By Laura Russell
Do you like to travel? Do you like to travel internationally? Well, traveling to practice dragon boating or racing in dragon boats is a whole new level! I have traveled once to Florida to attend camp and once to Florence, Italy for the 2018 IBCPC. When I was leaving Boston with my paddle on my back and my bags for Florida, people looked at me strangely but when I arrived in Florida and saw so many others with paddles, we all knew we were there for the same reason and we felt a kinship before we even said hello! I had no idea how I was going to get from the airport to my hotel in Florida and I walked up to someone holding a paddle in the car rental line and asked if they were going to the same place and if they had room for one more person, SCORE!
Years later we met at the IBCPC, having stayed in touch via social media. I had given my paddle to the team I was paddling with to Florence so they could transport it with the others, which was wonderful. I flew by myself and met my team at the airport in Florence, Italy where the travel company had made arrangements for a luxury bus to transport us to our hotel and other excursions. It was the BEST trip I had been on in a long time. I was with people of different ages, nationalities, spoke different languages, some had hair, some didn’t, some were still going through treatment, still others were years out of treatment, some had supporters with them, others just came by themselves, but we were all breast cancer survivor dragon boaters and we all helped one another, hugged one another, supported one another. I had torn my hamstring 7 weeks earlier and was amazed at all the people willing to help me from roommates, to teammates, to hotel staff, and at the festival. I was not alone.
I will never forget going into a jewelry store on the Ponte Vecchio and some dragon boaters came inside. I knew they were dragon boaters by their shirts. What was great was we knew we already had three things in common – breast cancer, dragon boats, and we were not from Italy. We started talking and it felt like we knew each other for more than 5 minutes. Then we kept looking for each other around Italy because most of us were continuing our trip after the IBCPC. To this day, I stay in touch with some of them, they are from Australia.
Things to remember when traveling for dragon boating:
Bring your favorite dragon boat gear – bike shorts & outer shorts or whatever you wear, team shirt, water shoes, dragon saddle, water bottle, hat & gloves (if you use them regularly)
Paddle & blade cover – festivals don’t always have different lengths so best to pack your own if you are able; if you buy a paddle bag, make sure you can fit at least 2 paddles in it – help to defray airline costs if you share with another person & maybe fit dragon saddle or towel around paddles to protect them a little more
I like to bring my own PFD but make sure you are allowed to wear it – some festivals insist on you wearing “matching” PFDs/their PFDs.
Your favorite energy bars because sometimes the food served during lunch at festivals is too heavy on race day – it was 90-100 degrees in Florence with high humidity and they were serving pasta & rolls for lunch
If possible bring an extra team shirt if you want to trade shirts – some of the team shirts are amazing – in Florence the sought after shirt was the Australian teams
Bring pins if you like to trade pins
Bring first aid items: Electrolytes!!!, Voltaren, bandages, pain meds, Benadryl, ice packs that you snap, hand sanitizer
Camera or phone or iPad (but clean up space before you leave home)
Clothesline for room to dry paddle gear
Reusable grocery bag that packs small
BUT MOST OF ALL bring toilet paper! Yup, toilet paper.
(Do I add this – That was the most coveted item in Florence. If you had toilet paper everyone flocked around you for some.)
I miss that water bottle…..
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