European Journey Part 3- Terracina to Munich

So Thursday morning rolls around and we want to get an early start to make sure we get to our next destination, Terracina, nice and early so we can spend as much time on the beach as possible. While looking for train tickets, we found our two choices were either a train at like 5am or 3pm. Lourdes looked into the bus schedule for us as found the bus leaves at 10 and we would arrive around noon. Perfect. We made sure to take the metro to the station nice and early as we had to find an ATM to get some money for the bus ticket. We arrived to the station at like 9 and found an ATM and bought our bus tickets. We sat and waited and next thing we notice its really close to 10 and no buses are here. There are a few people, but not buses. Then, a lady comes up to Audrey and says "shopporo" (I don't know how to spell it in Italian and the internet and google translate have been no help) and shows her some signs that are in Italian. Turns out no buses were running that day from 8:30am until 5pm. Unbelievably unreliable transportation we think. Can't really trusts the buses to get to our destination. So we head back to termini to get some train tickets and book the train arriving at like 5pm and then we book the return train for 5pm the next night, which is scheduled to get in at 6:30 to Termini, giving us 30 minutes to get to our night train. Surely we can trust the trains.

We arrive to Terracina and find our little B&B as scheduled and went to spend some time at the beach since there was still daylight and it was pretty warm still. We sat around for about 2 hours before heading back and getting ready for dinner. We went to this wonderful restaurant and had a fantastic meal. We got some wine

Temple of Jupiter from the beach

and it was one of those fancy places that pours a little in your glass and has you try it to make sure you like the bottle. Being that this was the 2nd time in my life I have ever had wine while out at dinner, I had no idea what was going on and why the waiter was standing there staring at me holding a bottle in my face after pouring a sip of wine in my glass. Audrey told me what to do, and I took a sip and amused him by saying it was fine, I really had no idea if it was good or bad or what, but it was wine and tasted okay by me. From there, we ordered fried mozzarella, which we were expecting to be like cheese sticks. Nope--they were these 4 hunks of fresh mozzarella that were battered in the light breading and fried. We ate 2 and a half and decided to save room for our main courses. We each ordered a pizza, Audrey got some kind with Salmon and some sauce, and I got the best pizza man has ever created. It's called the Lasagna, and had tomato sauce, mozzarella, skinny pieces of ham, and 4 huge spoonfuls of ricotta cheese on top. It was beyond amazing, words can not describe it. Needless to say, we did not finish off our pizzas. I tried so hard because it was so good. We were at dinner for about 2 hours and I was so determined to finish the pizza, but I just couldn't. Audrey is currently at home working on perfecting this pizza for my return. We got back and went to sleep to go spend another day at the beach on Friday.

We went back to the beach Friday, this time with all our stuff as we had to check out of or place. We also had no towels, so we were using dirty shirts to lay on and stuff. I'm 90% sure everyone thought we were homeless people. We (well, I) decided against going to the beaches you have to pay to use that come with chairs and umbrellas and go back to the free public beach. We laid there for about 3 hours and baked in the sun (and I am now peeling and look ridiculous since I put on no sunscreen). We got hassled by numerous people walking the beaches trying to sell all sorts of crap. I could careless about buying sunglasses, and I really doubt they were authentic Gucci, Prada, and Ray Ban sunglasses they were peddling on the beach. From there, we walked to one of the places you have to pay for and snuck in to use the showers. I changed my shorts on the beach and we went to get food where Audrey used a bathroom to change. We then got to the train station about an hour early since we had nothing else to do.

