March 22: Welcome to Italy. We're Going to Croatia
Dee's and my first full day in Italy began at 6:30 a.m.., when Maj Filzen called to tell us that we were going to Croatia for an overnight trip.
The two of us finally saw the team at 8:00, when everyone met in the lobby of the main building for breakfast. We walked over to the base mess hall, which served made-to-order omelets and a variety of other breakfast-type foods.
Following breakfast, Dee and I made a quick trip to the commissary to buy bottles of water for our trip. Then, we went back to our room and packed an overnight bag for our trip, before meeting everyone back at the main lobby.
Our bus for this excursion wasn't allowed on the base, so Maj Filzen had to shuttle everyone from the hotel, around the airfield and to the main gate ... in our little three-passenger Fiat. Luckily, the Harrington family had driven over from their home in Germany to visit Michelle and had their SUV. They helped reduce the time with a few back-and-forth trips.
Since Dee, Regina and I had been standing outside when Maj Filzen pulled up, we hopped in first. It was so much easier to load up the car this time with just a couple little bags!! When we got outside the main gate, Dee and I asked the guards if we could get back on base to get a photo of the "Welcome to Aviano Air Base, Italy" sign,
Since they were already intrigued by our "carpooling" situation, they let walk back to the sign and take the photos, welcoming people in both English and Italian. Finally everyone arrived, so we loaded the bus and were on our way. We were joined on our excursion by Michelle's family, Caroline's mother and our local volleyball tour guide, Cory.
Our journey was halted once, though, while a herd of sheep crossed the road. They didn't seem to mind that they were holding up traffic.
Eventually, we arrived at the Italian-Slovenian border and drove through without stopping. Since Italy and Slovenia are both a part of the European Union (EU), drivers are able to travel from one country to another without stopping. It's pretty much like crossing state lines here in the U.S.
The trek through Slovenia was actually pretty quick and soon we found ourselves at the Slovenia-Croatia boarder. Croatia is not part of the EU, so we had to hand our passports over to the boarder guard. We waited while he took them into the building. When he returned, we eagerly checked for our stamp. However, we realized that the guard had only stamped about half of the passports, so some of us had to go on without the coveted stamp.
My goal on this trip was to see if they have brightly colored "Welcome to..." signs at the entrance of each country. And they do! Once we passed the border station, we were greeted with a cheerful "Croatia" sign. Unfortunately, it was raining pretty hard and the photo opportunity was blurred.
We finally arrived at the Hotel Pula, which was located in - amazingly enough - the city of Pula. The majority of the city skirts the coastline and our hotel was just a short walk from the beach.
After trading our passports for room keys, we headed to our rooms and quickly learned that a `two-person room' meant two twin beds right next to one another, with only the frame separating them. The whole team was located in the same second-floor hallway, with balconies facing the courtyard and water. Dee and I took turns taking pictures of our balcony-mates, Katie and Nichole.
There was a gift shop in the lobby, but it was closed for the daily siesta. Postcards sat on the other side of the glass doors, mocking all of us that wanted a tourist must-have. After a quick team lunch at the hotel buffet, Dee and I wandered out to find the path that would take us to the Adriatic Sea.
Before we did that, however, we had a surprise, when my cell phone starting chirping that I had a text message. Service had been very spotty in Italy and non-existent at Aviano, so we had only been using my phone as a very fancy clock. Apparently I got excellent coverage in Croatia and had a text that said "VIP and Croatian National Tourism Board welcome you to Croatia." It continued with a number for tourist information ... for a charge.
So... back to our trip to the beach. Along the way, we ran into Michelle, who was taking the same path with her mom, dad and sister. There wasn't any sand at the beach; instead it was covered with smooth white rocks. Plus, the whole coastline was made up of rocks and cliffs, so Dee and I wandered along the rocks for a good long while. We saw the girls come down to the shore ... their bright blue travel suits are very easy to spot, even at a distance.
As the coastline curved around another corner and seemed to go on forever, so we found a set of stairs carved into the ground and headed up to the road. We walked back to the hotel and met up with everyone in the lobby as we geared up for our match.
Cory told us that it was a 15-minute walk to the gym. Well, he failed to mention is that was only if you were running. About a half hour (and a lot of miles of Pula streets) later we walked into one of the city's recreation centers, which featured a gym and an outdoor basketball court. Tyler was heralded as a hero for carrying the medical bag all the way. Using some imagination, Dee used a large tree stump as her training table, while she taped up Jasamine's ankle.
After a quick warm-up, the girls handed their opponents an Air Force Academy pennant and we started our match. Dee, Regina and I sat in the bleachers, kept stats and cheered on our team. We started out strong, but our opponents showed why they are the defending Junior National champions. According to the scoreboard, we were the "gosti", while the Croatian team was the "domaci".
At the end of the match, both teams gathered at mid-court for a team photo. As we prepared to leave, Cory's wife came. They live in Slovenia, so she had driven in for the night. She volunteered to drive the med-kit back to the hotel, so Dee, Regina and I tagged along.
Back at the hotel, everyone met in the dining hall for another trip to the buffet. The team was going to go out with the Croatian team to a place their coach owned, while our coaches went out with Cory and his wife. Regina was battling a tooth-ache, so Dee and I hung out in our room and found the one English speaking channel on our 12-inch television.
Picking up a faint wireless signal from the lobby, I was able to check my email and write my track recap. While watching CNN International's never-ending feature on dogs, we had the doors to our balcony open to let some of the nice night air into our rather stuffy room. Giving up on the TV, we could hear a faint music beat coming from somewhere in the distance. Since it sounded like it was coming from the ground level of the hotel, we wandered downstairs.
During this time, we learned that the lights in the hallway were on motion sensors. It's pretty unique to open your door to a pitch black hallway. And it was a pretty fast timer as well, since the lights went off before we reached the staircase.
Once downstairs, we found the source of our noise. In the lower lobby, a man and a woman were playing keyboards, while numerous people listened, wandered around, played cards and watched the EuroSport figure skating championships that were being shown on all four televisions.
The musical entertainment, which Dee said reminded her of a party for a 50th wedding anniversary, opened with John Denver's "West Virginia". Since we were now clearly intrigued, we pulled up a couple chairs and listened to several local songs, the Beatles' "A Hard Days Night" and some polka that was thrown in for good measure. Couples danced on the small wooden floor. My personal favorites were the two older ladies that took to the floor every time they played a polka.
Finally, our long day started to catch up to us and we headed upstairs. The team returned a short time later. I always find it entertaining when people get louder in their attempts to quiet everyone else. Soon, the second floor was quiet as everyone slept peacefully.
