The Baseball Tour

Well, now that I have had a week to recover from the trip, I thought I would sit down and write my final thoughts on the experience.  I am so glad that I had the opportunity to take this great trip with my dad before I go off to college, later this month.  Obviously, a lot of things are going to change once that happens, so it was nice to be able to spend some quality time with my dad before all of that change comes about.

All of the ballparks were pretty incredible and I enjoyed seeing all of them, but here are my top 3 from the trip:

1. Fenway Park (Boston, MA)
2. Yankee Stadium (New York, NY)
3. Miller Park (Milwaukee, WI)

Fenway and Yankee Stadium are two classic old parks and it was definitely a treat to get to visit them.  Miller Park was definitely the best of the “new parks.”  As you can see from the pictures, it was very cool looking and modernized with a retractable roof.

My vote for the best video/scoreboard setup has to go to the Rogers Centre in Toronto.  They had a huge screen for showing replays, lineups and the scoreboard.  Although that’s nice, the thing that really got me there were the LCD screens on the outfield wall showing scores from along the league.  They had alll of the scores, how many outs there were, who was up to bat, and even showed the base runners.  I really enjoyed getting the occasional glimpse at the White Sox score on those screens.

Alright, now on to what everyone is really here for, the food reviews.  The best out-of-ballpark food goes to Pat’s Steaks in South Philly.  Pat’s is the originator of the Philly Cheese Steak and the Cheez Whiz filled sandwich did not dissappoint.

The award for the WORST hot dog goes to Fenway Park.  That’s right, one of the oldest stadiums in the country has THE worst hot dog that we had.  The Fenway Frank was grey and really didn’t have that much flavor.  With that said, on to the last food award!

Finally, my award for the best hot dog on the tour was a tie between the dog at Jacob’s Field in Cleveland and the Nathan’s hot dog at Yankee Stadium.  Jacob’s Field had some incredible “Stadium Mustard” that really made the hot dog.

Thank you to everyone for reading the site all this time and putting up with our ramblings and attempts at humor.  I am going to try to get some videos from the trip up here that I took along the way, so stay tuned for that.

Most of all, thank you to my dad for taking this trip with me.  It is something that we have both wanted to do for a long time and it was great to finally get to go on “The Baseball Tour.”

Well we made it! It took me a while to get through my piles of stuff here to post this. Harrison I had a fantastic trip, how can you not. We got to see the country and some great baseball parks and games. We met a lot of really nice interesting people and got to re-connect with some old friends we hadn’t seen for a while. Best of all I had the chance to spend some time with Harrison, just the two of us before he’s off to Miami for school.  What more can you say!

We pulled into South Haven, Michigan around 1:30pm on Saturday afternoon. Suki and some friends had decorated the place for our return, a great surprise. We put the car in park, Headed in to a cool air conditioned house and started telling the tales of our travels, tales that will continue for some time to come I’m sure.

It ended up being an early night, I can’t imagine why. A great BBQ’d dinner and no hot dogs in sight! A cold Old Style and a game of bean bags completed the evening.

That’s all to report. With Labor Day, the summer will come to close in a few weeks. Everyone will scatter in a different direction ready to get on with their busy lives. Suki and I will be empty nesters, and if I get asked to write an essay on “How I Spent My Summer Vacation”, I’ll have the greatest story to tell.

Today, we set out from the north suburbs of Chicago and headed towards Milwaukee, WI for our 11th and final game. As most midwesteners know, no trip to Milwaukee is complete without dropping by the Brat Stop. My dad and I stopped by there on our way up and had a nice big brat (not like we’ve had enough tube meat on this trip or anything). We also picked up a package of cheese curds for later on in the day.

We got into Milwaukee about 5 or 6 hours before the game, so we decided to see what there was to do. We ended up driving by the Summerfest venue, only to find that they were holding GermanFest. Of course, we had to stop.

