We set off for the west coast on Friday, June 6th. After an uneventful stop in Kearney, Nebraska, we made our way all the way to Ogden, Utah which was a very nice city with some cool views of the mountains and the Great Salt Lake. The next day we made it to Pendleton, Oregon. It was probably the best stop on the trip. It was a big rodeo town and we managed to pick up some fine western-wear there. I got myself a nice belt with a buckle. After four days of driving we finally made it to the west coast and to Seaside, Oregon. Needless to say we were ready to be out of the truck after 32 hours of driving time.Steve Binder and I are staying with the same host family about 5 minutes north of Seaside in a town called Gearhart (you can drive onto the beach here). We live with the Truax family who owns their own candy shop in a town south of Seaside. It's a pretty sweet place. We have a host mom and dad, brother, sister, brother-in-law and nephew. It's a pretty big family so we are always on our toes. But everyone is very nice and made us feel welcome in our new home. We had a couple days to ourselves where Steve and I found a gym to workout at and saw the sights of the town before we had an official practice. We ran into some players at the workout place and at some shops downtown and everyone was excited to be here.
We had our first workout as a team on Thursday and another on Friday. The weather has been unexpectedly cold. For the past week we have only seen the sun a limited amount of time and the rest of the time it has been kind of cloudy and rainy. We are told that will change, and Steve and I are banking on that because we weren't thinking about bringing warmer clothes since we were going to be on the "beach".
Opening day was Saturday and we traveled to Portland in two 15 passenger vans through some thick forests and big hills. We won the first game 11-0 against the Pacific Javalinas and 5-1 against the Portland Titans. Steve and I both played both games at our respective positions (3rd and 2nd) and did well. It was nice to start the year 2-0 before opening up at home tonight against the Aloha Warriors.
We have a good mixture of players on our team. About half of the team is from the Oregon area, and the rest come from Arizona, California, Nebraska, Illinois, and even a "mate" from Australia. Everyone is getting to know each other and it looks like it should be a fun and successful summer out west for us. We'll write again in about three weeks I hear. Hope all is well back in Madison, and try to stay dry!
-Alex Berta- Sr, 2nd Baseman
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