So as you probably know, I am doing an internship in US right now and will stay here for almost 6 months . I have to admit — this is the longest I have ever stayed abroad. I am not really sure what to expect and what will change during my time here, but I definitely expect it to be a great experience in many ways… So far I cannot really write anything about my work – it’s been only a week after all.

If everything goes well, 2012 will be quite funny year for me. So far I have spent 3 months living in Sweden, then 10 days in Czech, and if everything goes according to the plan, by the end of September I will have spend 6 months in States… So all in all, 9 month out of 12 living abroad. Can it get any better? :)

No matter you what think, my opinion is that you are young only once and you’d better enjoy it as much as you can (till you can). And so you should do whatever you enjoy. In my case, it’s travelling, meeting new folks and just not caring about all the serious shit called career, family life etc. But do get me wrong, I will get there, eventually…

But I got a bit off topic.  My first days @ US. What they were like? Just plain AWESOME!

I decided to fly to NYC as the flights were a bit cheaper and mostly because of the fact that my cousin lives there. So I said to myself, how about Easter weekend in New York? Why the hack not :)

I got there quite late – the expected time of arrival to JFK airport was around 9pm (US time), but then you add 2 more hours for immigration check-up, half an hour till you actually get to the train and then more than 75min long subway ride to Manhattan… All in all, it took me longer to get from JFK to my cousin’s place than to fly from Prague to Warsaw. But eventually, all was good, we stayed up quite late and hit the bed around 4am (≈ 10 am Prague time), so I was quite dead.

Next item on the agenda was pancake breakfast… We needed to eat a lot since the plan for Saturday was some serious sightseeing :). And I guess we did quite good with that.

Then we set off to see Brooklyn Botanic Garden, where I have never been to. That place was just amazing and I took more than a hundred pictures. But more importantly, I met up with my friend from Prague – Pavol (NYC Googler). We talked quite a bit, then met his friends, went for a small snack and parted our ways. This wasn’t the last time I saw him this summer, and as he had different plans, we said bye-bye. After the garden visit, we hopped on subway once again and continued our journey to Brooklyn Bridge.

The weather was stunning and I was able to take couple of really nice panorama-pics. Just check them out on my Flickr page!

Once we were done with that, we started arguing about what place to go to for a dinner. After a while, we settled for sushi Tenzan, a place where we have been numerous time already and it’s definitely the best sushi restaurant I have ever experienced! And with crepe cake and hot sake shot in the end, we decided to wrap up  the day.

The plan for Sunday was a bit different – no more sightseeing, rather sporty stuff! Wake up early, hit some bagels with jelly, run 3miles to the swimming pool, swim for an hour or so, than run 4 miles back… lunch, rest a bit and hop on the bikes for a small (50 miles) ride alongside 9w bike-route. And it all actually worked out incredibly well, even though I had some doubts for a minute since my training was everything but not consistent in last weeks… And I just wasn’t sure if I actually could handle that much.

But I did handle it  all, more or less. Running and swimming ware fine, bike ride was EPIC, even though I was hurting like hell in last 10 miles. But my friends took it easy and the pace (because of me) wasn’t any brutal… But the best part ware the sceneries that we drove along. It was just great – beautiful views, perfect (well, a bit windy) weather, no cars, hell of a route! This was one of the best rides I have ever done in NYC and our small refreshment stop at the "By the way, BAKERY” was just the tip of an iceberg for me (had a mind-blowing chocolate-pecan cake).

We got back quite late, just when the sun was about to go down… Once last delicious dinner, couple beers and I started getting ready for the bus ride next day before I hit the bed. All in all, just awesome 2 days in NYC and I cannot wait to get back to that city any time soon!

Next morning was quite easy – get up on time, grab a cab and wait for GreyHound bus to DC. Everything went well, thanks to my cousin, my snack-bag was bigger than my meal-supply for 2 days :). Yet I enjoyed it as always.

Thanks, Martina, for everything!

Check out my Flickr links:

1. Arrival to US
2. Day I @ NYC
3. Day II @ NYC

PS: more coming soon!

This is (finally) the last part of our travelling diary from summer spent in the United Stated. In the previous report, I covered post-season work that was done by me and a couple of other friends. It was fun, it was long hours though and in the end, we all were glad that it is over :-).

We were supposed to hit Six Flags theme park one more time as a company retreat, but due to the bad weather it was postponed to mid September… which made it impossible for me to attend, as I had already booked some flights to Miami, FL. Yep, that’s what lifeguards do :-D.

To be specific — we finished work by 9th September, my first flight was scheduled on early morning 12t September. So I had 3 more free days, which we really enjoyed with our friends from the pool. We went to a steakhouse (Outback), a pancake house (iHop)… It was all about eating, packing, and eating once more.

