Men's Soccer Costa Rica Trip Blog: Days 6 & 7

Emory University junior goalkeeper Caleb Grisell will be blogging throughout the men’s soccer team’s preseason trip to Costa Rica.

Click here to view pictures from the trip.

Day 6

When I woke up this morning, I had no idea today’s events would completely justify all the countless hours I worked during summer to pay for this trip.

It started out like every other day so far, an extraordinary breakfast complemented with freshly cut fruit and juice that made your mouth tremble. We left our hotel at 9:00 AM, sad to see our beachside paradise vanish into the distance, but also full of anticipation at what the day would bring. After a long and winding four-hour drive through the mountains, we arrived in the rainforest at our third hotel: The Tilajari Resort. We quickly dropped our bags off in our rooms, ate a light lunch, loaded back onto the bus and departed for an experience can only be described as ethereal: Zip-lining the Arenal Volcano.

I have been blessed with the opportunity to do and see a multitude of unique and interesting things: swimming with sharks, surfing in a hurricane, making a half-court buzzer beater.  But, I can honestly say our zip-lining tour was one of the most incredible experiences of my life.

We begin the tour with a 20-minute tractor ride up the Arenal Volcano followed by a 15 minute walk up the volcano to the first zip-line canopy. We did a total of nine lines, ranging from 50 to 200 meters high and 100 to 1,000 meters long reaching a top speed of 70 kph! Words cannot describe or encompass what we saw from either the canopies or the zip-lines: miles upon miles of untouched rainforest, insects and animals I have never heard of or seen before, along with sensational waterfalls and glassy rivers.

After we finished our tour and loaded back onto the bus, we drove about 30 minutes to the Baldi Hot Springs, a luxury resort with over 15 hot spring pools ranging from 98^o to 115^o and a full assortment of water slides. Once Coach Travis let us off the bus, it was like unleashing children in the candy shop.

The biggest surprise of the night was Coach Ben Buerger who, with hesitation or encouragement, launched head first down the steepest slide and skimmed on his chest almost 20 feet into the pool below. Upon seeing this feat of bravery, one of the staff, not wanting to be outdone by an American, put on an exhibition of tricks down the same slide that would have made an insurance agent turn over in his grave. After we had seen the extent of the life guard’s aquatic acrobatics, we began to work our way up the volcano and sample each pool as they became hotter and hotter, until we could no longer physically withstand the heat. By 9:00 PM we were all so exhausted we could barely make it to our bus and collapsed in our beds, as we prepared for what tomorrow would bring.

Day 7

I woke up exhausted, completely drained from yesterday’s zip-lining and hot springs, but was able to immediately find energy when I remembered we were going white water rafting today.

After an excellent breakfast, we all loaded onto the bus and drove an hour to El Toro Rio. We all received a brief safety lesson in the event one of us fell out of the raft or the raft flipped and then walked for about 15 minutes to the launch site. Once we reached the river, Coach Travis divided us into rafts by position, putting forwards with forwards, midfielders with midfielders, etc. It did not take long for the first raft to flip, after rounding only the second bend, I came across Ben Schlang in the water, while Ross Chaffin and Michael Scannapico trying to flip their raft back over. Needless to say, none of us were surprised that the forwards were the first to flip their raft. 

After two hours of rafting class four rapids, yelling at howler monkeys, and seeing some of Costa Rica’s natural beauty, we reached the end of the river, loaded back onto the bus and, after a superb lunch of fish, chicken and steak, returned to our hotel.

Upon arriving back at the hotel, we all immediately went to our rooms for a nap before our game against El Toros del Norte. After our last game, we were all nervous about playing on a grass field. Fortunately the hotel had groomed and cut the field which we were to play on.  However, someone had taken an ATV out on the field before our game and completely tore up the left side of the field.

The intensity was high from the kick-off, the touches were quick, the passes were crisp and the runs were sharp. We started much better than we had in our previous two games, not needing 15 minutes to settle down and get possession. Zach Samuels and Chris Howie plagued El Toros with their dangerous runs down the flanks putting multiple serves into the box, but were unable to convert.

We came out just as strong in the second half and after a strong run by Charlie Donahue down the left side and a clever move by David Langton, Kam Zia was alone in front of goal to slot home the game’s first goal. Emotions were extremely high after the goal and 5 minutes after scoring, Kam, having lost the ball at midfield, chased down an El Toros player and tackled him from behind right outside of the box. Although it was a friendly, the ref gave Kam a straight red and we were forced to play a man down for the remaining 20 minutes.

We valiantly played the remainder of the game with only 10 players, as Alex Scott and Adam Waxman had especially impressive performances in the center of defense, stopping almost every attack before it became dangerous.  Zach Samuels ran tirelessly up top chasing down balls and helping us maintain some possession. While it seemed imminent we would pull out the win, in the 94^th minute, the referee called Adam Waxman for a handball as he slid to block a rebound after I had saved and deflected a shot. The El Toro player stepped up and smashed the ball to the right corner, tying the game and referee immediately blew his whistle to signal the end of the game.

While it was upsetting to have lost a game we believed we deserved to win, we were thrilled with the progress we had made from our first game, the effort we gave even down a man, and the visible increase in our match fitness.

Keep checking EmoryAthletics.com for updates and photos throughout the team's Costa Rica trip.