Catching up: Minnesota to Kansas City

You’ve probably noticed it’s been a while since our last post. We spent these last few days camping in The Grand Tetons and Yellowstone, and before that, well, we were just lazy and we're on the move a lot. Moral of the story is there is a lot to catch up on, so we’ll spare some of the minute details for the sake of time. We left off in Milwaukee and since then we’ve been to Minnesota, Kansas City, St. Louis, back to KC, Denver, and then began our camping trip on the way to Seattle. And that brings us to today as I write this from I-90 west in Idaho.
We headed out from Wisconsin for the Twin Cities to see the Twins play the Royals (yes, we saw the Royals AGAIN. Couldn’t we have found a better team to see all the time?) As most of you know, the Twinkies just opened up their new stadium this year, Target Field, which is an outdoor field and made a lot of noise because the team has played in a dome for a long time. We got to the stadium a couple hours before the game and toured the outside of the park since it wasn’t yet open. Some highlights included a huge bronze baseball mit, this wall that was lined with shiny aluminum flaps that sort of fluttered when the wind blew, so it made it look like the wall was kind of fluid, and really the fact that the place was so clean. Most of the parks we’ve seen so far are well more than a year worn, so it was definitely a change. I also liked the color of the building structure which was sort of a reddish brown hue. We eventually made our way into the field for the game and found our seats in the lower left field bleachers just behind the foul pole. The twins won the game so it was a great atmosphere…and I think Twins fans are of the more passionate we’ve seen so far on this trip. There was also some good variety of food in the park, including the stir fry that Andy got. But, all in all, I thought Target Field was nice, but nothing really that spectacular. We didn’t know anyone in the Twin Cities and we were both pretty beat from a long couple days, so after the game we decided to just crash in a motel and hit the road early for Kansas City, where we would be staying with Andy’s Aunt Chip.
We hit the road early for our trek down to Missouri. After picking up Joyce’s tent from her brother’s house in Minneapolis, we found out first hand how boring Iowa really is. The weather was awful, with 55mph gusts and it was pouring buckets! But it was strange rain because it would pour for 30 seconds, be completely sunny for a few minutes, then absolutely pour again. It also didn’t help that we were on I-35 and only I-35 for the whole state of Iowa.
We finally made it to Kansas City, which was great because Aunt Chip made us feel right at home. She fed us like kings and it was great to relax in her house for a few days and spend some time out of the Tacoma. While we were there, we spent some time with Chris (Andy’s cousin, Aunt Chip’s son and brother to Steve who we went to the Milwaukee game with) his wife Katy and their two boys Tyler and Max, who were awesome. One of the funniest parts of our stay there was this one time I was walking out of Steve and Katy’s house to the truck, and Tyler (who is about 3) said “How is he going to fit in there??” (If you don’t know, I’m 6’5” so I get a lot of height comments). That was great.
The second day we were there (I think) we visited the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum. They don’t call it a hall of fame because in their minds everyone was a hall of famer, which I thought was a nice touch. It was a really cool place with a movie to start that talked about the history of the league and some of the more successful players like Satchel Paige and Jackie Robinson, which was followed up by a walking tour with all sorts of different info, artifacts, signs, posters, old scorecards and all kinds of stuff. We even learned that the first time lights were ever used for a baseball night game was in the Negro Leagues, and it actually did a lot to attract fans and eventually made its way to the Major Leagues. There was also a gift shop, where we got a couple things. One of the teams was the Pittsburgh Crawfords, which for one year had an amazing five future MLB hall of famers on the team, and Andy was able to find a Crawfords’ hat. The funny thing was, the next night we were watching Baseball Tonight and the Indians and Pirates were wearing Negro League uniforms so the Pirates were wearing the Crawfords stuff, which was quite the coincidence!
So, our game in St. Louis was before the Kansas City game. After a few day hiatus at Aunt Chip’s, we crossed Missouri on I-70 (another long, straight, boring road that we got very used to) to go to St. Louis. We found a Days Inn which, from the internwebs, seemed not too far from downtown. It was a real nice hotel for not much money, but the bad part was it was about a 2 mile hike to the downtown area and wasn’t quite in the best area. Fortunately we were only there for a night. We got there and we were both pretty tired, so we had to take some time to get our modes up. Then we made the trek to Union Station which we thought would be cool. They had some alright shops and a food court, but the best score was a sports shop that had a buy one baseball hat get another at half price. We had been on the lookout for something like that, so I got a new Sox cap (I had only had the Memorial Day version until then) and a throwback Brewers hat (the one with the glove), and Andy got a D.C. Memorial Day and baby blue Royals hat.
Then we went to the Stadium and got our tickets and walked around the outside. They had a lot of awesome bronze statues of the Cardinals greats like Stan The Man Musial and Ozzie Smith, my favorite shortstop of all time. We then found a bar to get a couple beers before the game and were thoroughly entertained by some guy who turned 60 that day and was there with his son who was about our age. So we got in the usual rigamaro with them, telling them about the trip and such. But, they were both pretty sloshed so it was really just funny to listen to them for a while. Busch Stadium was really a cool place. It was fairly new and had good stores, including a bat manufacturing shop right in the stadium. Our seats were in the third row of the right field bleachers. It was blindingly sunny that day so not only were we sweating bullets but we were almost completely blinded by the sun for the first few innings. They were playing the Mariners and Ichiro led off the game with a home run which was coming right at us. We both stood up when we saw the right field coming back to the wall. Then he turned around ‘cause he knew it was gone and we were like “Oh, S%*#!!”. We had no clue where it was, but it turned out to be a whole section above us so it was an absolute BOMB! If you happened to be watching ESPN that night you can vaguely see us, Andy dressed in all red and me being the tall goofy kid in a white soccer jersey (it’s on the wrap in recommended links). The game was a fun one and the Cardinals won. We checked out a couple bars after the game and made it back to the hotel.
The next morning, we watched some soccer and then headed to the Arch and went up to the top in the little tram cars they have. It was really cool…definitely do it if you go to St. Louis. Next, it was back onto I-70 to head back to K.C.