We walked around GermanFest for awhile, listening to music on a bunch of different stages that all sounded basically the same. The food and drink choices at GermanFest were probably the most interesting part of the whole experience. First off, they were serving Pigs Heads ($5, subject to availability), check out the photos for that one! Also, apparently Jagermeister shots are very popular with the mostly older crowd wondering around GermanFest.

As we sat and listened to one of the musical acts, we watched as an older guy came back to the table with a shot of Jager and just sipped it for awhile. At one point, he turns to his wife and says “Yeah, apparently they have these with some kind of energy drink too.” It just seemed like the wrong crowd to be pushing Jagerbombs to…

Anyway, from GermanFest, we made a stop at one of my dad’s favorite spots in Milwaukee, the Safe House. I had heard about this place for years from my parents, since it was where they had their first date. The place is concealed in an alley and is behind a door labeled “International Exports Ltd.” Once inside, you are faced with a seemingly ordinary room. Pull the secret lever and a door swings open, revealing the inside of the place. From the bar, you can see that they have a closed circuit camera setup in the room, so those already inside can watch others struggle to get in. Apparently if you get there after 8pm or so, there is someone in the room asking for a password to get in.

The inside of the Safe House has all kinds of cool spy posters and artifacts. The entire place is filled with secret passageways and all kinds of cool stuff. I took a bunch of pictures in there, so be sure to check out the shots from there.

After spending some time at the Safe House, it was time to head out to our final game of the tour, at Miller Park. The stadium looks incredible from the outside and even better from the inside. There really isn’t a bad seat in the entire park. We were on the first base side on the second level and we had an incredible view of the field. They had an LCD scoreboard, tracking the scores around the league, much like the Rogers Centre. Miller Park also sports a retractable roof for those cold and rainy days.

Although they have my 3rd favorite stadium, the fans are less than into the game. For most of the game, the Brewers fans were quiet and lethargic. This is definitely a big contrast from Fenway and Yankee Stadium. I would also like to note that I improved my Fast Pitch speed since Cleveland, from 62 to 67 mph!

At the top of the 7th inning, they had the famous sausage race. You may remember this from the millions of replays on SportsCenter of some baseball player hitting and knocking a sausage over with their bat (intentionally!), during the race. Here are the food ratings:

Brats from the Brat Stop:
Harrison and Larry: 10/10

Hot Dogs:
Harrison and Larry: 8/10
As we headed out, we picked up our final souvenir t-shirt and natural wood mini bat. We drove out of Milwaukee and back into Illinois to stay at a Hampton Inn, somewhere in between Milwaukee and South Haven, MI. With all of the games behind us, all that remains is the trip back home.

We headed out from the south suburbs on our way to Wrigleyville on Thursday. We decided to park at my dad’s college friend, Brian’s house, north of Wrigley, so that we could take the train into the game. We weren’t really sure which house was his exactly, since the numbers on his house were somewhat hidden. So, when we parked, we rummaged through his recycle bin until we found a magazine with his name on it.

With that behind us, we hopped on the train and luckily it took the express route right to Addison. Now, you have to understand that this was one of the hardest stops for us, since my dad and I are lifelong White Sox fans. Being that we’re Sox fans, it’s manditory that we hate the Cubs. That said, Wrigley Field and Wrigleyville are great, it’s just unfortunate that the Cubs happen to play there.

Prior to the game, we stopped by the Cubby Bear and checked out the crowd for a little bit. After, we decided to go and wait for my dad’s college friends who were meeting us at the park, right in front of the statue of Harry Caray. Unfortunately, some dark clouds rolled in and it threatened to rain, so my dad and I went inside the park to stay dry. We handed out the tickets to my dad’s friends through the gate.

The game was very good. We saw our first back to back home runs…by the Cubs. Not only were they back to back, but 2 consecutive pitches. Unfortunately, the Cubs won, but other than that it was a great game.

Wrigley Field was easily the most low tech and oldest stadium that we have visited. I definitely enjoyed the park, and the scoreboard was very cool. Ok, let’s wind this up with the food ratings:

Hot Dogs:
Everyone except for Brian: 8/10
Brian: 9/10

It’s Chicago, part one!

