Columnist Cristyn Enea: We’ve learned plenty in Europe

Cristyn Enea

Tuesday, May 28, 2002 | 9:06 a.m.

Editor's note: The UNLV women's soccer team is on an 11-day, 10-night European tour that includes games against teams from Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands. Cristyn Enea, a senior midfielder and communications major who earned second team all-Mountain West Conference honors last season, has agreed to provide the Sun with periodic updates on the tour.

LIEGE, Belgium -- It's been a great trip so far ... except on the soccer field.

We lost our second game of the trip on Sunday, 4-1 to Standard Liege, a first division team in Belgium. We earlier had lost 4-1 to FC Frankfurt on Friday in Germany.

Obviously, we're disappointed we've lost to two very good teams, but this trip is more important for bonding and creating a good team unity for next fall when the games really count.

And, it's not like we're playing a bunch of stiffs. FC Frankfurt won the Unlimited European Sports Association (UESA) the night before we played them and they have 12 members on the German National squad.

We also were still a little jet-lagged for that game. We had flown 12 hours the day before. And before the game that day we spent about five hours visiting a castle in Heidelberg. Needless to say, our legs we're still a little wobbly.

Before our game against Standard Liege, we went rock climbing and mountain bike riding through a bunch of caves in Holland. It was pitch-black in there and we just had to follow our guides. A number of us bumped our heads on the low ceilings of the caves because we couldn't see anything. Still, it was a blast, probably the best part of the trip so far.

Monday we tried to visit Anne Frank's house in Amsterdam. However, the lines were just too long. We saw the outside of it later, though, on a cruise through Amsterdam.

The weather has been strange at times. It can be sunny and in the 70s and before you know it you are in the middle of a downpour or it's hailing. It poured during our game against Standard Liege.

We still have two more games starting with tonight here. And we still have a whole lot of sight-seeing left to do before we come home on Friday.