Blog: Ducks Begin Euro Tour in Prague
06/19/19 | Women's Volleyball
The Oregon volleyball team is currently on an 11-day European tour with stops in the Czech Republic (Prague), Austria (Vienna), Slovenia (Maribor) and Italy (Venice and Milan). In the first blog entry of the trip, freshman Alex Laita highlights the Ducks' travel day and their first two days in Prague.
June 18, 2019
By Alex Laita - Freshman Outside Hitter
The first day of travel consisted of jet lag, surprisingly good airline food, airplane TV movies, and a lot of excitement. After the 8am bus ride to the Portland Airport, we checked our bags - all of which were surprisingly just under 50 pounds - and headed to the gate. When we boarded, many of us were overjoyed to see in-flight entertainment screens on the back of each seat. During the 9.5 hour flight, I managed to watch two movies, read a few pages from my book, doodle in my sketchbook, and complete a game of sudoku (which apparently is not supposed to take an hour to finish). Not to mention, the airline provided us with copious amounts of food. There were probably four meals given to us by the end of the flight, and they were actually really good. The team was anxious to stand up and move by the time the plane landed in Amsterdam.
The Amsterdam airport was definitely one of the nicest I've ever seen. It was full of designer stores, ample restaurants, and extremely modern restrooms, in which I struggled to locate the bathroom stalls because they all looked like closets. After getting lunch during the two hour layover, we boarded the plane to Prague. I killed time by making a visually unappealing friendship bracelet, and sleeping. After getting our luggage from baggage claim, we met our tour guide, Kiki, and boarded the bus to our hotel. At this point, all of us wanted one thing: SLEEP. However, to beat the jet lag we had to stick it out for a few more hours.The Ducks have arrived in Prague! Follow along with them over the next 11 days on our Instagram story. #GoDucks pic.twitter.com/CT4MZvz7n3
— Oregon Volleyball (@OregonVB) June 17, 2019
We had lunch in the city, and admired the centuries-old buildings and intricately paved sidewalks. Afterwards, we headed back to the hotel and got changed for our first practice in Europe. Being a freshman, adjusting to a new practice routine is challenging. Not only do you have to adjust to new drills, but also to the speed of the game.
With our sleep deprivation in mind, I think it was a pretty successful first practice. We took the tram to an authentic Czech restaurant and enjoyed an extremely filling and delicious meal. At the end of the day, Brooke Nuneviller and I got back to our room and got ready for bed. I had never slept that hard in my life.
The next morning, we arose from our sleep comas and took a surprisingly difficult hike up to the Eiffel Tower of the Czech Republic. We climbed up 300 steps to the top of the tower, and the view was amazing. You could see countless buildings, cathedrals, rivers and hillsides.
Everyone got gelato before we walked over to the Prague Castle. I was amazed by the detail of the entire building and how well kept the castle was, considering it was built in the Middle Ages. It's shocking being in a city like Prague, as almost everything around us had been there for hundreds, even thousands of years. We got lunch near our hotel and then got ready for our first match against the U20 Czech team.
It was a surreal moment wearing an Oregon jersey for the first time. Playing the Czech team was truly a great experience, at times it was a bit overwhelming trying to adjust to the tempo of the serving and setting, but my teammates were a huge help. The Czech team proved to be great competition for us, they were a mature, hard hitting team. It was a great way to start our European tournament and to great way to see what needed to be improved. We ended our second day in Prague with a lovely dinner, and more gelato.
