casual ultimate » ok we’re back on track - or - what i did on my summer vacation

our trusty readers may have noticed that we were lacking blogspiration last week. so no posts. but in an effort to get back on track, and since neither of us are playing nearly enough ultimate this summer, we’re going to start posting about just about anything. some of you may be thinking, “don’t you already do that?”. kind of, i guess. but the posts may be more random than usual, maybe not as long, but who can say. for example, this is a picture of a cow on parade in copenhagen - i hope whoever came up with the cows on parade public art idea trademarked it, because they’re everywhere.

ms. ultimate got back from an action-packed european vacation last week. It turned into a sports trifecta when, in addition to hanging out backstage at Wimbledon the first week and getting a prime spot at the Tour de France Prologue in London the last weekend, the european union triathlon turned out to be in Copenhagen the Saturday she was there. who knew? Not to be lost in the shuffle was the bizarre city-wide rollerblade race that was held the following day. Those crazy danes!

after a bit i began to miss you guys and, of course, the ol’ disc. in an effort to keep up my ulty spirits i decided to scope out potential fieldspace in London, Copenhagen and Amsterdam. London has by far the most space, as perhaps Lyrica can attest to, but they have a thing about not walking on the grass that may be hard to overcome. This first one’s a shot of some potential space in Kensington Gardens; lots of open grass area, but big patches were left unmown. good for aesthetics, maybe not so good for ultimate.

these next two were taken in copenhagen. there’s not too much open park space here, and much of what exists is heavily manicured, so field-size expanses of lawn may be cut in two by a path. (those used to playing on sewer grates in washington park may be able to get over this.) this first photo was taken in the rosenborg slot (palace) gardens, which were absolutely beautiful. it’s no surprise hans christian andersen was from denmark/copenhagen, because parts of the city look like an absolute fairy tale. to the right is a gratuitous castle shot; this is rosenborg palace. what you don’t see in this pic is the surrounding moat, complete with mama duck and ducklings. what you also don’t see is the lawn on the other side of the palace: enormous, perfectly maintained, completely flat, guarded by gentleman with a machine gun. three out of four ain’t bad.

last and sadly least, amsterdam. there’s not much room to play in the city proper, although my map showed greenspace just outside of town. i guess they sacrificed grass for canals. or, actually, they didn’t sacrifice grass for anything. heh heh. heh. i’m hilarious *and* mature. anyway, here’s some lawn on the museumplatz, amsterdam’s museum campus. the van gogh museum, the rijksmuseum and the big concert hall surround this park, where i saw folks playing soccer/football in the evenings. the van gogh museum was fantastic, by the way, you should definitely go if you’re in the neighborhood.

sadly, i never actually saw anyone playing ultimate anywhere. i saw some folks tossing with a 175 g disc in Hyde Park after the tour prologue, but that’s it. by that time i almost abandoned my new bike friends to toss, but it was late in the day. i’m crossing my fingers that the rain holds off and summer league happens tonight.

oh, and of course, the finest grass was at wimbledon: the courts looked like the plushest of putting greens. are we surprised that they were already reserved for another sport?