Saturday 22 Nov
6.30 am - Cardiff
Lucas has a hangover.  No one knows if he has been out all night drinking or whether he was born that way.  Either way, he still has a hangover.  We watch him and Nick argue who was the most drunk the night before. 

We watch 30 or so under 16s, their parents, their kit and no doubt the family dog trying to cram into a mini bus.  There are 24 Titans itching to get on our luxury 48 seater coach. 

"All aboard!"

24 people get on.  Doctor Geraint - 'Doc Hollywood' to his friends, although for some reason Wookie insists on calling him 'Flashman' - is late.  Then again, Geraint is always late.  When God was handing out late, Geraint was first in the queue.  Unfortunately, it was the wrong queue.  By the time he found the late queue, he was late. 

Bench coach Sean does a head count.  The response to his question of who is missing was a chorus of 'Geraint'.  A few minutes later, Doc arrives, apologising that he is late.  Off we go!

On the bus
Wookie comes up with a get rich quick scheme and does a whip round (keep your perversions to yourself!) and buys a shed load of lucky dip lottery tickets when we get to the services.  We are all going to be rich!!!  I've never seen a bunch of guys get so excited about 6 little balls.

Reading Services
Lucas still has a hangover and wants some food.  He also insists that he needs to visit the bathroom (beginning the American speak before we even get to New York) and tells us in intimate and explicit detail of his normal toilet behaviour.

24 hungry people get off the coach and are promptly mugged of all their money by the till operators as they buy a 'delicious' breakfast.  At least, that's how it looks on the pictures but as we all know, the truth is out there...and definitely not on our plates.

The newsagent is cleared out of copies of the Sun and The Sport.  Strangely for a hockey trip, nobody buys a girlie mag.  Geraint is taunted for a few minutes with a copy of 'The World's Greatest Medical Disasters".  We get back on the coach - Lucas still needs to visit the bathroom, but is quiet for a few minutes whilst looking at his Rough Guide to New York which he has just bought.  Kevin borrows it after Lucas is finished.

Heathrow
We reach Heathrow at 10.15, a full 4 hours before the plane takes off.  Still, the bar will be opening in 45 minutes.  Kenny picks up the team's sticks which the Stubble Brothers - Jon and Dai - left on the pavement.  Richie asks Ken if he has any luggage tags.  He hasn't.  Richie asks Ken what the hotel room is like.  He tells him that it's square, has a bed, a door, and if he's lucky, a bathroom.

We check in.  The Aer Lingus guy is Mr. Jobsworth who wants to check each bag, including the kit, for illegal things we can't take into America, like fruit and plants.  Instead, we check in with a nice Irish lass who we will quite happily show our jockstraps.  Richie asks Ken if he has any luggage tags.  He still doesn't.

We head to the departure area and everyone splits up.  Moggy goes to buy a guide of New York, everyone else goes to the bar.  Kenny was unfortunate enough to go to Duty Free where a very nice lady forced him to drink samples of Glenfidich whisky.  Which is nice.  She then forces him to drink a sample of Laphroaig, it would be rude not to.  Then she forces him to drink Strathisla.  It's lovely, so he buys a bottle.

We board the plane.  We are going by Iceland Air, via Reykjavik.  This is typical of the Titans, cheapskates to the last.  Why do something straight forward when you can really bugger it up.  Still, none of us have been to Iceland and are looking forward to the experience.  Plenty of jokes about Bjork and  fish and whale blubber.

On the plane to Iceland
The soothing tones of Bjork accompanies our lovely fishfingers and whale blubber lunch.

On the plane to New York
We board a different plane for the second leg of the journey.  Sticker realises he has left Lucas's New York guide book on the other plane.  Big altercation.

The team discovered the joys of ‘Viking’ beer, brewed with Icelandic barley and Icelandic water.  Lawrence, Serpico and Hoskins have taken a special likeness to it and try to drink the plane dry.  In fact, drinking the plane dry should be a pretty difficult task we have been told that we can only have two alcoholic drinks.  About 7 drinks later, a stewardess resembling Mrs. Doubtfire approaches Kenny. 
"Are you in charge?" 
"No, but I'm most sober." 
"One of your friends has had an accident" 
"Show me" 
She points to a puddle on the floor.
"I think we need a plumber" 
"Don't sell Lawrence any more beer.  I’ll have a whisky.  Make it a double, and ask that nice Helga to bring it to me."