(FYI...we are actually in Los Angeles now but are still slacking with the posting/internet availability. I wrote all that a few days ago so we'll have more to come soon. And by the way...we've driven 3000+ miles in 10 days. Wow.)

Made it to the Pacific

GeoTagged, [N42.53760, E124.39722]

We haven't made a post in a while so I thought I would give you a quick update. As you may have noticed, we haven't posted to the actual blog in a while. This is not due to us having fallen off the earth, just that we have been occupied having such a good time.

AND WE MADE IT TO THE PACIFIC!

Since our last post we have gone to a Twins, Cardinals, Royals, Rockies, and Mariners game. Joyce and Jen joined our trek and camped through Wyoming to Seattle. We got to go white water rafting, drive the beartooth pass and

We will post more later!

Mile: 6,712.4

The Brew Crew and Wisconsin

As I mentioned before, we had a few days to wind it down in Edgerton after a long and fast paced stay in Chicago. Steve and Traci put together a great feast of ribs, corn on the cob, and baked beans Sunday night and we took it easy around the house. They both had to work Monday, but we stayed at the lake house and did a little fishing off their dock on the Rock River across the street, which feeds into Lake Koshkonong. No catches but Andy had a bite.

Our tickets for the Brewers game at Miller Park were for Tuesday night, so Andy and I headed over to Milwaukee early in the day to hit up a couple brewery tours (if we are going to see the "Brewers" we gotta check out the breweries). First, we went to the Miller Brewery, which was something of a town in itself, called "Miller Valley, where it's always Miller Time." Miller is the second largest brewer in the world, I believe, and the tour started off with a fancy movie in their own, three screen theater, then a walking tour in and out of some of their buildings. We got to check out the different equipment they use, learn about their brewing process, see their bottling and packaging buildings, learn about some of the history, and then finally taste some free beer at the end. We got Miller Lite, Miller Genuine Draft, and Lienenkugel's Summer Shandy. Not the best lineup by any means, but it was free so no harm done.

After the Miller Tour, we went to a smaller local brewery called Lake Front Brewery. Ahh, now this was a brewery tour. As they well emphasized throughout the tour, they were by no means Miller, and were not trying to be. Their version of a fancy introduction movie was some guy holding up different pictures of hops and barley as he spoke, which was pretty funny. And, we got the beer in the beginning, middle, and end of the tour which was loads more fun. Though, it was $7, but worth it because we got a pint glass at the end. The tour guide (also poster holder) was a riot, cracking jokes at everyone in the crowd, as well as Miller quite a few times. Their beer was really tasty though, and it was a much more laid back atmosphere, so Lake Front won the brewery tour battle of Milwaukee.