Around 4:30, 25 minutes before our train is supposed to arrive, a man comes over and starts blabbering in Italian about who knows what, but we hear the "shopporro" again. So we start freaking out, and Audrey asks some people who show up to the station and luckily one guy speaks English and informs us they were checking out to see if trains were running, since there would be an Italian rail strike that day. Wonderful. Instead of taking the 3pm bus out to Rome since the buses can't be trusted, the trains aren't running because of a strike. Magnificent. The man who told us the trains aren't running is going to Roma, and tells us to follow him. I'm pretty sure Audrey thought he was going to take us to a field and gut us and sell our organs on the black market, but I had faith in this stranger. And we really had no other choice. We got on a bus and I figured out he was taking us to another train station that is possibly running to Roma at 5. Well we get there and that on is not running. The next train to Rome is at 6 and we have to be there by 7 to leave. It's a 70 minute train ride. We sit and wait since we have nothing to do, and its all out of our hands. There were trains scheduled to come before ours and none show up. An announcement comes on and we find out the train is coming, but its 5 minutes late. We are silently freaking out and I think we both started planning how to spend our night in Rome and get home to Copenhagen. We got on the train and sat in silence for the whole ride. As we arrive to Termini at 7:20, I see a European train leave, so I'm trying to stay calm, but am really thinking great we're stuck. We get off and start running to the platform to see where our train is leaving from, and see just a ton of people hanging out at Termini. We look up and don't see a platform by our train. Next to it, in red it says 19:25---our train had also be delayed, we had made it!

So dirty, but happy we made it!

We both looked at each other and let out the biggest sigh of relief. Needless to say, our train would be delayed until about 9, so we had plenty of time. A train from Terracina even arrived before we departed. It was one of the most tense, suspenseful moments of my life. We sat around and got some McDonald's since it was right there.

The night train was pretty smooth. The staff knew about our ticket issue and was great with it all. We were in a compartment with 6 beds, basically bunk style with 3 on one side, and 3 on another. Audrey and I were lucky to have the lowest ones. There was a younger girl on one of the second ones, and a nice, older guy one the other. He mainly stood outside and watched the scenery. There were various stops throughout, and our entertainment came sometime throughout the night as an older, out of shape (to be nice) Italian lady came into our compartment. Auds and I are sleeping and I'm pretty sure she woke up as I did listening to this lady. She climbed about 4 steps up the ladder and started panting and making some kind of noises and speaking Italian to herself for a solid 5-10 minutes. I tried to sleep, but it was extraordinarily difficult. I finally popped in my iPod and rolled over and slept as she was talking to one of the train people having someone translate the Italian to English. I guess nothing got resolved because this lady just slept on the floor in our compartment. It was so annoying because she moved for no one as they had to leave. She just laid right in the way. If she did move, it took her about 5 minutes to get up and she was pressing on our beds to get up, like grabbing my arm that's on my bed and using it to press herself up making the same noises as when she was on the ladder. I was just wondering what she was thinking when she booked the bed, that's all really.

We arrived to Munich at like 8am and had all sorts of time before meeting our friends from Truman, the Brinks. I'll get into that part next time to let you fully digest how lucky we felt to have made it to Munich!

Best delayed train ever!

European Journey Part 2- Rome

Audrey left yesterday afternoon and arrived home safely late last night (this morning Copenhagen time). I can only imagine how much sleeping she will do today. Esben is gone with the National Team, so I have the place to myself. I have a ton of laundry I need to do, as well as clean my dirty room. I'm slowly getting that done.
Now, on the the fun vacation part...........

We took an early flight out of Krakow to get to Rome nice and early. Esben has told me about the flights where people clap when the plain lands. I really thought he was joking, but when we touched down in Rome, the Wizz Air flight cheered as if the home team scored a touchdown. It was pretty weird. I'm pretty excited when we land safely too, but the pilot is doing his job. It kind of reminded me of the commercial where Peyton Manning went around and cheered random job people. It was like maybe 8am when we got to the airport and since we only had carry on luggage, we walked right out and waited for the shuttle bus to get us to a Metro Line. It took us about 2 hours from the time we landed to the time we got to our B&B near Vatican City. We did a much better job this time of finding our place and were greeted with a wonderful buongiorno from an elderly couple that was in the building. We made our way up to the 6th floor and met Lourdes, our keeper for the week.

