Saturday, August 9, 2014

We've arrived in Barcelona!

The Swarthmore Women's soccer team has officially settled in for our first night in Spain! Traveling, quite literally, from near and far to be together once again, the players reunited over an authentic Spanish meal tonight to catch up and begin preparing for yet another season together. But this end of today, as always, didn't come about without its share of adventure...

Several of the players and coaches met on Swarthmore's campus yesterday afternoon, August 7th, (Eastern Standard Time). A.k.a., a long, long, time ago, it seems... We boarded a bus to JFK yesterday around 2:00pm. Along the way, the initial crew picked up another assistant coach, sat in some traffic, and caught up on our summer adventures. Sitting on the bus, I could hear talk of summer lab research, phosphorylation events, life cycle analysis, and the like. True Swattie summer material, along with all the fun vacation stories, jobs worked at scuba shops, beach trips, etc. 

When the group reached JFK, there were more friendly faces to be found at the gate, and our group continued to grow as players arrived from other parts of the country, bringing with them stories and personality to add to the mix. By the time we boarded our red-eye to Madrid (props to Emma Sindelar, who had personally prefaced the international red-eye with another the night before to get across the U.S. Trooper.), we had a solid group of 24, including 3 coaches, an administrator, and 20 players. Mind you, 2 more players would still meet us later in Barcelona.  

Our flight to Madrid was relatively empty, giving us space to spread out while we jetted across the pond under a sky full of stars. As red-eyes go, we found the sunrise in what felt like too short a time, many of us only able to snatch a couple hours of rest before breakfast was served. While smooth, the flight was a little bit on the later side, so we missed our intended connection to Barcelona this morning. We used the time to catch up on more stories, grab some food, and get some much needed rest at the airport.

After a restful layover, we boarded our flight to Barcelona without a hitch and continued on our way. After successfully collecting our bags, we met our guide for the week, Han, and headed to our hotel. The hotel is excitingly situated on the Rambla Catalunya, right in one of the popular areas of Barcelona. A quick check-in and some time to settle brought us to dinner time--our first authentic Spanish meal. We gathered and walked together to the restaurant, where we were able to sit at large tables for our first dinner together. 

All in all, the dinner was a great kickoff to our trip. Tomorrow we are looking forward to our first training session with a Spanish coach. Details will follow!

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