The very last night spent in Baltimore was as easy-going as possible. My friend Neeraj helped me out and let me stay at his place. And since he got new DSLR, we went our for a short walk in the harbor. And man, we took a lot of pictures :-)

Catching the flight in the early morning next day was easy — the transport in Baltimore is superb and after hopping on the first light rail (= train), I got  to BWI Airport a way sooner than I actually needed to. I was a bit afraid of the security checks and everything else, but as it turned out, nobody was really pushy and I was even able to „smuggle“ some  cosmetics I wasn’t supposed to be carrying :-).

I got to Miami right before lunch time and the only thing I had to do was catching a ship — yes, that’s right: We were supposed to go on a CRUISE :-). So I jumped on a blue van (service called SuperShuttle), paid 20$ and got to Miami Port. Once again, way sooner than I actually needed to. But it was a smart choice since there was a buffet lunch being served on the pool deck :-). Right after that, I waited for my friends to arrive… and then we left for BAHAMAS PARADISE!

The itinerary of our 4-day cruise adventure was as following:

• NASSAU @ Bahamas
• COCOCAY @ Bahamas
• KEY WEST @ Florida

Sounds amazing? It truly was! To describe my first experience to someone who has never been on a cruise, that’s almost impossible. Let’s just keep it to „the most awesome 4 days in my life“. Everything was taken care of, you didn’t need to do anything apart getting (at least) some sleep before another day full of eating and partying began. All that mixed with snorkeling, jetskis, gym, jacuzzi, and ordering room service at 2am :-).

The stops we made were great. It all worked like this: you arrived to a port in the morning, went for a breakfast (well, more like four breakfast meals in a row :-), then got off the ship and spend a day on Bahama island doing whatever you pleased, then got back, ate a snack, went to gym/running track and got ready for a rather posh dinner with several dishes (and deserts)… some rest afterwards before evening program (=parties) kicked in :-). That was it, 4 days in a row. We were „genuinely smashed“ — to quote our Aussie friends during the very last breakfast buffet.

In the end, I have to say I was really glad the cruise was over :-). Once we were back in Miami port, we jumped into a taxi and drove over to our hotel in South Beach. Even though we had some plans to see the beach etc., we all went to bed instead and slept for several hours. That was the aftermath after our cruise — it literally destroyed us, yet we had the time of our lives :-)

The only thing we needed to do that day was to pick-up my brother who was arriving from Tampa. And after that, another party. This time at Miami Beach with a couple of lifeguards from around Maryland and also 2 girls from Virginia, who were on W&T as well and also happened to be our high school friends.

As a part of our preparation, we went to liquor store and „got ready“ with some rum. Which was a bad decision to make :-) Right now, that night is often referred to as „a night we will never talk about“ since a lot of bad things happened. No one got injured (or arrested), fortunately, only „material damage“ :-)

After the „night we will never talk about“ we still had almost full three days left before our flight back to Europe. Even though we made a very thorough plan, we had to make a lot of changes as well since everything was a bit different from what we expected. Also, thanks to our wild party on Miami Beach, we lost like half-a-day that we spend in the bed… recovering :-).

So the next day was about sightseeing in Miami, and is there a better way to do it than with a bike? Sure not! To summarize, we biked for more than 40 miles and our main goal was to see Key Biscayne, which was one of the best things we could do! It was beautiful, stunning and we got to see some EPIC houses of american rock-stars and whatnot.

We got back just a couple of minutes before the bike-rental shop closed down. It was very adventurous (and tiring) ride, we got one flat (thanks to bad karma, of course :-), but we enjoyed ourselves like little kids. When I was selecting which pictures to include in this report, I almost started crying and wanted to go back right away :-). We had an unforgettable day, one that I would put among the best ones during summer 2012.

And to make things even more interesting, take a look at this video!

That was our last day in Miami. It was also a very first time we went to bed before midnight and instead of a party we went for a nice meal in a „local“ Cuban restaurant. We needed to get some rest — a long drive to Orlando was on the itinerary the very next day :-).

And it all started rather boring — a taxi drive to Avis car rental, getting another SUV (we ended up with KIA this time) and setting off for yet another fascinating adventure. It was a very long drive and we planned to make some sightseeing breaks. But, as always, we had to change plans :-). This time it wasn’t our fault entirely — our GPS broke down and we had to drive to Miami Airport to replace it, which caused us to cancel the trip to Everglades (national park with alligators and everything else). … I was actually really looking forward to seeing it all, but what the heck.

This wasn’t the last time we went to Florida :-).

With a new satnav (and some extra miles), we headed to Palm Beach, where we got a short rest and went for a „swim“. It was one of the nicest summer places and it had huge waves too, so we played — once again — like little kids!