After getting stuff dropped off, we headed in to Rome in order to check out the National Museum and the Baths of Diocletian before heading to Termini (the main train station) to maybe get some help on our Rome-Munich train tickets that had not arrived before our journey.

Discus Thrower Statue

The Museum is literally across the street and on a corner from the station, but of course we missed it. We ended up walking way up to a park near the Villa Borghese through a beautiful park. We stopped for a bit at a fountain and stuck our feet in as most of the people were doing to cool off on the incredibly hot day. From there, we got to the Modern Art Museum and realized that was not the National Museum. The whole time we were looking at the wrong place on our Rome map. Oh well, we got to see a nice park. From there we walked back through the Piazza del Popolo to the Spanish Steps and got on the Metro back to Termini. We located the Museum much easier this time and strolled around. It was a super neat place with a lot of cool statues and busts of the famous. From there, we went to Termini and waited in line to get help. We needed to book new tickets and then we would get a refund for them. Unfortunately, our train was booked, so we could not do that. We returned to our room, and I called the Bahn website I ordered from. This guy was very helpful telling me the could not resend them since they were sent by mail and they have a money value, all things I already knew. He put me in contact with the City Night Line, who operates the train, but I would have to call in the morning. Since I had a reservation and the confirmation with me, we should be okay.

Monday morning came and we ate our breakfast and had some coffee with Lourdes before I phones the City Night Line. I talked to Sandra who was beyond helpful and told me to forward the confirmation e-mail and she would get it to the hands of the staff on the train and if we are unable to get a new ticket printed, we should be fine with the confirmation. we immediately zipped to an internet point and did that. From there, we did what I was most excited about--the Ruins! We went to the Colosseum, the Roman Forum, and Palatine

Inside the Colosseum

Hill. It was so freaking cool. You walk right out of the Metro station to the entrance to the Colosseum. It was unbelievable to think you are standing in something people stood in and cheered in 2000 years ago. I truly loved it and thought it was the coolest thing ever. Right across the road is the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill.  The Roman Forum was basically the town center of ancient Rome, where the Senate used to be housed. It is basically just a ton of ruins and some cool arches from thousands of years ago. The stuff is all hard to describe and I cannot remember what each little thing was without looking it up, but I was just fascinated by it. From there we

walked up to Palatine Hill. There, we got to see the spot where the throne would have been, and the huts of Romulus, again, more just super old stuff. I loved that day so much. My camera died that day and I didn't bring my charger because I just assumed that since Audrey and I both had the same brand of cameras, her charger would work, but I was way wrong. I'm happy I was able to get some good pictures of all that stuff though.

Tuesday, we just kind of wandered Rome and saw all sorts of stuff, since we would use Wednesday in Vatican City. We got to see the Castel Saint Angelo, the Trevi Fountain and the Pantheon, as well as the Piazza Navona and the Spanish Steps again. The Pantheon is freaking awesome because its an architectural marvel from 2000 years ago, since the height of the dome and the diameter are

Outside the Panteon

equal, making it a huge sphere. The only light is from the huge hole in the top of the dome. It has lasted forever and it sits lower than street level, which shows how much the city streets have risen the past 2000 years. Tuesday night we went back into Rome and got a pretty nice dinner. I was wearing my Gold Diggers polo and was asked by our waiter if I played rugby and then asked if I was a professional American Football player. I felt so cool, but couldn't lie. From there, we walked across the street and got gelato, and I got "recognized" again, as I was asked if I am a professional. Audrey hated that so much, mainly because it made me feel like I'm important.