And that's about when the rain started. It came down hard and didn't stop for quite a while, but luckily Miller Park is one of the few enclosed stadiums we'll see on this tour so we were still able to enjoy the game and stay dry (well, once we got to park at least). We got to the park and met Steve and Traci in a Friday's restaurant they have in left field right inside the stadium. It was pretty cool to sit in there and watch the teams take B.P., similar to what they had in Cincy. After some appetizers and drinks, they kicked us out because of the hour time limit at a table. It was just a way to try to usher more people in, so we walked around the park and then headed to our seats for the game.

Miller Park was really a great place. The roof was closed because of the heavy rain, but we learned that when the weather is nice, not only the roof but also the windows all around the sides open up. We were sitting with Steve's friend from work Gregg (who secured the tickets for us. Thanks very much Gregg!) and his family, so we had quite the crew of Gregg, his wife, their two daughters, Steve, Traci and Andy and I. Some other highlights are the big slide out in left field that Bernie the Brewer slides down whenever the Brew Crew (aka Brewers) hit a home run. We even got to see one that night, but I was too slow with the camera to snap a photo of Bernie himself sliding down the slide. For the most part, it was a pitcher's duel between Ted Lilly of the Cubs and Yovani Gallardo of the Brewers. So, Steve came up with some great ways to keep us entertained: first, we had the "Mound Game", where each of us got a certain inning, top and bottom half. If the ball settled on the mound at the end of the inning (either by the umpire, or tossed out by the catcher, you get the point), then everyone else owed a dollar to whoever had that inning. Andy and I had never heard of that one, so we'll have to pass that along throughout the trip; Then he busted out the home run derby contest, where we held a draft of two players from each team (adjust according to party size. Only Steve, Andy and I played this game) who we thought would hit a home run throughout the course of the game, and again whoever got it right got paid.

Surprisingly, there were almost just as many Cubs fans as there were Brewers fans this night (including Steve). It made for a good atmosphere though, and the game ended with excitement when the Brewers had a walk off single to score two runs and win the game in the bottom of the ninth (you can guess, Steve wasn't too happy). It was our first walk off of the trip! And, we were starting to think we were a curse for home teams because everyone we went to see seemed to lose in their home stadium, so all in all it was a great night. Andy and I both agreed that it was also the front runner for best stadium of the trip thus far.

The next night we needed to be in Minneapolis for the Twins game, so we decided to crash back at the lake house in Edgerton since it was an hour and half closer than going back to Steve and Traci's house. That pretty much wrapped it up for Milwaukee so it was on to the Twin Cities. Oh yeah, and we did try the famous Wisconsin cheese. It was good.

The Windy City: Part II

So, we left off after our tour on Friday afternoon after of downtown Chicago and the Willis Tower. Once we got back to Hyde Park, Aric invited us to join him and the U Chicago D.O.G.S (Department of Geophysical Sciences) softball team who plays every Friday. It turned out they had wayy more than enough players that night, so we all turned to some cornhole and a 30 rack of Pibbers (aka PBR). Probably for the better that we didn't play...it wasn't much of a competition but it was definitely a great time and was fun to meet some of Aric's co-workers.

Little did we know, that 30 pack turned into a liquid dinner for some of us (Al). After the softball game we went to Aric's friend Ann's house, but didn't stay long since she had plans to go to a cat's birthday party (strange, I know). So, we left Ann's and wandered around until we found an appealing bar, which ended up being one where we got a free personal pizza with every beer, so that made it an easy choice. After hanging there for a while, we moved along to another spot with some pool tables and such. It was getting late, so Aric, Mara, Andy and Al made their way back to Hyde Park. But, some of the bars stay open until 4am, so Matt and I forged on and found another bar (we were also enticed by these two girls who said they lived in Hyde Park and were going to some club first, but that fizzled out real quick when they said this club was 40 blocks away). We eventually got a cab and made it back after a looonnggg day in Chi Town.

