Fly-over video of soccer facility

The turf is down!!

Check out the pics of how the new soccer stadium is coming along. The turf was laid last week!!

It will be a great stadium for our players to compete in, the bowl shape of the hills will make for an awesome and unique venue!!

Soccer stadium pics!!

Recent pictures of the new soccer stadium at Behrend!! Exciting times for the soccer program with a state of the art turf, floodlight field to play on!!

Derkacz accepts women's assistant position at Slippery Rock

Congratulations to former men's and women's soccer assistant Casey Derkacz on accepting the assistant women's soccer coach position at Slippery Rock University.
Casey excelled during his time on the staff at Penn State Behrend, helping both the women's and men's teams claim AMCC Championships in 2011.
Casey graduated with his MBA from Penn State Behrend in May of 2012 and will begin his duties at Slippery Rock immediately.
Best Wishes to Casey as he takes the next step in his coaching career.

Brazil Pics

Just a few pics from our Brazil trip!!

Final Brazil Blogs

These are our last few blogs from the Brazil trip. 

Wednesday Day 6

Today began with an hour long transfer from Paraty to a port where the team boarded a boat that brought us to our private island, Illa Grande. On the way there, we learned that this island used to be a prison similar to Alcatraz. Soon after arriving we enjoyed a freshly prepared buffet of traditional Brazilian food; it was delicious! After refueling, we hopped back on the boat which took us to a different part of the island to enjoy a quick swim and a 50 minute rigorous hike through the jungle back to our resort. Unfortunately, after a beautiful morning of sun,  our hike ended with an afternoon storm. However, this weather didn't stop us from kayaking and swimming in the ocean to cool off.  Soon, after some down time to freshen up, we enjoyed another meal including rice, vegetables, breaded beef, and fish.  Kito, a friendly staff member and hike tour guide, taught the team many different styles of classic and modern dances which we really enjoyed !! After a few hours of lessons, the night wound down with a last dip in the ocean and the perfect company of teammates and our new Brazilian hotel hosts.

Thursday Day 7

We started the day at 8am with a  delicious breakfast that included scrambled eggs, meat, and bread. The weather was a little cloudy but there was no rain which put us all in great moods because with no rain we got to go on the boat and visit beaches and snorkel in the ocean. During the boat ride to the first beach we soaked up the bright sun peeking through the clouds. When we got to the beach we were happy to see the sun was out to stay! We really enjoyed laying out, taking pictures, and snorkling in the shallow water. The view of the surrounding islands and ocean was indescribable.  The water was pretty clear but still a little cloudy because of the rain from the previous couple days. The few of us that went snorkeling saw some fish and got cool seashells. We took a ton of pictures of everyone as we knew it was our last full day in Brazil together. After we were satisfied with our tans (or burns) we decided to skip lunch in favor of  a snorkeling excursion and visiting another beach. We traveled on the boat close to two small islands and anchored near them. With Kito as our leader, in two parties we snorkeled around the island coasts and in between the small islands. Kito went first to check if everything was safe. Once he gave us the clear we went and snorkeled around and in between the islands. The water was pretty shallow near the islands so it was easy to see the colorful fish and reefs despite the water not being as clear as it could be. The snorkeling excursion was agreed to be one of the best things we did while on the island. While one party went snorkeling the other enjoyed being in the water and relaxing on the boat. When we were finished we boated to the next beach. We anchored close to the beach and were able to walk to the beach in only waist deep water. The beach was smaller than the other but the view was still amazing. The locals' friendly dogs kept us company as we walked along the beach looking at the hundreds of shells washed up on shore. Dani and Cassi found huge whole sand dollars. Dani also managed to find a starfish among the seashells. After some relaxing and pictures we walked back to the boat and headed to the resort. It started raining as we got close to the resort but it didn't put any of us down since we had the whole afternoon in the sun. When we got back we showered and got ready for our goodbye BBQ dinner. We started with some potatoes with a delicious butter/cheese topping that we all enjoyed. That was followed by grilled fish, sausage, ribs, squid, and bread. It was easily our favorite meal of the trip! After multiple helpings of everything we all still managed to find room for the chocolate pudding cake for desert. After dinner Patrick and Fernando joined the team for a game called Catch Phrase that Robin brought. The game is very similar to Taboo. We all had a lot of fun as we played 3 rounds of the game. After we were done Fernando sang a song he wrote when he was younger as he played the guitar. It was a beautiful song and by the end we were singing along. Kito took the guitar next and played Hey Soul Sister by Train and let us sing it. He sang a few more songs in Portuguese as we hummed along. Afterwards we cleared the floor to dance to our favorite songs we learned over the trip one last time. We danced and had fun well into the night ending with a small bonfire on the resort's beach. It was surely a great way to end our time on the island and our last full day of this unforgettable trip."