At Dinner

Wednesday we went to Vatican City and peeped the Vatican Museum and Saint Peter's Basilica. We got the museum around 1:30 I guess, and there was zero line. If you show up at like 9 am, it's SUPER packed because all the tour groups are there. It was a neat place to walk around, and you could spend so much time there, but the tour groups make it rather difficult and borderline unbearable. They all herd up and take pictures on the same thing at the same time and you have to weave around all of them. We basically zoomed through a really neat hallway, just so we could pass some groups to get to the Sistine Chapel before them. Before that, I made us take a detour to see Raphael's The School of Athens painting. It is fantastic. In our guide book, we read that Raphael was working on his

paintings at the Vatican the same time Michaelangelo was working on the Sistine Chapel. Raphael took a break to see what Michaelangelo was up to, and when we saw the Chapel, he was basically like damn, the stuff I'm doing looks like finger painting, so he beefed up his work and added Michaelangelo to his painting. We got to the Sistine Chapel and sat there for at least 30 minutes taking everything in. Wow, it was amazing. From there, we waited in line to climb the 550 step to the top of the dome of St. Peter's Basilica. It was a bit daunting as the path winded and got extremely skinny, and Audrey had a mini claustrophobia attack. We got up there and spent 5 minutes outside and immediately went back down. Inside, St. Peter's is HUGE, but it really doesn't feel like it. It was designed to minimize how large it felt. We caught an evening mass in Latin in the Basilica and headed home to pack for Thursday.

We got to see a lot of the cool stuff in Rome, and it was a really great time and cool city. I'm sure I'm forgetting something, but we took in so much. I'll get in to our last morning in Rome and our remaining day in Italy in my next post!

European Journey Part 1- Poland

Audrey and I started our European travels by heading to Krakow, Poland with the main goal of taking a day to see the Auschwitz Concentration/ Death Camp. We arrived on Thursday around noon and managed to figure out how to get from the airport to the main train station, which is where our directions to our B&B start. Unfortunately, we did not have a map, and it was extraordinarily hot compared to Denmark, so we wandered around in the heat, got directions twice, and after about an hour we found it. We felt like idiots since we missed the large sign for the Globtroter Guest House. Oh well. After we checked in, we walked around the area, and went to the Main Square. It is the biggest medieval square in all

Inside the Market

  of Europe. In 2005, it took first place in an international ranking of World's Greatest Squares, so it was a pretty fun place to hang out. The original planning dates back to 1257, however the building has been renovated quite a bit over time. The square is just a great place to people watch, as there are many street performers and some breakdance shows that take place. I would say we spent the majority of our time just sitting there.

Sign to entrance "Work Sets You Free"

Friday was our big day, and reason for visiting Krakow. We took a group to to Auschwitz. The ride takes you through the Polish countryside and winds around, but after about 90 minutes we arrived. It is just an eerier place. It's hard to actually wrap your mind around what happened there, but there are pictures and displays everywhere to remind you. We had a phenomenal tour guide

Rail leading into Birkenau for selection

who was extremely knowledgeable about all the topics. Again, its really hard to try to get what happened there, but when you close your eyes, you just get chills. One of the most intriguing stories from the trip, in my opinion, was told by our guide. There was a picture of the selection--when the trains brought in new people, they would get off and be selected to head to the right or left; one side lives to work, the other hits the gas chambers. There is a picture blown up on the wall of an SS member running the selection. Our guide told us that some time ago, a man was on the tour and recognized the SS man in the picture. Turns out it was his father. Imagine finding out your father was directly involved in the selection process. It's hard to really explain everything there.

Pool built to show Red Cross things are OK

There are rooms filled with luggage, as prisoners were told they would start a new life so pack everything up, one room filled with two tons of human hair, and another with shoes, brushes, all of that stuff. It really takes it out of you to see something like that. We headed to Birkenau which is about 3km away, but it was raining, so we didn't go too deep in. We got to see where prisoners would sleep and head to the top of a guard tower. Just a wild day overall. We returned pretty wiped out and just again, walked around the square.

