Clouds, Clouds and More Clouds and the Tour de Neuhausen

Neuhausen from one side of town
Main road into town

Some Tree that fell up in the hills
The view from Chrisitians' Parents House overlooking Deggendorf.
You can't see it; but the hill is through these woods up that road...

It has been consistently cloudy the entire time that I have been here in Germany...no joke, there has not been more than one or two days since I've been here that I am either covered in rain or simply lacking the essential light of the sun. Anyways, this last week has been pretty interesting and pretty busy for me. Monday began my training with FC Bad Kotzting and things have been going pretty well I suppose. I have a lunch meeting with the coach tomorrow to see where things are going, so we'll have more information tomorrow to deal out. Training over here is actually really similar to the states, which is obvious at home, but over here a lot of people really are surprised that Americans play soccer. The forwards over here are a lot more technical and smart on the ball. This is probably the biggest difference in the two styles between the countries. Everyone is crafty up top and really good at taking players on and waiting for the correct time and opening to shoot. Midfielders may bit a bit more crafty but nothing like I haven't seen in the states thus far. Defending is pretty similar everywhere, and this is no difference. The guys are tall and strong and do their job well. For me personally, the training is a lot less physical here than it is at home. The coaches seem to think that I should be tired from the drills, but its nothing like it was at home. American GK is a lot about power and working hard (at least ours was). Here it's a lot about being clean and holding the ball much of the time. It's taking a bit getting used to. My hands are not as clean as I would like them due to the lack of training before the week, but it is coming along. The past week entailed more of the same, waking up, going to Christians work and helping him out with various things from packaging, recycling, counting, and moving things around. I've also been back and fourth from his parents house doing some gardening and yard work to keep myself busy. Haven't really been able to get out too much and see the actual towns and take some pictures so yesterday, while Christian and his girlfriend were out, I took out one of their bikes and started to ride around Neuhuasen. The area is really nice and I just decided to take some pictures that I could and get a feel from what the town was really like. For the first half an hour, I decided to ride up and down this huge hill road that Christian has right next to his house. I thought it might be a good opportunity to try and get a good down to the city picture or different overlooking picture. Wrong, I got a few good looks around the rest of town, but the hill proved nothing more than a great workout and awesome ride down. Let's just say that I have a new admiration for the Tour de France. I went up and down this thing 3 times just for the hell of it, but its was good fun coming down. After riding around the town for about an hour, I came back here and relaxed until they got back and we watch "Mr. Brooks" a movie starring Kevin Costner that I had never even really heard of. But it was good, surprisingly good. Recommended. Anyways, today I am off to go to lunch with everyone and head off to Christians once again.

Hope all is well,

Brian