Saturday, we got some breakfast and then chilled out by Lake Michigan which is only a few blocks from Aric's apartment. Later that night, we hit the town in style and went to the John Hancock Tower downtown for drinks. Probably the classiest place we've been to on the trip, as we were 95 stories up in the Signature Room, with gorgeous views of the city on a clear night. Later on, we met up with Ann and some of her friends at this place called the Hideout, which was a bar/dance club in some strange middle of nowhere part of the city. We were waayyy overdressed but still had lots of fun. We were the last ones there around 2am, and the bartender mentioned this place down the street that was open 'till 4 or 5 so we gave it a shot. Turned out to be this biker bar, which was rather interesting but we only stayed for a beer and then crashed.

It's pretty obvious we were all in need of some R&R, so we chillaxed at the beach and then went to one of Mara's friends who was having a cookout for Memorial Day and played some 'hole. Speaking of that...even though its a little belated a special and sincere thank you goes out to all the men and women who have served or are serving our country to protect our freedom and our country.

Anyways, Matt and Alex both headed back to Boston on Monday, and Aric obviously was busy throughout the week with school and work, so things quieted down quite a bit from there.

We were back at the baseball on Tuesday with a visit to US Cellular Field in the south side. The White Sox were hosting the Texas Rangers (who we've seen twice now), but lost 9-6. We've got another post in the works just for this game, so you can all check that out shortly.

On Wednesday, Andy and I walked around the North Michigan Avenue Area and the Navy Pier, which is a really nice area of the city that runs down by the Lake. Off the charts condo buildings, a nice riverwalk, a huge Ferris wheel, and some restaraunts (including one of Harry Carry's restaraunts that we ate at and watched the Blackhawks/Flyers game.

I had been wanting to check out some museums and such, but they were all pretty pricey so we hadn't done it. Fortunately, we found out that the Field Museum of natural history and the Chicago Art Institute were free on Thursday's, so Andy and checked out both of those in the afternoon. The Field was pretty cool, its prize posession being the largest preserved skeleton of a T-Rex named Sue, and we also checked out a nice exhibit on the Ancient Americas, Africa, and then just putzed around the rest. The art museum was much more entertaining with a great mix of abstract and modern art, architecture and design works, classical pieces, and some renowned paintings including many of Picasso's art (my favorite was The Old Guitarist, a piece I studied in my high school Spanish class with Señor McNee) and Grant Woods' American Gothic, whose detail was both stunning and impeccable. All this staring at walls got us pretty tired, so we had to stop and grab a coffee so we could get going again for the Celtics/Lakers game one of the NBA Finals. We ended up at a sports bar called Mother Hubbards. They had some cool sports trivia where riddles were given and we had to decipher each sports team name...so that kept us busy for a while while we were watching the Celtcs get spanked. Later on we started talked to a woman named Melissa who was sitting next to us. She was from San Antonio and, as a Spurs fan, was rooting for whoever could beat the Lakers. She graciously bought us a beer (thanks Melissa! it was great talking with you and good luck with everything) and we chatted for a while, along with a couple other guys at the bar, one of which was from Wooobahn (Woburn, Ma) and the other from Washington, D.C. Thanks to both of them as well for the beer! After the game, we went to a couple other places that turned out to be wayyy out of our price range, so it turned out to be an expensive night.

Friday was a bit of a slow day, until we again joined up with the D.O.G.S for the weekly softball, and Andy and I both got to play a little bit so that made it fun. Afterwards, the three of us met up with Mack and Ari and we biked to Reggie's, the bar we went to before the White Sox game on Tuesday, to see some live music. We got to see three very interesting and very different bands, but it served for good entertainment for the night. We biked it back along the Lake, but not before I unfortunately blew a tire (sorry Mack!). But, luckily Mack was all over it and had a spare tube and all and changed it in a jiff on the side of the road. It was great taking the scenic route back, with one of the best views of the city we had seen all week.

The week was finally winding down, but we finished it off with great tour of Wrigley Field on Saturday afternoon. We got to walk around the bleachers, learn some history of the and field and the Cubs, check out the clubhouses, the press box, luxury suites, and even went on the field! It made for a great way to finish the trip, and afterwards we got dinner at Harry Carry's other bar across the street and then hopped around for one last night in Chi Town.

We really can't thank Aric enough for everything. We had a blast man and we hope you did too....feel free to come out to Boston anytime you want.