JFK
We all get through customs OK.  Well, almost.  Sticker, slightly worse for wear after a tipple or two with Lucas and Geraint, has his second altercation of the tour.  He meets a very nice Norwegian man who jumps the queue.  Suitably fuelled by Jack Daniels, he insists that unless he gets to the back of the queue, "I’ll f@&*%$g chin you, you foreign b@*^$!$d".  (Quite ironic really as Sticker isn't exactly American either).  The poor guy was petrified.  He'd obviously heard about the infamous incident when Sticker was banned for life from Penarth post office for the same offence.

In broken English, the Norwegian protested his innocence.  Then all hell broke loose.  Sticker spotted the guy had an ‘I Love Jesus’ badge and claimed that he must be "Jumping the queue for Jesus".  Sticker, Pagan Sun God Worshipper as he is, decided to try to convert him to the worship of the hallowed turf of the Vetch Field.  It took a while, but we managed to calm him down.

On the plane, we all had to fill in immigration cards.  Wookie was clever enough to upset customs by claiming on his card that he came from Wales rather than the planet Zog.  And Leon was mistaken for the Columbian drug dealer, Mr. Big, and is questioned at length as to why he travels to Florida so much.  The threat of a latex glove extracts the truth - Leon is a closet member of the Mickey Mouse fan club. 

Two of the Old Pucks - Rob Gravina and Jimmy Cannery - are waiting for us at the airport.  They have laid on a bus and a case of beer.  At last, American Budwiser!  We head off to the Holiday Inn, Rockville Center, Long Island. 

Long Island
We meet our three Canadian playing partners who believe they are playing for the Welsh National side!  Chris McClean is the goalie and Jeff Coles is the scoring threat we so desperately need.  We hope that Craig will form a solid defensive partnership with his brother, Geraint.   We go to a place called McQuaid’s.  We all get very drunk, despite the fact that we are playing a game the next day.  We meet some nice American ladies.  Geraint uses the worse chat up line in the world, "Hey! I'm Geraint!  I'm from Wales!" and talks the night away with most of the bar.  His brother picks up want Doc couldn't handle.  Lucas meets a girl called Jamie.  She blonde, blue eyed, beautiful, big chested...and married!  No chance there then!
 

Things - dark, scary things - are going on in there, but we can only guess as to their nature.  For the most part, their secrets must remain just that, secrets.  But by their very nature, secrets have a nasty habit of revealing themselves and one or two of these came to the surface... 

After their first night together, Sticker was the first to wake.  He stretched his arms and gently caressed Wookie's beard.  He yawned, "I think I'll have a shower."  Feeling a little disgusted with himself having been up until the wee small hours, drinking beer and partying with his compadres, he gingerly headed towards the bathroom. 

He clicked on the bathroom light, quietly opened the door and stepped in (cue loud, scary music).  There, in front of him, IT sat.  Brown, shiny, steaming on the floor, IT sat there, challenging him. 
Sticker screamed - he rushed out of the bathroom, wailing and cursing at the top of his voice,

"You dirty b*!%!£&s!  Which one of you dirty b*!%!£&s did that?" 
"What?" 
"That turd on the bathroom floor, you dirty b*!%!£&s!" 
They looked at IT. 

"Not me" said Lawrence. 
"Not me" said Lucas. 
"Wasn't me" said Wookie, trying to think of something different. 
"It must have been one of you dirty b*!%!£&s!  It wasn't there last night!  I'm off, I'm not sharing a room with you dirty b*!%!£&s!" 
And he was off... 

"It wasn't me" said Lawrence, beginning to doubt himself. 
"It wasn't me" said Lucas, beginning to doubt himself. 
"Wasn't me" said Wookie, trying to think of something different. 