Saturday would be our last day in Krakow, so we decided to head up to Wawel castle, since it looked pretty cool. We got there early at 10am and just walked around a bit. It was a bit confusing as general entrance to the huge castle and cathedral is free, but you had to pay to get into certain rooms and exhibits, but nothing really was there to tell you what exactly you would be paying for, so we just enjoyed some views from the castle. From there we walked around the Kazimierz area, which is kind of like the Jewish area with a bunch of synagogues. Nothing too special. We spent the remained of our Saturday sitting in the square until we took a shuttle bus out to where we were staying Saturday night, since we would be flying out of an airport 90 minutes away, at 6:05 am. The hotel was super nice, and we slept for a little bit before waking at 4:30 to get to the airport to catch out 6 am fight into Rome.

Krakow was awesome and the Polish people were exceptional nice to us. I'll be back to talk more about Rome, but as of now, Audrey is getting ready to leave and we are going to go to some souvenir places before my practice this evening.

When in Rome....sweat alot

I am currently in Rome for the last evening, just letting anyone who cares know that we are alive and nothing happened to us in Poland. Krakow was a blast, and we have seen and been overwhelmed by Rome. Our feet are exhausted and all my shirts well sweated through. Tomorrow we head to beach Italy before coming back to Rome Friday to catch a very difficult night train, that we luckily now have tickets for.  Ok, well it is now time for some pizza or something, goodnight!

PS- Kim, it has rained for a total of 2 hours so far on our trip, and I had watermelon gelato. I really hope I am alive tomorrow!

Becoming a Tourist

Audrey arrived safely early morning and we have been going pretty much ever since. She arrived bright and early at 8am, sunny smile beaming as she entered into Copenhagen. I looked like I could have been living in the airport for days with my shaggy hair covered by a hat, my gold digger hoody I threw on, and some sandals. The morning is not really my best friend these days. We got back and threw her stuff down and went out to visit Copenhagen. I acted as a tour guide and we walked the city. We started at City Hall by Tivoli and made our way up to the Little Mermaid. We walked the Strøget seeing many different street performers and food carts. It's quite a different pace than in March/ April when I've been there. We walked to Nyhavn and walked the harbor I guess, seeing the Opera House and stopping in at Amalienborg Palace. Our next stop took us up to the Little Mermaid, and we finished the afternoon with a sandwich at the train station taking us back into central Copenhagen to get on the metro home. Esben made some pasta for dinner and we enjoyed it outside with a nice evening and chatted for a while.

Friday, Kim picked us up and took us to Roskilde to visit the Cathedral and the Viking Ship museum. We had original planned on going up to Helsingør and touring Kronborg Castle, but it was raining cats and dogs, so we chose Roskilde. Let me start by saying the Vikings were some badass dudes. They went everywhere and did what ever the hell they want. We got an idea of what their ships were like and if you saw a bunch of those coming up on the horizon, you'd be pretty scared. The viking museum houses 5 ships that were

 found like 50 years ago, but they weren't brought up for a couple of years. The story behind these is actually pretty neat. The Vikings knew the fjord had certain areas that made it easier to get through. In order to make it more difficult for anyone getting in, they sunk some ships to block off a shorter passage, making it extremely difficult to get through. The ships are basically in there as pieces put back together, nothing too whole, but you are able to get the idea of just how huge they can be. It was astounding. We were able to get an English tour, as no one was there for the Danish tour and our tour guide gave us a special one. Kim bought me a special book called "How to be a Viking in 13 Easy Steps". The first one is call yourself a viking, so I got that one down. The next is milk a cow. If anyone wants to help me with this one, let me know because it's really holding me back, and I want to be a viking so bad! Next in Roskilde was the Cathedral. It basically seems like the Westminster Abbey of Denmark, as it is home to all sorts of dead royalty and important people. Some of the tombs are just nuts, and others really got the shaft. It was a pretty sweet day in Roskilde.