So that brings us to now, as I'm writing this from Edgerton, Wisconsin at Andy's cousin Steve and his wife Traci's house. Thanks so much to the both of you for having us! We'll be going to Milwaukee for the Brewers game with the both of them on Tuesday.

Well that was a pretty epic post, huh? There will be plenty of stories to come, so stick around.

Rangers 9, White Sox 6

US Cellular Field was our second stadium destination in Chicago. We were going to see a pretty decent pitching match up on paper. Buehrle v Harden. Turns out neither pitcher got out of the 5th though. Luckily Chicago knows how to have a hood time regardless of the on field performance. I think they have some practice with that for the past 101 years on the north side, so the south side must have taken a page from their book.

Before the game Ben and I chilled out at Aric's watching a few movies, waiting for him to get home from work. Someone suggested to Aric that we go to Reggies, ahead of time for the game because, A) they have good beer, B) they have good beer specials, and C) they have a "shuttle" to and from the game. All excellent qualities for a bar to have. Reggies is known for being a "heavy metal" bar but when we got there around 5, they were playing 90's pop rap. "Ok..... Weird" we all thought but as we got to talking to the bartender she informed us that the owners daughter was in the building and "the owners daughter gets what the owners daughter wants." As soon as they could they switched over to some pretty good rock that could pump anyone up and make them bang their head.

As for the beer specials... Half off Founders and Stone drafts and $2 extra for 8 jumbo buffalo wings with each beer. You cannn put it on the booard..... YES!

The shuttle was leaving just as we were finishing up or food. The bartender did agree shot with us all after hearing about our trip (whiskey and buffalo sauce.... Interesting to say the least) and we were gone. It felt like our own personal limo bus too because it was a full sized school bus with us, the driver, and 4 other people. This shuttle really knew how to make an entrance too. The bus was painted to look like some kind of daemon lizard and it blared death metal out the windows as we pulled up to the stadium. Pretty much everyone in a two block radius stopped and watched us get off.

Once we got into the stadium we had some fun posing with all the monuments scattered around the field but didn't have time for much more because the game was about to start.

We sat out in left field in the bleachers. this was the first time we actually sat in legit bleachers, not seats. Luckily they had backs to them and it wasn't crowded so it wasn't bad at all. It was actually nice because you could spread out and it was decent Home Run territory.

US Cellular accomplished something that not many parks have done. Because there were not many seats in the outfield and the jumbo-tron was in center, literally every seat in the house had an OK view of it. Totally changes the big league game experience if you don't have a view of it. So that was cool.

Once the game started, the left field fans immediately turned into the "Josh Hamilton Haters," something we were very familiar with from the Toronto massacre, so we felt right at home. Unfortunately the rangers got a decent lead early, so there wasn't much to cheer about.

In the middle of the game everyone started rush out of the stands for some reason. Then we figured it out. A Sheet of rain came down and it randomly started to pour. It only lasted a little bit before it let up to a light rain so we took the opportunity to move down to the first row.
The hot dog guy came around trying to bargin with people selling them for $4. Ben tried to get him down to $3 but he got rejected. About 30 seconds later he came back and made us a 2 for $6 offer. Who knew vendors actually bargained?

Eventually people started to trickle back to their seats once the rain subsided so we got kicked back to our original seats but it was getting late in the game so we moved right on up to between home and 1st for the last couple innings. The White Sox actually had bases loaded in the bottom of the 9th but couldn't connect on a walk off, ending Aric's chances of seeing a Chicago team winning at home.

We got back on our heavy metal bus, back to Reggies and went straight back to Aric's from there to pass out.

Basketball in the A.M.

U.S. Cellular was a pretty cool stadium. The outfield concourse was the coolest part with all the legend statues and a full bar. Food variety was good. Fans.. angry but into the game so it's acceptable. The palce wasn't ushered to death which I think is huge for a stadium that doesn't sell out. All in all a good stop.

