Planning for Week 06

So there it was, Week 6… We had actually already completed the “just thinking” weeks/months ago. When Rhein Fire announced the flight with the team and fans to Madrid, we thought in a brief moment of mental derangement, great idea… we’re in. We booked without further ado. I have to say that we’re not really fans in the true sense of the word, we have several teams that we think are cool, but we’re not really fans of any one franchise. Rhein Fire is right up there. We’ve always been treated well there and have met some really unique and nice people. But being ELF nomads and fans of the league rather than fans of a franchise made it a little hard for us to immerse ourselves in a fan trip. But we wanted to go back to Madrid anyway because we loved it there so much. So why not on a plane with Rhein Fire, who we also like. So it wasn’t that difficult for us after all. The flight cost €399 per person (return), which wasn’t cheap but was definitely fair.

Our goals were, of course, a few shots and possibly conversations with the players. A kind of documentation of the trip with the fans and cheerleaders. And other interesting motifs that you don’t get every day. Plus, of course, our equipment that had to come along. Reunion with friends (shout-out to Tom and Roberto). And the reunion with a few players (shout-out to Ja’Len Embry and half of the Bravos).

So the flights were already booked and paid for. The destination was also clear, as was which game we would be photographing. There were just a few “small” problems. The first “problem” was that the flights were, of course, to and from Düsseldorf. You’d think that wouldn’t be a problem these days. But unfortunately it wasn’t quite that easy. The flight left at 9 a.m., as online check-in is not possible on a charter flight, so we had to be there earlier. Ideally around 7-7:30am. Trains weren’t running at that time. A bus simply takes far too long to leave in the morning. We also hadn’t found anyone who wanted to take us from the bus station in Düsseldorf to the airport. As I unfortunately have an eye condition that makes it impossible for me to drive at night, we had to take the Flixbus overnight again. We had originally planned to do the same for the return journey.