After that, we stayed with Kim and went back to his apartment to ultimately eat dinner and watch the World Cup of American Football game between Germany and Mexico (Mexico won by a TD, pretty good game). We also watched America's Funniest Home Videos and some youtube videos and had a blast. We were cracking up like little kids with some of the videos. The winner of the night was great---it was two baseball players like maybe 8-10 years old who are wearing cups for the first time in their baseball uniforms. They have a baseball and are basically taking turns holding the ball and whacking their own and each others nuts to prove it doesn't hurt. It's just funny because that really what you do when you put one on for the first time.  Overall, it was a magnificent Friday.

Saturday, we started off the day by heading to Rosenborg Castle. I had already been earlier, but I couldn't hide this gem from Audrey. We bought a tour book to go along with it, as most interesting pieces have numbers that correspond to the book. The basements houses the crown jewels dating back to Christian 4 I believe. It is a pretty cool place. Saturday was a terrific day, so we went to one of the sausage vendors and hung out in the gardens by the castle for a little while. In the evening, we went out to Esben's parent's place for some BBQ with his parents and some family friends. Esben made a smoke some time ago and had smoked some trout, ribs, brisket, and lamb. It was freaking fantastic. His parent's live in the super cool farm outside Copenhagen, and they are beyond welcoming. They house has been in the family, and they feel pretty lucky to be able to live in it. They evening, food, and company were fantastic. Everyone is so welcoming, and when conversation would go on in Danish for a while, someone would also kind of summarize what was going on. It was a marvelous evening. We went back to the apartment briefly, then out to the Happy Pig in Copenhagen. Lars came and met us there and we sat and drank and listened to the live music until about 3:30. The performer was playing everything, from Jack Johnson to Lady Gaga, so it was some good tunes.

Sunday began around 11:30 when we decided to go to the Open Air Museum. It's this huge place that has a bunch of old houses from around Denmark. If they were not on the land originally, they were moved here. Some were extremely old, and a lot of them I couldn't stand up in. The thing I thought was the coolest was the beds. There were no bedrooms. The beds were built into like cubbies in the walls with a little hole that would be covered by a curtain. It was an absolutely overwhelming place that never seemed to end. We drove to the

beach to check it out for Auds, and there was some kind of beach party going on that was pretty cool. We got back and I followed the Women's Soccer World Cup. It was a phenomenal game from what it sounds like. It seems like FIFA is trying to hose the US, but we're just like get bent and go win. American Rules! In the evening, we went to Lars' place (AG was there as well) to watch the USA vs. Germany game in the World Cup of American Football. It was a replay from earlier in the day, and Kim was doing the commentary on the game. I cannot judge how he did, since I do not understand Danish at all. It was neat since the team USA head coach is Northwest Missouri's head coach. There is a lot of MIAA connections as multiple NW Mo and a Washburn player is on the team. Team USA's defense dominated and we won 48-7.

Monday, we had some plans to check out some stuff, but as soon as we got going, it started POURING down rain. So we came home and looked into what we should do in Rome. The weather cleared up eventually and because super nice, and we headed down to the beach. I finished my most recent Dexter book, which is now the 2nd book I have read on my own in 2011 (which is 2 more than I have read on my own since probably about 1995, when I became too old for Dr. Seuss).  I made some pasta for dinner and we had a pretty chill evening, since we had big plans for today.

We got up nice an early today to head to Christianshavn and check out Our Savior's Church. There is a huge like steeple I guess you can climb up and get some pretty amazing pictures of the area. We climbed the 400 stairs to the top and it was incredible. Pretty scary overall though. We got there at a great time, as we were climbing down, we passed so many people waiting to go to the top. We peeked inside the church, which was spectacular as well, then headed out to find Christiania. We got sidetracked a bit, and I got pooped on by a bird, but luckily I had another shirt with me. We made it there, and wow, it is a different place. I'll have my buddy Rick Steves help me out, from his guide book titled "Scandinavia". In 1970s, Christianians established squatters rights in abandoned military barracks. The main street is called "Pusher Street" due the former sale of soft drugs along. Now, there are a lot of stands selling jewlery and shirts, as well as some hash and other such items. My favorite thing was watching a guy with XBox games going stall to stall to try to sell them. There are a lot of no photos signs painted, and I witness a local yelling at a couple girls for taking a picture. So, unfortunately, Audrey was not able to document this. Here is wikipedia's take on Christiania.

