Sunday, June 19, 2011

Saturday, June 18, 2011

Finally.... we get to Iceland. It was Worth the Wait!

Our trip started without a hitch.  Everyone to the airport, on the plane, and flying to Newark with no problems in site. Once we landed in Newark we experienced a little hiccup.  We quickly gathered our bags and headed to the Iceland Express counter to try and check our bags early to begin the long 4+ hour layover.  When we got to the Iceland Express counter we learned that our wait would be much longer.  For some unexplained reason, our flight had been delayed by 4 hours and would now leave Newark at 1:00a.m.  Yikes!

We managed to kill nearly 3 hours of our layover time in the Chili's Too restaurant.  This establishment will go down in history as the slowest possible service on the planet.  I think the Putz family managed to wait well over an hour before their order was taken.  It was slow as molasses, but not quite as tasty.  We took it in stride though because the slow service made our layover seem a little quicker.

After midnight we were able to board the Iron Maiden Frontier World Tour 2011 plane. I'm not kidding.  Here is a picture of the plane.  You've got to check out the pictures.

Although our Iron Maiden "Ed Force One" was grandiose in image, the seats were the tightest seats any of us had every experienced.  I'm thankful we were flying a team of 10 year olds instead of 16 year olds.  The good news was that we were all so exhausted that we slept fairly well.

When we arrived in Iceland everything began to click again.  The tour bus for Erin Parham & Friends was ready to sweep us away to good ol Taco Bell/KFC for a quick bite and then to a tour of the area surrounding Reykjavik.  I would tell you all the cool sites and such, but I'm so delirious at the time of this writing that I can't remember any names.  The pictures will have to suffice at this point.

After we checked in to our hostel the groups split up to explore the area.  Eventually we all ate a pizza dinner on the deck under the warmth of the sun, which had been shining brightly all day.  The weather is simply fantastic.  Following dinner we took a nice dip in the thermal pools next door.  AAAHHHG!

Can't wait the to get the boys up @ 7:00 am tomorrow for training!

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Lauren's Birthday? That calls for the Sugarcubes' Birthday

Happy Birthday Lauren!

In 1988, the Sugarcubes from Iceland debuted an album called Life's Too Good and the 'big' hit was Birthday. Perhaps you remember it. The Sugarcubes are Bjork's original band. This video is the English version and truth be told, the Icelandic version is better, but the English version has a video with shots of Reykjavik and they have an interesting birthday party in the Blue Lagoon at 2:35.

Also shown at 1:41 is Keriư Crater Lake where Bjork performed a concert on a barge in the middle of the lake. I think this is part of the Golden Circle Tour.

Back in 1988, a young strapping lad just out of college, I was really digging on the Sugarcubes and I remember thinking how cool it would be to travel to Iceland. A mere 23 years later, an old sagging lad gets to go. Thanks for getting this going Parhams, can't wait.



Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Are We Ready Yet?

We hope today's preparation scrimmage helped the boys burn off some of that nervous energy they've had bottled up in anticipation of leaving in 2 days.  I think it would have been better to have all the parents running in the scrimmage!

We want to extend a huge thank you to Golazo Energy Drink for outfitting the team with some great training jerseys and wrist bands.  The boys look fantastic!

We also want to thank all the players that helped us prepare for the tournament today as as "Team Kade." Thank you Jack, Aiden, Tyler, Cason, Kade, Ian, Dalton, and Conner.  We promise to show our Rush pride in Iceland.  

 


Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Upcoming birthday

Hi everyone, Lauren turns 13 on June 24th while we're in Iceland. Please wish her a happy b-day when we're out there!

Thursday, June 9, 2011

Introducing Rush USA

Jonas Sigurdsson, from the Shell Tournament, asked if I could provide some photos of the team and some information about where we live.  I put this on the Meet the Team page.