Final Day

As we finished up our AMAZING trip to Brazil, our last stop was in Rio de Janeiro. We left the beautiful island of Ilha Grande and made our way to Rio. Once in Rio, we drove past Sugar Loaf Mountain, where cable cars took groups of people up to the top of the mountain to over look the city. We were unfortunately unable to visit Sugar Loaf due to time constraints. As we drove through the city, Fernando pointed out a couple hotels where famous actors and actresses such as Beyonce, Vin Diesel, and Justin Bieber stayed. After awhile, we decided to take a walk through the city to get to two of the most famous beaches in Rio, Copacabana and Ipanema Beach. As we were walking through the city, the sidewalks had amazing black and white swirling designs to it. When we arrived to Copacabana Beach, there were many sights that we, as Americans, were not used to seeing at a beach. All the men were walking around in Speedos while the women were wearing the infamous Brazilian bikinis. Once again, that was a culture shock to many of us but as with everything else, we just accepted it and continued on with our sightseeing. There were vendors everywhere we turned trying to sell us one thing or another. A few of us bought some bracelets, necklaces, and sunglasses from them. There were also very intricate but huge sand castles that were put on display for people to look at and take pictures. After we had a nice walk by the beach, we were all starving and ready for lunch. Little did we know what type of lunch was awaiting us! We went to a Brazilian steakhouse, which had a buffet. We thought that the buffet had a vast amount of different food, but little did we know that there were going to be many servers walking around cutting unlimited slices of steak, beef, chicken, and fish. Needless to say, it was a great meal! After lunch we continued to drive through the city on our way to the Christ statue. Once we got there, we shopped around a little bit buying souvenirs for our families and friends. We did not have enough time to walk up the mountain to the statue, so we took a trolley car to the top. The Christ statue was an absolutely amazing and breathtaking experience and sight to see. The view of the city from up there was also unbelievable. We could see the soccer stadium where the world cup is going to be held in 2014. We only had about 45 minutes at the Christ statue, and after that it was back to the bus to head to the airport. We said our tearful good-byes to Fernando, and boarded our flight back to the United States. Overall, we all had the time of our lives, and could not have asked for a better trip. It truly was a once in a lifetime opportunity, with new memories and friendships made, that none of us will ever forget. And the graduating seniors could not have asked for a better way to end there four years at Penn State Behrend!

More Brazil updates

Sorry for the delay, we had a hard time with the wi-fi in Brazil.
This blog is about our first day in Paraty:

Monday May 14

After an adventurous three nights in the mountains, we traveled to the city of Paraty with an early morning wakeup call at 4 am due to the 5 hour drive ahead of us. The drive was through the windy and bumpy mountains. There was legitimately a speed bump every 200 meters. It was a bit rough, but we made it to the city rather tired around 11 am on Monday morning. After arriving to our hotel, Pousada da Corsario we unpacked our things and walked to get lunch at a local buffet in the center of the city,  with an assortment of Brazilian foods such as; chicken hearts, fish, chicken, pasta, and an assortment of delicious fruits.  We were in for a culture shock when we were told we cannot flush toilette paper down the toilet.

 The food this time was familiar after being in the country for three days. We finished lunch and came back to the hotel to relax for a bit before touring the historic square of Paraty that can only be accessed by foot or horse carriage (which we did not have). Walking around was an adventure in itself because the city was built in the 1800s and the streets are still in their original state that consisted of large waterfall boulders that are filled in with sand.  This, mixed with downpour rains made for an interesting time when it came time to go on our historic town tour.  Between having pop quizzes on historical happenings (clearly we didn’t pay attention in our history classes) and focusing on not twisting our ankles between rocks, to dodging piles of dog and horse mess and suffering from hypothermia, we did manage to learn a few things about Paraty.  We learned that Brazil was not a significant piece of land until its natural resources were minded such as gold, sugar cane, rare stones, and diamonds.  Portugal was  the first to claim this land, hence why they speak Portuguese (which we are slowly learning along the way).  Specifically, Paraty is a harbor city used for trading and exporting resources.  The town was lined with one-story  buildings that had beautifully  colored doors and windows.  The interesting thing about this town is that is it flooded for half the year.  The town was specially designed to accommodate the high tides.  Once the tour was over, we stopped at a few stores to see what Paraty had to offer the American tourists.  After we were completely soaked we came back to change into some dry clothes.  We then proceeded to go to our first dinner in the city.  We were surprised when we had to pick a “date” for dinner because the entrees were made to specifically feed two people.  We were entertained when a local street vendor came into the restaurant and made all of us flowers from palms.  Once dinner ended, we enjoyed the live band that brought out the Brazilian dancers in us all in the restaurant Paraty 33.  Since we had our Samba lessons, we thought we knew all there was to know about dancing.  Fernando even showed us a few new moves that had us falling out of our seats laughing.   He is a really good dancer and enjoyed showing us the dances he knew.  After a night full of laughter and memories, we walked back to our hotel for our first night’s sleep in a Brazilian city.