From there, we made use of the fanastic weather and hopped on a canal tour. It took us around the canals of Copenhagen (obvious from the name). It was pretty cool to see the stuff from the water.
For those of you who don't know, there are a lot of canals and water in and around Copenhagen, as it was a major hub of trading and such since it is directly on the water. From there, we took on a traditional Danish lunch of smørrebrød. I got a sampler kind of which was a fried fish, two types of herring, roast beef, and some thing that was like a pot pie with chicken and asparagus. Audrey got the fried fish one, and munched on the herring, since I made her try it. From there, we went on a frantic search for ice cream. After turning many corners with no hope, we found one we remembered from Thursday. I got a large soft serve dipped in chocolate, and Auds got a couple scoops of chocolate chip and chocolate, since that's all she understood and was surprisingly unwilling to ask for help. After that, we walked to Tivoli Gardens. It has been a magical wonderland since 1843. You can read some history and what not about it. Apparently the King of Pop himself, Michael Jackson tried to purchase it at one point, and when that didn't happen, he built his own. We spent the evening enjoying the gardens and walking around checking out the rides. We were short on cash, so we didn't get on any rides, we just sat on benches and enjoyed the park. While walking around, we found this sweet place that you put stuff on a stick, and dip it in chocolate and add a topping, so we had to do it. We got one with marzipan, 2 pieces of nougat, a strawberry, and a piece of banana, dipped it in milk chocolate, and topped with hazelnuts. We also used the last of out krona for the day on a cup of coffee to enjoy with it. It was as good as we dreamed. We got home a little while ago, and Auds added her pictures since I am worthless with that. Currently, the US is beating Mexico by 10, which I hope becomes a final so I can talk some smack to Carlos.

Tomorrow we are hitting up the Danish Resistance Museum and we don't really know from there. In the evening we are meeting up with Sanne in Vedbæk to possibly get on the boat and enjoy the harbor. Thursday we embark on our European excursion. I'll do my best to have some updates during that time. Hope everyone in the Midwest is enjoying 100+ temperatures, as its been in the high 60s-mid 70s here, and we'll hit some 90s in Rome. Until then, enjoy!

Summer Break

So I've been on the summer break for over a week now. Last week didn't feel like much of a break since I was busy from about 8am when I would wake up until 5:30 when I would get home. It was great having something to do, because I would probably lose my mind if I didn't work the camp. It's nice having something to look forward to when getting out of bed.

I know I explained the camp a little bit from my first impressions on Monday. It was pretty much the same all week. Some of the kids were afraid of hitting someone else and hurting them, some were afraid of getting hurt, and some just really wanted to watch what was going on. Don't get me wrong, there was a fair share of kids going hard and enjoying every minute of it. As the week went on, kids got more of an understanding of the game and realized they won't get hurt if they get hit, and a lot of them just bounced back up. The big event of the week (for the coaches as much as the players) was a game between two teams drafted by the coaches. It was me and a senior team RB against two U19 players. We drafted a solid O-Line players, but what they lacked in OL/DL, they made up for in athletes. As much as I hate to say it, we lost the game HUGE. Our 1st, 3rd, and 5th pick, who was our RB, QB, and Center, did not show up for the game. We couldn't even get the ball back to the QB. We had one OL guy who really understood the concept of things, but really didn't execute. Our best OL was a receiver who played OL because he just wanted to hit someone. The hardest part of it all, was I could not communicate that well with them. The kids knew our plays by name compared to the other guys (who would huddle them up and show them cards of the play) which was great, but no one blocked anyone and when we did, it was a straight tackle, so it was funny. Towards the end, I just started using a white board to draw plays, and they seemed to work out alright. Defensively, we were always there, but our tackling consisted of reaching out and grabbing, hoping they would fall down. The best part though, was the kids enjoyed themselves and were introduced to American football. Hopefully some of the kids join the Gold Diggers, cause there were a few athletes (all on the other team).

