2008 UC Davis Foreign Tour Archive
By John Lamanna
Friday, Aug. 29
Today was our first full day in Paris. We stayed up all day yesterday in order to get adjusted to the time difference, which meant most of the team was up very early in the morning due to the jet lag. In any case, we woke with a lot of energy ready for the day ahead.
Our morning started with a top notch breakfast buffet at the hotel. After breakfast we met as a team in the lobby of the hotel to start our trek to the Eiffel Tower where we met our tour guide for our bike tour of Paris. We used the subway system to make our way from the hotel to the Eiffel Tower. Even after seeing the Eiffel Tower yesterday, today it seemed even more impressive. It is amazing how huge the Eiffel Tower is, especially when you stand right underneath it! We found our tour guide without any trouble and followed him to the "Fat Tire" bike shop.
The bike tour lasted a full four hours which include us stopping for lunch in the middle. Touring Paris on a bike was absolutely incredible. We biked all through town stopping and learning the history of all the famous buildings and structures. King Louie really had the life, building mansions and churches just for the royal family. Unfortunately, our bike tour had to come to an end. The tour was so interesting it could have lasted another four hours. We made our way back to the subway and back to the hotel. The players got off their feet and started to get focused for the reason we traveled to Paris, to play basketball.
We bussed across Paris for the game. This allowed us to see other parts of the town. Once we arrived at the gym, our focus had changed to intense focus getting prepared for the job ahead. We tipped off just before 9 p.m. We kept the pressure on defensively and offensively the whole game. Joe Harden, Mark Payne, Vince Oliver and Dominic Calegari all had great production. We pulled away with the win providing us with the highlight of day! We move to 1-0 on the European Tour and are looking forward to spending all day tomorrow in Paris. Possibly the "Mona Lisa" or Picasso's famous work will be in store for us.
-Coach Lamanna
