was very questionable. So on Saturday the US will take on Croatia for 3rd and Spain will play Serbia for 1st. Both should be great games.
After the game we headed back to our hotel and crashed. Everyone was falling asleep on the
P7290550
Someone's happy to be awake this early subway. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a group of guys this tired…and it’s only day one.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.057s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 9; qc: 21; dbt: 0.0331s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Richie & Cheryl Hiltzik
non-member comment
Looks like fun
Hi Charlie Great to hear that you are having fun your cheesy smile translates into Italian beatuifully mom and I miss you very much. Mom ran into jakes mom and bruks dad at golden spoons (agouras version of gellato) they all lifted a spoon in your honor. Missing you terribly. Hoping you are having a blast make some noise for team America. We love you mom and dad they all