Wookie went to investigate.  There IT was, in all IT'S glory, sitting beside the toilet on the floor.  He took a closer look.  Then a closer one.  Then a sniff.  He picked it up and walked back to the bedroom. 

"Is this your chocolate cake, Sticker?" 

Several other strange things happened in that room.  Sticker became almost a recluse.  He never came out during daylight hours.  He claimed to be watching movies.  We think he has become a vampire. 

Sticker has lost Moggy's New York guide book.  Big altercation! 

GAME - Cardiff Titans vs New York Coaches
Rob collects us in the bus and takes us to Staten Island via Manhattan.  As it's night time, New York is all lit up and looks great. 

We reach the rink and discover that we are playing the coaches team.  They catch us on a hop.  Unfortunately, our hopping session lasts a full 60 minutes and we get stuffed.  Chris has a BIG game in goal, otherwise it could have been even more embarrassing than the 9-4 score line.  I wonder what the score would have been if they carried on adding goals to the coaches after the 2nd period?  Rob, playing for the coaches, felt sorry for us and decided to help us by taking out his own players with slap shots.  It still doesn't help. 

Kenny picks a fight with Nick.  Then his line mates. Then the rest of the team. 

Sean is showing remarkable composure on his first ever appearance behind the bench.  Either he's been reading up on coaching skills or he's drunk.  We think he's drunk. 

Sian, Tracy and Anne are appointed official photographers for the tour but spend most of the time in the cafe drinking coffee to keep warm.
 

Walking away from Time Square, Chris and Jeff notice the Ed Sullivan theatre where the David Letterman Show is filmed and get way too excited.  Risking the deafening cacophony of car horns, they run across the road (not to difficult really as the road is grid locked) and try to get tickets.  Their pleas that they have come to New York from Canada just to see the show are met with mocking laughter.  Even so, the lady on the door (a babe we are told) tells them to call her in a few days.  Chris and Jeff insist that they are in there with both the Letterman Show and with the girl.

And on to Hooters - a place where the food is good, the beer is cold and the waitresses have got great...waitressing skills.  This is a male chauvinist pigs paradise.  A good time was had by all.  Sian, however, was the most popular girl in there when it was photo time and she was offered everyone's camera to a take a picture the boys will treasure forever! 

Somehow, just as it is getting dark and dangerous, we managed to lose Wookie.  This may have happened when we were going into the Disney Store when the security guard mistook him for the Yeti and cast him for the next Disney movie.  Fortunately, he got himself back to Rockville Centre, but most importantly, he found his way to McQuaids where we find him quaffing beers and cursing us.  He comes up with a story about being abducted by aliens.  This is quite plausible considering his likeness to Chewbacca and the rather strange implant up his nose.  Or is that a giant bogie? 

The Blue Note Jazz Club (Great!)
We have been invited by a member of the Old Pucks, Dwayne, to visit the well renowned Blue Note Jazz Club (Nice!) in Greenwich Village where he is the manager.  This cultural experience is lost on most of the team.  Kenny seemed to like it, although it may have been something to do with the McCallan whisky he was drinking, even though he had to re-mortgage the house to pay for it. Unfortunately, we weren't told that we had to pay to get out of the place either.  Dwayne, not the smallest of chaps in the world, didn't have to many arguments from the team.  Luckily for us, he was guesting for the Titans in our final game.
 

GAME - Cardiff Titans vs New York Old Pucks
We get the away team dressing room - the one where the Rangers will be the next day.  Stubble Brother Jon is very sad and sits in all the stalls and then each toilet so he can say that he has sat where Gretzky's ass has been.  We all tell Jon he is sad.

We are getting nervous about the game.  The thought of playing in front of 16,500 empty seats is freaking us out.  And it gets worse as they make us queue up in the corridor before we get on the ice.  Jon gets even more excited, "I'm standing where Gretzky will be standing!"  We all tell Jon to shut up.  Each team lines up along the blue line - the Welsh National Anthem booms out across the arena - awesome! 

