Fudpuckers...again!

I'm so excited that I had the opportunity to play in the Fudpucker's volleyball tournament again! This time I played on a co-ed team. Here's a recap from my second trip down to Destin.

Thursday
I rushed home from work, finished packing, and loaded up the car. We got on the road around 6:10. The drive seemed long since we weren’t familiar with the route and it was dark, but we finally arrived just after midnight. Since it was late, I assumed we’d be disturbing my teammates, but before we even opened the door to the condo I could hear the party. We made our way to the kitchen and living room where we found Ron, KayLynn, Nimara, Kristin, Dave, Chloe, Jay, Leslie and JT playing cards and drinking games. We immediately joined in on the fun and stayed up until about 2:30 catching up with everyone.

Friday
After staying up so late the night before I couldn’t believe that I heard people up and moving around at 7:00—but it was still to early for me. I dozed back off until about 8:45 and joined everyone in the kitchen. Nimara made breakfast sandwiches and we hung out until the last few sleepers joined us. I wandered out to the 800+ square foot balcony to enjoy the views of the bay, and was amazed that the water was so clear (from 6 stories up) that you could see stingrays swimming by! Chloe was intrigued and went down to see if she could touch one—of course, unlike the aquarium they were terrified and swam away.

Once we were all up and fed we headed down to the beach for some volleyball. After about an hour in the heat and direct sunlight, we decided to head back to the condo for a dip in the pool and some time at the lazy river. We spent a couple of hours down there before heading upstairs for a pasta dinner. After dinner we rushed back over to the beach for some more volleyball before dark. We played through a magnificent sunset until we couldn’t see the ball anymore and returned to the condo to get ready for check-in/registration at Fudpuckers. We got our t-shirts and drink tickets before wandering around the restaurant (including live alligator area) and a mini-museum. We got our first round of drinks and settled by the stage to watch a great band play.


Saturday
We got up early Saturday morning to have breakfast and prepare snacks for the day before heading over to the Boardwalk for the 8:30 captains meeting and pool assignments. Play started at 9:00 and we didn’t do very well. We spent our first three games getting used to playing together and making silly mistakes. We came back in the afternoon to win our last two, giving us a 2-3 record for the day. We were disappointed, but since all teams reach the playoffs, we decided not to take the losses too hard and prepare for the next day.


We finished around the same time as the girls (who went 4-1 and ended up first in their pool) and walked back to the condo. We all went down to the pool/lazy river again for a couple hours before dinner. Eventually we all showered and walked over to the Swamp for the player’s party and buffet. We had some dinner and took a group picture, followed by lots of drinks and dancing. There was a band at this party, too—and they were also really good. I left the party around 10:30 and crashed, I’m still not sure how or when everyone else got back.

Sunday
Another early morning (that seemed earlier because of the party the night before) and we were at the beach. Unfortunately, we lost our first match, eliminating us from the tournament. We had to ref, but then planned to watch the girls, not realizing that they had been eliminated, too. We packed up all the tents and chairs and went back to the condo to regroup. We relaxed for about an hour with beers on the patio, watching the jellyfish that had overtaken the bay before heading back over to the Swamp for lunch. We filled up with Ron, KayLynn, Leslie, JT, Chloe, Jay, Nimara, and Kristin before heading out of town. On the way back to the highway we stopped at an outlet mall for about an hour, and finally hit the road around 4:10. We got home just before 10:00, in time to unpack and do a little laundry before crashing. Monday morning was going to come fast!

All in all, I had an amazing weekend. Though we didn’t win as much as I would have liked, it was a great trip with great people who I’m proud to call my friends. So thankful to have met all these great people through volleyball!