Travel Day

     Yesterday (September 7) Team USA all met up in Newark and we began our trip to Brussels, Belgium. After sitting on the plane on the runway for about an hour, we finally took off on our 8 hour flight. The flight was actually very good, which is all one can hope for on an overnight trip to Europe. The back of the plane where I was sitting consisted of myself next to Dustin, Daniel across the isle, Missy in front of me, and Jarrett behind me. This definitely made the trip rather interesting and kept us entertained for most of the time. We all found it really hard to sleep, so each of us got maybe a good half hour which was not good because of the 6 hour time change. Once we landed, it was 7:30am, which in our time was 1:30am.. Let's just say we were a little tired from not sleeping.

     After we finally got our baggage, exchanged money, etc., we found the bus and started the 70 mile trip to Oostende, which we thought was going to be really fast. What I've learned over my past 3 years on team, however, is to never listen to how long they say the bus ride is actually going to be because something always happens. This year, two cars swerved in front of our bus and one of them actually slammed into the side of it. None of us felt this and actually had no idea anything had happened at all until the driver slammed his breaks on and we all went jolting forward. No one got hurt, nothing serious at all to any cars, but it did give us an hour detour which we did not need. We finally got back on the road, drove a few miles, and stopped at a gas station to use the bathrooms (which you have to pay for!) and get some food. We got back on the bus, drove a few more miles, and hit a dead standstill traffic jam. The bus driver got off the highway and took us around some back roads and got us back to the highway around the traffic. So long story short, an hour or so bus ride turned into a four hour ride. Never fails.
     We finally got to the hotel, which is very nice, and settled in. We unpacked a little bit and headed out onto the boardwalk at the beach to explore and find some food. The rest of tonight was just everyone hanging out and resting. Practice starts tomorrow at 8am and we're all so excited to try out the track for the first time!!