January 16 started with another checkout and bus ride, this time back into the EC via Koper, Slovenia, and then into Italy. It was about 3 hours by the time we got to the Hotel Damodoro in Pordenone and everyone had the afternoon to eat lunch in town and check it out. Unfortunately we were met with a dreary, cold day and just a little too much rain to be comfortable. Pordenone is an awesome little Italian town about an hour north of Venice, and it’s a neat place to get a real feel for authentic Italian living while still having good access (via train) to Venice.
We re-split teams for the evening and headed off to our respective matches all in the same bus, getting dropped off team by team in a well orchestrated evening of volleyball set up by our good friend Mauro Rosato:
Team Cory: Pallavolo Pordenone, Serie C, in Pordenone (2-2)
Team Tim: Pallavolo Polistar Chions, Serie C in Villotta (3-2)
Team Ron: Vam Iso Italia San Stino, Serie C in San Stino (3-1)
It should be noted that Erin Clark was sent off to Innsbruck on the train just after arrival in Pordenone, so we’re now pretty low on middles and several of our outsides are having to share time in zone 3 on some of the teams. Again, this is a worthwhile learning experience as sometimes players are expected to play out of position when dealing with European coaches, budgets, and management.
That night we had a nice Italian feast at Woody’s in town and then, since absolutely everything was closed after our 10:30pm dinner, a large group stayed up in the hotel lobby philosophizing and finishing off the hotel’s supply of wine.
Our last full day on tour, January 17 saw the majority of the girls heading off (in the never-ending rain and gray) to Venice on the train. Everyone seemingly pulled off this feat of mass transit without any issue, and hopefully enjoyed the magical city of Venezia even though the weather wasn’t really cooperating.
We only had two matches for our final night, with several girls realizing that they just didn’t need a ninth night of volleyball on their 10 day trip:
Team Tim vs. Domavip Porcia, Serie C in Porcia (3-2)
Team Cory vs. USC Cordenons, Serie D in Cordenons (4-0)
We made it to dinner by 10:00pm tonight, and Mr. and Mrs. Woody again cooked up an awesome spread, this time for our Last Supper. Although almost everyone was exhausted from the trip, and long day in town and playing, most everyone was enjoying our last night together until the wee hours. Several had a 4:00am cab to the airport while everyone else knew that a 7:30am bus loomed for the final stop at Venice Airport…
It’s worth noting that during the closing moments of the tour, a team from Spain’s SuperLiga B called and needed an outside pronto. We spent several hectic minutes on both the evening of January 17 and the morning of the January 18 getting Bridget Fuentez’ tickets squared away, but as the rest of the crew was boarding planes for the USA, Bridget was on her way to Monforte in the northwest corner of Spain to hopefully become the fifth placement from the tour…
Becki Rodin: Weert, NL
Jayme Gergen: Klagenfurt, Austria
Bri Mueller: Klagenfurt, Austria
Erin Clark: VC Tirol, Innsbruck, Austria
Bridget Fuentez: Ribera Sacra, Monforte, Spain |