We got in on Tuesday night and settled in at my parents’ house. It was going to be our first stay of two nights in the same place. And, a chance to use the laundry. At this point even our souvenir t-shirts were running low.

We needed to eat and for Harrison there was no other choice but Aurelio’s Pizza. I know he had been thinking about it since, maybe Philadelphia. Well, our sausage and mushroom pizza did not disappoint. We got to bed early for our big day on Wednesday.

It started out drizzly, but we knew that wouldn’t last (or at least hoped). I brought my PSF 30 just to insure a sunny day. We arrived at the 5th Quarter around 10:00am. Larry Klein, our driver/chef/tour guide/entertainment director had the van loaded and ready to go. Joe pulled up and we were all aboard and off to the White Sox game we go.

After our arrival at parking lot G, the unloading begins. Larry had seen to it that we had everything we needed for the perfect tailgate. Bean bags and boards, chairs, table, music, a cooler that could not be better stocked and of course the Smokey Joe! It’s a good thing Larry has an extremely large vehicle. I would have felt bad if he would have had to rent.

With the unpacking done the cooking and bean bag games began. 5th Quarter burgers and sausages with all the fixings. As usual Joe and Harrison dominated the bean bags. Larry and I did win the first game, but I don’t think they were fully warmed up yet. Larry’s a pretty good parking lot chef! The food was cooked to perfection and it took about 30 seconds to disappear once off the grill.

We packed it back up and walked down to the park. We got in just at game time, found our seats and sat back to enjoy a White Sox victory over the Twins. Unfortunately the Sox hadn’t gotten the memo that we wanted to see a big home team victory. They continued their struggles and we were there to witness it firsthand. Pretty it wasn’t.  Well the Sox lost, but we didn’t let it spoil our day.

During the game we ran into a bunch of folks we knew. Harrison had a chance to get together with some old friends from when we lived in Chicago. That was nice. Larry ran into a lot more. I think he’s running for Mayor, maybe I can help!

Back at the parking lot, we had a few beverages and waited for the traffic to thin a little. On the way back home we were going to make a stop for Joe to take care of a little business. I took this as an opportunity to embark on what Joe was now calling, “The Heritage Tour”. A tour of Larry and my old neighborhood on the south side of Chicago. Check out the photos. There’s one of me standing in front our old place. Larry got one of those pictures at his place too. We also checked out the “Golden Lady”. That was fun!

Back at the 5th Quarter we caught up with some old friends, had a few beers, played some trivia and ate some dinner. It was a great way to end our White Sox game day.

Oh, here the food ratings:
Parking lot food: Everyone: (10+/10)
Hot dogs: Larry, (8/10), Harrison (7/10), Larry K. & Joe (?/10), they didn’t want to commit.
Beers Consumed: several

We’re off to the Cubs game today; we’ll see how that goes. Staying the night at Brian’s (another Drake friend).

More Later…

It does! We left after our game in D.C. for Cleveland. A pretty uneventful trip except for our unscheduled vehicle maintenance stop.

We had been hearing a ticking noise coming from the engine since Toronto. That was a while ago. At a gas stop close to Cleveland I decided to check the oil level. Bad news, no oil. I mean NO oil, not even a drop on the dip stick. A service stop was definatly in order. After asking the girl manning the Sonoco service center, it was off to a Wal-Mart in Streetsboro Ohio for synthetic oil.

After exiting, we spotted the store, but even better a Valvoline oil change place. Easy decision, we pulled in. Good news, bad news. No oil filter for the Rover, but they put in 4 QUARTS of oil. They said we almost had the record, a little short I guess. They really helped us out of a bad spot. Even better, they gave us directions to another Valvoline shop in Stow Ohio. They called ahead for us to make sure they had our filter, they did. After a 20 minute side trip we pulled in. Tom took great care of us. They did a complete oil change and got us back on the road in about 20 minutes. Oh, by the way, the ticking stopped. Probably should have done that 1,200 miles ago.