The game itself goes great - a 4 - 4 tie.  The Titans first point in North America!  (In Canada we lost all four games but won the soccer match!  We did win one game in France, but that was against a team from London.)  A much better team performance, especially as Geraint actually passed the puck out of defence instead of going coast-to-coast.  It was nip and tuck all the way, but a very enjoyable experience.  Jon announces to the team that he has skated where Gretzky has skated.  We tell him that #99 skates a tad better that him and to shut up.  Sean is still an extremely calm and serene influence behind the bench - we have a vote - he must have a secret stash of Bud. 

Jeff tells us that the David Letterman Show tickets and the girl are a con. 

Sian has been talking to an Islanders official who says that we may be able to meet the teams the next day.  Jon wets his pants.
 

Islanders vs Rangers
What a game!  A full house saw a 4 - 1 victory to the Islanders.  We sat with the Rangers supporters and were treated to the full range of taunts from the home supporters.  Choruses of "If you all hate the Rangers clap your hands!" and "Gretzky Sucks!" rocked the building to the extent that some Rangers fans took it too much to heart and were thrown out! 

Leon was on top form and treated everyone to the new phrases he had picked up, his all time favourite being "You dumb f&%k!"  Leslie threatens to kill him, but Kenny talks her out of it - the rest of team will gladly do it for free. 

The game itself was brilliant.  Islanders were the better team on the night.  It was a once in a lifetime experience to see the Great One in action.  Rangers made a fight out of it - literally - but could only manage a single marker to the Islanders 4.    One of the players got a hat trick, and true to form, the game had to be stopped as the fans threw their hats onto the ice!  Amazing to think that the day before WE played on that ice!  Great stuff! 

HUGE beer session when we got back - it would be rude not to!  Big queue to get into McQuaids, but as we are regulars by now, we walk straight in. 
 

Madison Square Garden
The tour of Madison Square Garden was a sombre affair.  An awesome site, but too many sore heads to really appreciate the event.  I wonder if Lucas and Wookie knew they were sitting in Gretzky's stall? 

Shopping and Limping
Lesley and Tracy decide to go shopping, Moggy decides to tag along too.  The pace is frantic - the girls are notorious shoppers - and Moggy succumbs to the inevitable - he develops a serious shopping injury.  His left knee has frozen, leaving him with a pronounced limp and an empty wallet.  He is not going to make the final game the next day.  Instead, he buys a special clip board with a hockey rink outline printed on the back so he can take over Sean's coaching duties.  He has also taken to frightening the life out of people with weird and wonderful facts about everything and anything.
 

Wookie has taken over from Kenny in starting fights with his own team - this time Moggy catches his fury.  He puts up a spirited, if over technical,  fight but he is not match for the furry one, except for the technical bits which left Wookie scratching his head.  It turns out that Rob is actually running the bench and calling line changes.  Using an advanced form of ventriloquism, he makes Wookie think that Moggy was calling the changes.  Most people are only calling Moggy things with B and C and D and F and T.

Stubble Brother Jon has obviously benefited from skating on the same ice as Gretzky and contributes with an assist.  Craig and Geraint have recovered from their exertions with the local females and their bout of "Fatal Attraction" to play blinders on D.  In fact, the whole team is buzzing and we win something like 9 - 5. Huge celebrations and photo sessions follow the hand shakes.  Another two points in North America!

Then its off to somewhere for beer and pizza - all you can fit in for $9.  The pizza is great - the beer is disgusting, but we drink it anyway.  The speeches are pretty good and very heartfelt, but Rob feels it is necessary to bring up "that Louise nanny bird".  Sean is very cool about the whole thing.  We think he is very drunk. 
 

The plan is to get Leon to propose to Anne before we leave JFK.  Leon is not too sure, but the beer is telling him it is a good idea.  He is drunk, very drunk and is wearing that glazed, uncomprehending look that only drunks can wear.  We keep the pressure up and the beers flowing.  Kenny does a dry run to show him what to do. 

"Anne" Leon says, "Anne, darling, will you marry me?" 
"On your knees" she replies. 

Leon falls to the floor, picks himself up and is helped into a kneeling position. 

"Will you marry me?" he pleads. 
"Oh, alright then" 

Leon falls to the floor and does the dying fly.  Someone passes him a drink to calm his nerves. 
Isn't New York romantic?