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Women's Lacrosse Australia Blog
December 17, 2008 | Women's Lacrosse
December 13-15
We finally made it!!! After 20 hours of flying, we landed Monday morning in beautiful Sydney. We were greeted by sunshine and our friendly tour guide Carmel. Of course no travel experience would be complete without lost baggage. Not everything made it to Sydney with us, but we have been assured it will get here shortly. After leaving the airport we boarded a coach bus and had informal tour of the city on our way to Bondi Beach. The beach was gorgeous but we were all most impressed by the water. The waves were bigger than many of us had ever seen and according to a local expert the current was the strongest that she had seen in years. A couple brave souls ventured into the surf and the smiles on their faces made us even more excited for our surf lessons tomorrow! After the beach, we headed back into the city and stopped at a scenic overlook to take pictures of the Sydney Opera House and Bridge. The water was incredibly blue and the sites made us truly feel we had landed in Sydney. We then continued our trek to the hotel to prepare for our first practice in Aussie Territory. It was quite the practice with the Sydney Skyline in the background. We are now preparing for dinner, where a few girls have ordered kangaroo!!! Then it's off to bed to get a good night's sleep to acclimate our bodies to a fourteen hour time difference!
G'day Mate!
Holly, Cassie, Katie C, Jenna and Eloise
Day 2: Surfing in Manly Beach
Day 2 began with a beautiful ferry ride to Manly Beach, with great views of the Opera House, Sydney harbor and harbor bridge. Once we arrived in Manly, we had some free time to get lunch, sun bathe, go kayaking and shop before our surf lesson! After a quick instruction on the beach, we dove head first into the waves. No doubt that Kait Perelle was the expert, but the rest of us held our own, especially with a nice push on our boards from the instructors. A couple of wipeouts, kawabungas and hangtimes later, we were tired from all the paddling and ready to grab some grub! Each group ventured to a different restaurant on the water, watching the sun set and enjoying the local atmosphere. We were all WIPED from an awesome day of tanning, swimming, surfing and much more...no trouble sleeping tonight!
-Marie McKenna
G'day mates! After a hard practice and a quick lunch, a few brave souls headed into downtown Sydney to conquer the Harbor Bridge. Upon our arrival we met our
guide, Mon, who suited us up in very fashionable one piece jumpers, hats, walkie talkies, and sunscreen. We learned how to properly climb ladders and steps in the training center (where Alicia Keys and Jordan Sparks were spotted days earlier). Feeling confident in our climbing abilities, Mon led the ascent up to the top of the bridge. While climbing all 2,000 plus steps Mon told us about the history of the bridge and some interesting facts about Sydney. From the top, we had great views of the Sydney Opera House, the Blue Mountains, and the Sydney Harbor. At our destination, Mon gave the headset to Marie McKenna who led the group in a Tiger Pride cheer for all of Sydney to hear.After the three and one half hour climb, we had the rest of the evening to explore the Rocks (a historical suburb of Sydney). We wandered around the town, shopped, and picked a restaurant. Tomorrow we are headed to Adelaide and taking with us our great memories of Sydney!
-Kristin Morrison and Caity Manzo
Day 4: Goodbye Syndey and hello Adelaide!
Today marked our final morning in Sydney. After one more tasty breakfast at
Gungho, we all piled into the bus and headed off to the Sydney
airport to catch a flight to Adelaide.
Thankfully before we left Nellie and Eloise were finally reunited with their
lost luggage. Unfortunately for Holly and Annie, the airport still had yet to
return their stick bags. Before our flight, the Sydney airport gave everyone an opportunity
to do some much needed shopping for books, Christmas presents and Yankee-swap
gifts. After an hour and a half flight, we landed in sunny Adelaide (with all of our bags thankfully) and headed off
to our next location, the Adelaide
Shores Holiday
Village. Upon arrival it
did not take long for us all to drop our bags in our new rooms and quickly
disperse to the pool and beach for some quality tanning time. Our new location
is absolutely beautiful with the beach a short walk away. While some of us
worked on our tan, a large group of girls also traveled to the nearby grocery
store to get food to stock our new villas and also to get food for our upcoming
team barbeque on Sunday night. The day ended with a team trip to the town of Glenelg where we split up
into small groups for dinner and had the opportunity to watch a true Australian
sunset. After a long day of travel and sun most of us fell asleep quickly after
dinner. Tomorrow marks our first day of competition with the Aussies!
-Caroline, Lizzy and Kait
After our first night's sleep in the bungalows, we woke up around 8:30 and boarded the bus to go to the Cleland Wildlife Park. On the way, we stopped at a look-out point where we could see the city of Adelaide and took the traditional once every four-year lacrosse team picture around the lighthouse. Then, the adventure really began as our next stop was the Wildlife park. A bunch of us took a picture holding Peter the Koala. The guide told us that a koala sleeps for nineteen hours a day, and so Peter's 30-minute “photo shoot” with us was basically the equivalent of an 8-hour work day for him. In contrast to us sleep-deprived college students, what a carefree typical Aussie-style life! One of the highlights of the trip was being able to feed and pet a bunch of the animals. The kangaroos were especially friendly, and extremely hungry! All we had to do was hold out a handful of food, and they would hop right on over and eat directly out of the palms of our hands. They liked being pet, and even let some of us give them hugs! The emus, on the other hand, were not as receptive...one image that really sticks out is of a large emu chasing and growling at our very own Allison Behringer as she tried to approach it and make friends. In addition to these native creatures, we also saw dingoes, wallabies, wombats, echidnas, and even a Tasmanian devil!