The Windy City: Part I

Chicago has been our longest stopping point (and a much needed one after a whirling dervish of a first 3 weeks) so there is much to talk about. First off, Andy already gave you all his impressions of Wrigley, but mine were a little different so I'll share my thoughts too. If you've ever been to Fenway, just picture that but kind of flipped around. Tonsss of room in the areas behind first, third and home, but not much in the outfield other than some scattered bleachers and some really awesome bleachers posted up on building across the street in the outfield. Must be nice to walk up your apartment stairs and be at the game...I thought that was really cool. Definitely an old school atmosphere at Wrigley, the main scoreboard in center field is not electronic, and had a lot of numbers that Matt and I couldn't even figure out what they meant. We assumed they were starting pitchers' numbers for each of the games, but they were all wrong (i.e. John Lackey is not #6, who was pitching for Boston for that night). And, I was pretty dissapointed in the fan knowledge when I asked some kids behind us that boasted jerseys and all but didn't know either. Come on now, ya'll need to get your acts together out here in the Midwest.

Part of the park that I loved (which I guess Andy didn't see) was an open concourse that ran all the way around the park (except for the outfield). Hot dog/beer stands, seating, and an open view of the Chicago skyline (which, by the way, is the best I've seen of all the cities we've been to so far). It made for a really nice tour of the park. Granted, the poles that Andy mentioned are super annoying, but I'm kind of used to that from Fenway too.

So, after the game on Wednesday night, Matt, Aric, Andy and I went out on the town a little bit. We started off at a German spot (actually, the same company as the one we went to in Cincy but not as nice. No cornholin' here Brandon and Chad!) We put down a litre of their finest then moved along to another spot, the name of which escapes us both. We started off with some of the "Hawaiin Punch" shots we ran into in Cincy. The bartender actually thought it was great and named it "Ben's Special". Finally have my own drink! Anyways, we hung out there for a while, chatting with some other people in the bar then headed out. We hopped on the L (the elevated subway here). Aric and Matt both passed out on the train. We were tempted by some locals on the train to leave them there, but who knows what would have happened had we done that. So we got off the closest stop to Aric's, and it was probably the worst neighborhood ever. Literally. We eventually got a cab after being heckled and what not outside a convenience store and made it home safely.

The next morning, Al was flying in from Boston so Aric got the honor of waking up at 5:30 to drive and pick him up at Midway (mind you, we went to bed around 3? Quote of the night: Aric saying "I can't believe I have to go and pick up Al at the airport in 3 hours!) Once Al got here and got settled, we got some official Chicago deep dish and then took a tour around the U Chicago campus as Aric had to get some work done and go to class. Later on that night, we all went to Wicker Park to check out this ping pong bar that Aric had mentioned. We got there, and it was kind of dead but the ping pong tables were open so we threw back some Hamms and played some ping pong. Little did we know, this was apparently the place to be if you were a.) hipster or b.) wanted to watch the best table tennis you've ever seen in your life. Pretty much just like those youtube videos we all watch in amazement. At first there was just one European guy there who was a little older. I consider myself a decent ping pong player, and Aric beat me earlier in the night. This dude wrecked us both. That wasn't even the start of it though. I played another guy later on and somehow managed to get 12 points off of him, but I'm pretty sure he was being nice/warming up for the big guns we were about to see. A crew of asian dudes came in, and I'll just say it was some of the best entertainment we've seen on this trip. These dudes were NASTY! We've got a video somewhere, so we'll get it posted up here sooner or later.

So, the next day Andy, Alex, Matt and I headed uptown to see all the sights. We took the #6 bus and got off near the Buckingham Fountain, this huge fountain by the lake. Then we made our way to Millenium Park to see The Bean and lots of other cool sights and architecture feats they had there. After that we grabbed lunch at this diner type place down the street, where I tried the 7 saltines in a minute challenge and failed miserably, and then walked over to the Willis (a.k.a. Sears) Tower, the tallest building in the States and former tallest in the world. We forked over the $12 to go to the top and it was well worth it. After the 63 second elevator ride took us 103 stories up (yeah, its that fast), we were free to walk all around the top floor with clear views of Lake Michigan and all parts of the city. It was quite the place. One of the coolest features was these 4 completely plexi-glass boxes that stuck out of the side of the building where you could go in and look straight down at the street. That got the juices flowing for sure, and we got some pretty good photos. After that we went to a DSW because Andy had to get about 12 pairs of shoes. (Nahh, just 3) I ended up getting some sandals too, and then we headed back to Hyde Park (where Aric lives).

So, this post is getting uber long and there is still much to talk about. So, I'll leave it at this for now. Keep on the lookout for Part II soon.