Nothing too eventful happened besides that until Saturday. Esben and I were planning on going to the beach, but the weather forecast told us not to. About 3, we went to Netto to get some food and it was beautiful out, and we were kicking ourselves for not going. About 6pm, it gets dark and stars POURING down rain. It was the wildest storm since I've been here. There was actually thunder and lightning, which is something I hadn't seen too much of during storms. It was a solid downpour for a long time. It died down and I went with Esben to one of his friends apartments. They were all very nice and welcoming of the American. They all seem to have studied in American at some time. The best part was some other Americans showed up. I didn't really catch their full story, but they were studying somewhere in Copenhagen. They went to Oregon, so they enjoyed football, so Esben and I had to try to get them to come to a Gold Diggers game after the break. We may have got a few new fans!

Sunday, I went to the U17 National Team tryouts with Esben out in Herlev. It was super nice day, but very humid still. There were a lot of kids there, and our senior RB coach and our U19 head coach are coaches on the team. Johan, the Rebels head coach was out there, so I talked with him and Esben most of the time.

I celebrated the 4th practically the same way I would in America--with a BBQ by the water. I found my way out to Vedbæk, which is where we went out on the boat a couple weeks ago.  I was proud of myself, because the trains running for my ususal station, Nørreport, were not running due to the storms, so I read the stuff in Danish and found my way to another station, where the trains were running from. It's so simple, but I get super pumped when I do something cool like that. I brought a couple Budweiser and some sausages for the grill, however, there were already burgers and potato salad there. Quick aside about potato salad, I never really knew I liked it, and maybe it's different here or something, but I have enjoyed it very much when I have had it. It was a gorgeous evening there with Kim and his parents, Esben, Thomas (one of the coaches) and his family, and Johan and his wife. I ate like a champion and we made some s'mores and had some sparklers and firecrackers and those little spinny things that are a bunch of different colors. I thought it was funny because they asked what I usually do on the 4th, and I was just like well probably the exact same thing, just with different people (obviously). It was a fantastic evening, and I arrived home tired from all the eating.

The rest of the time, I have been relaxing. I do some Yahoo! Mock Fantasy Football drafts. Basically, they don't matter and its for practicing draft strategies or something. There are people that take it super seriously. I do it to make those people mad. Basically, I join the draft, and I draft only QBs. So I'll end up with like Aaron Rodgers, Peyton Manning, and Tom Brady before some people realize. It doesn't kick in until later when people are looking for QBs and realize I have them all. Some find it funny and others get extremely mad over the person messing around in a fake draft. It's mildly amusing for me and a good way to kill some time. I have also been cleaning some to make sure the place is presentable for Audrey. I'm super excited as she arrives tomorrow, nice and early in the morning. I keep telling her I'm going to make her wait in the airport for 4 hours like she did to me in London. I also gave her directions to my apartment, just to make her think I won't actually be there (of course I'm going to be there). I'm really excited because now it seems the summer vacation is starting, and I get to be a European tourist. I'll do my best to keep this thing updated as much as I can. So far in Denmark, we are going to Kronborg Castle on Friday with Kim and Saturday we are going to Esben's parent's house for some BBQ. I'm looking forward to that. Everyone has been throwing out things we need to do, so we will plan out how we will spend out Copenhagen time.

Hope everyone had a fun, safe 4th and the summer is going well!