After that, another 100+ miles to Cocoa Beach, our next destination. We were supposed to see Kennedy Space Center but somehow missed the opening hours… :-) So instead, we went to Ron Jon surf shop, one of the most famous surf places in the world. And since we were in THE surfers’ city, we had to hit the beach and grab some pictures too.

With Cocoa Beach crossed off of our list, there was one very last thing to do. It is actually related to our very first day in USA — when we arrived and got rid off all the responsibilities and paperwork at the aquatics office, we went to Domino’s Pizza for late dinner. And we made a deal that we would do the same thing on our very last day. So guess what :-)

Bellies full Domino style and everyone was happy. That was the very last evening in USA. But we were still more than 1 hour drive from Orlando Airport and had an (very) early flight to catch. Once again, to make a long story short — it all worked out, surprisingly we didn’t crash the car and got safely where we need to be. Then, it was just one very long day and we covered more than 6 thousand miles that day. Awesome? You bet…

True story! :-)

And now, 2 months later, I finally found some time (and motivation) to wrap up this diary. I will be repeating myself this time, but the summer we spent in Baltimore was one of the best times of my entire life — mainly thanks to the perfect work conditions we had, great group of people around us (mostly from high school) and absolutely laid-back lifestyle, which is something I miss the most right now. But what can you do… Life goes on, summer paradise is over and school/work schedule is fine too, only different.

Trust me, if you ever get a change to go on W&T program (lifeguarding or anything else), go for it. You won’t have time later on, that’s guaranteed… And if you take care of things soon enough, you will have an epic summer that will probably change the rest of your life :-D If you are not convinced yet, take a look at this photo collection from our whole summer!

KeyLanding & Post Season

So this is the last report from our Work&Travel summer spent in USA. I would be probably repeating myself now… but who cares:

It’s been one of the greatest summers ever; and the decision we made with my brother and other friends to go there… I consider to be one of the best I’ve ever-ever-ever-ever made in my life!

Last week at work was kinda different. I and my brother were moved to different pool (The Key Landing). We’ve been there already, so we knew what to expect. The pool itself is OK, it’s just that the location is not so good. It’s very far from everywhere… TacoBell, Mars groceries, bus to Baltimore. And since we didn’t have our own car during the summer, that sucks a lot! But as I said, we knew what to expect so we got ready :-).

And the best part is that the group of lifeguards who worked there for the very last week was just awesome and male-only (we weren’t the only ones being moved). So I guess you can say that we enjoyed it!

That’s us watching a movie… at work! :-)

The weather in September wasn’t very good, which was perfect for us as lifeguards– not too many people showed up. I can’t really remember the details now, but I am sure that we had at least 2 days totally off… It was raining lightly, the temperature got down to low 70s F.

So perfect „work conditions“, it can’t get it any better :-)

And we had lotta time for goofing around!

Among other things, I finally learned how to do a backflip. It took me a whole summer and there is still a lot of room for improvement, but at least I am not afraid of going backwards blindly anymore :-).

All-in-all, it went really fast and last couple days lifeguarding were actually the ones most-easy going. We had a great team, enjoyed ourselves tremendously… and just kinda took it easy as the summer was finally winding down.

Post Season

On the very last day of the pools being open (5th Sep) — once we closed down the pool, we started so-called post-season. In the span of next 4 days or so, we were going all around Baltimore and made sure that the pool were ready for winter (hiding furniture, lowering water level, etc.)… one after another. It wasn’t very interesting job, but once again – we had LOTTA FUN!

Not to mention the final after-after-parties only for those who stayed (couple guys), including our very first — but legendary — visit to Hustler Club in Baltimore :-).

After all the work left was done, I had 2 days to pack and say good-bye to everyone we got close to during the summer. We went „celebrating“ to stake house, iHop and couple other places. It all got very emotional and I can’t say that there were no tears involved :-).

I would just like to say one big THANK-YOU to Jule and Neeraj, who helped us quite a lot with everything related to our travels (transport, luggage etc.). Without you, everything would be much more complicated and we would probably get into some sort of troubles. So thanks again, I can’t wait to see you again — hopefully quite soon!

Last night in Baltimore

My last day in Baltimore was amazing. After I finally woke up (which was hard since we had lot of beers to finish before I left :-), I got my stuff ready and left Cockeysville to sleep over at one of our friends in downtown. It was raining almost all day, but that didn’t stop Baltimore Ravens from crushing the arch-enemy Pittsburgh Steelers :-). I didn’t see the game in person — the tickets were outsold weeks prior to the game… But it was just something unforgettable to see everyone wearing something purple and going crazy about the game. That’s just another thing I love about US: sports and thousands (I mean many and many thousands!) of fans cheering up the local team!

We went for one last walk to Baltimore Harbor… then hit the bed as I had to get up quite soon because of my flight to Miami, FL! And that would be the topic of the very last report! Stay tuned :-)