From there, we left to prepare for our first game against the Australian National Team. It was a pretty awesome experience to be able to play against the reigning World Champs and even go one-on-one against the legendary Jen Adams (arguably the best female lacrosse player in the world). After practicing in frigid New Jersey weather, it was also great to play in such sunny weather in the middle of December! The game started off pretty even, but the Australian team ended up coming out on top. We learned a lot from the game though, and we are definitely looking forward to a rematch in the next two days!
After the game, we ate dinner with the Australian team and the Dartmouth lacrosse team (they are also in Adelaide right now). We learned from the Aussies that they actually like vegemite, and so a few of us decided to try it after dinner. However, as Marine Graham can attest to after eating a heaping spoonful of it, vegemite definitely does not appeal to us Americans at all!
-Kristin Schwab and Katie Rogers
Day 6: Saturday, December 20th
It's our third day in Adelaide, and life in paradise is fantastic! This morning began with sunny skies and yoga next to the swimming pool. What a sight me must have been... 30 American girls, poolside, doing yoga at such an early hour. After getting in a good stretch we headed off for our first game of the day against Team Koala. We were focusing on communication in the eight, running our plays, and closing our double teams. With these goals in mind, we rose to the challenge and defeated Team Koala. We returned to the bungalows, and had a team dip in the ocean to cool off after the game. After a short afternoon rest we returned to the field for game two, this time against team Australia. Although the Aussies got off to a quick start, we worked together as a team to narrow the deficit. Even though in the end, the Aussies came out on top, we never stopped fighting until the end. Tonight we are all preparing for our talent show tomorrow. The coaches have challenged us all, saying that there is no way any of us can beat their act. We will have to wait until tomorrow to see...
-Cathy and Cindy
Today was a fun filled day! We had our final game against the Australians, a mixed line up for their elite team and the developmental team--and we won!!! We started off the first half very strong, but the Australians fought back in the second to tie the game. In the last 3 minutes we scored 3 goals, with Holly's game winning thriller clocking in at 0:09 seconds. We celebrated the win by bathing in the sun and frolicking in shark infested waters. There was one scare- a fin in the distance. Within seconds Cas sprinted to some rocks to get a better view. Turns out it was only a dolphin and Marie, Cas and Donnie immediately jumped in and tried to swim with it. After the beach we all returned to our bungalow's to prepare our pot-luck dinner. Everyone did an amazing job and we collectively prepared quite a feast! Before eating, we all gathered on the lawn for a "cultural experience." An Aboriginal family came to our hotel to teach us about their culture. It was very interesting and the best part, it was interactive! The team volunteered Marko, Manzo and myself to perform a "mating" dance with the three young boys. Of course it was no surprise when Marko and Manzo were actually quite good at it and I have a feeling we will see those moves in the future, just another souvenir to bring back with us to Princeton! Before dinner, a few of us attempted the boomerang and spear throw, but no one could throw it quite like the Aborigines. As Chris,DJ, Amy and Rob prepared the chicken and burgers, we enjoyed a beautiful Australian sunset.The dinner was one of the best of the trip, but due to lightening, we were forced to move inside for our Yankee swap.Some of the favorite gifts were a onesie pajama suit that Amy chose and Australian stuffed-animal backpacks. Later on we took taxis into Glenelg to enjoy the city nightlife and mingle with local folks. It was an early night due to our 6:30 am departure for Kangaroo Island tomorrow morning, but we're all excited for the adventure!
-Cox, Marie and Holly
Yesterday was our final day in Australia before the many hours of
flying ahead of us. We woke up early in the morning to travel via bus and
ferry to Kangaroo
Island. Kangaroo Island is the third largest island in
the country. We traversed the island by bus stopping along various points
of interest. We first raced up a 512 step climb to a beautiful look out
point atop a hill then drove to Seal
Bay. This quiet beach to is home to the Australian Sea Lions (recently named on the endangered
species list). We were allowed to sit on the beach and observed these
giants mammals from 8m away while our guide provided many fun facts about
them! After Seal
Bay we had a quick lunch
break and geared up for an afternoon of Xtreme sports. It took about 10
minutes to climb up a 40ft sand dune. We rented boards and sand-boarded
our way down the giant dune. Some people picked it up very quickly (those
with snowboarding and skateboarding experience) while for others it took a
little longer to master the skill. It was cool to watch Kait P, Marie,
and Cheri shred down the dune but everyone's wipeouts were far more
entertaining. I think all of us walked off the dune with about 5lbs of
sand. It was one of the more exciting events of the trip. After
attempting to shake the sand out we continued on our bus tour around the island
stopping again at various points for photo opts. We concluded our day on Kangaroo Island
with dinner and hopped on the ferry back toward Adelaide. We got home late that evening
to begin packing and prepping for another early morning start.
I'm
writing now from the airport where we are all anxiously awaiting to board the
plane and start the long journey back home. All in all it was an
incredible experience, one that the team won't forget, nor stopping talking
about. We are so grateful for the opportunity to travel to Australia, surf the beaches of Manly, feed
kangaroos, hold a Koala, traverse the Bridge in Sydney and of course play against the
defending World Cup Champs!
In the words of our Seal Bay Guide: Rock on my Wildlife Warriors!
-Katie C