All,

The season proper is just around the corner with the first league game taking place next week - what better time to think about going on tour...

Date and Cost: Tour is going to take place in late May, leaving for Brasil on 23rd and departing back to NY on 31st, arriving on June 1st. The cost is going to be circa $1,500 to $1,700 a man - but we have just under a year to do some serious fund raising and bring this level down by at least a few hundred dollars per head.

Tour Participants: The following people indicated a preliminary willingness to tour  - if you want to join this list, reply to nym_brazil08@hotmail.com by Tuesday of next week. Equally, if you now wish to withdraw from tour, now is the time to speak up. (Apologies to anyone who emailed a willingness but isn't on the list - my admin skills are not high.., see later):

David Elwell, Mike Bury, Ed Brydon, Luca Loguercio, Ryan Doyle, Brian Piantedosi, Christopher Getaz, Angel Rodriguez, Richard Richardson, Danny Sonon, Ben Whitney, Cody Eckstein, Josh Yakatan, Brian Tyler, Bill Ezzo, Sean Danahy, Andrew Mezo, Michael Martin, Scott Crafton, Dave Levine, Nick Mastrogeorgiou, Matthew Venzin, Ryan Hodson, Ryan McGarrity, Mike McNeil, Pat Schaal, Robin Lau (RJ), Chris Agnew, Dave Moylan

Hotel: We have a great hotel lined up - man sized beds, a pool and on the beach. http://www.praiaipanema.com/index.asp

Deposit: To ensure that we get a firm commitment and to secure the flights and hotel at today's prices, we need a deposit from every tourist. By 30th September, we need a non-refundable deposit of $250 per person. This does a couple of things - guarantee you a spot on the plane and guarantee that you will take a vested interest in attending tour fundraisers and the like.

The first tour fundraiser (Manahy and Gras take notes) will take place in the next 6 weeks - keep your eyes open for invites etc.

We will be setting up a separate bank account and tourists can be flexible in how they pay. We advise making monthly payments - but if you want to pay it up front, or wait until your annual bonus comes in, or set something different up, then that is fine. Non-payment means no tour.

The itinerary is shaping up something like this:

Friday: Fly out
Saturday: Game against a leadin Brasilian side
Sunday: Free day - beach
Monday: Statue of Christ the Redeemer
Tuesday: Beach barbecue and rugby
Wednesday: Free day
Thursday: Second game
Friday: Beach day, court etc
Saturday: Go home

We will add more to it as time passes (soccer game. suar loaf tour, mountain climbing, surfing) and we get a better idea of the numbers of tourists and any particular interests.

A request - I am not strong on the admin side of things. If there is anyone out there (preferably a tourist) who would like to join the tour committee in an administerial capacity, monitoring payments, collecting details and so on - please let me know. Don't be shy, I know there is a volunteer out there!

We have a date, we have tourists, we have time to sort this out properly - all aboard?

Regards

O Juiz