We pulled into Cleveland. We were staying the night Mike and Julie’s house. Mike is another college friend of mine. We pulled up to the house. Mike’s daughter Megan made a great baseball sign marking the house to help our pro active navigation.

You can see Megan and her brother Braden in the photos. Off to the park we go. After Mike gave us a driving tour of downtown Cleveland, (lots of nice sights, including a submarine and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame), we arrived at Jacobs Field. It’s a fantastic park. Great sight lines, nice views from everywhere. We were there early enough to catch a little B.P.. Then, let the eating begin…

I think this was the order of gastronomical delights, but I’m not 100% certain. It was pretty much a blur. Nachos, Hot Dogs, Peanuts, Cotton Candy, Pretzels & Funnel Cake. Accompanied of course by assorted beverages, both adult and non-adult versions. No throwing up, that was a plus!

Here’s some food ratings:
Hot Dogs: Larry (8/10), Harrison (9/10), Megan (8/10), Braden (3/10, he hates hot dogs, go figure), The mustard at Jacob’s was really fantastic.

Unfortunately the Indians lost. It was close at the end though. After the game we went back to the house hung out for a while. Harrison and Braden swapped video game secrets then bedtime. This morning we were up at a reasonable hour. Mike and Megan cooked us a fantastic breakfast. Homemade waffles, bacon, sausage and fruit. Pretty great, then off to Chicago for 2 games and a stay with my folks.

More Later…
 

We checked into the hotel in Washington DC at around 8 and found that the Holiday Inn only had a double-smoking room, or a room with a king, non-smoking.  We decided to take our chances with the smoking room.  Definitely a bad call.  The room was extremely smokey and we had to grab some air freshener from the front desk, but that really didn’t help much.

Anyway, today we got up nice and early so that we could check out some of the capitol’s sights.  Of course, we hit some of the mpre popular spots: Washington Memorial, Lincoln Memorial, the White House and the Vietnam Memorial.  We were unable to go up into the Washington Memorial, the tickets were sold out for the whole day by 10 am!  I loved the Lincoln Memorial.  Abe is definitely bigger than I had anticipated.  The Vietnam Memorial was just as I had imagined it being, very somber.

On my request, we also checked out the National Archives.  We got to see the original Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights.  Also, for some unknown reason, they had the Magna Carta on display.  I thought that the Magna Carta should probably be somewhere in England, but it was pretty cool nonetheless.

From there, we went to RFK Stadium for the Nationals game.  We met one of my friends from high school, currently attending George Washington University, at the park.  Apparently the Nationals are making an attempt to get more people into the park.  This weekend was their “grand re-opening,” so we got free Nationals rally towels.

Today’s game (Nats v. Cubs) marked an important landmark in our trip.  We got our first picture with a mascot (See our Photos page for the picture).  Yep, that’s right Screech, the Nationals mascot posed for a picture with us at the game.  You would think that would be enough for one game, but at some point, they had a president’s race.  Pretty much, this consists of guys racing towards home plate in giant inflatable president suits.
The race was between Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Theodore Roosevelt, and Ben Franklin.  Afterwards, I caught up with Abe and got a photo as well!

In the end, the Nats crushed the Cubs!!!  After the game, we drove out towards Pittsburgh and ended up staying in a roadside town just on the other side of the city.  Ok, on with the food review:

Hot Dogs: Larry and Harrison (7/10)

Next stop: Cleveland!

Let’s see.. Drove from Shea to Philly in the pouring rain. I mean POURING rain. Got into our hotel and hit the bed around 2:30am. It didn’t seem that late though. When we were driving through the downtown area there were lots of people still walking the street. The rain had finally stopped.

We woke up and figured we would take in a few Philly sites. We headed out of the hotel directly towards the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall. Unfortunately the line at “The Bell” was really, really long, so we passed. We did get a view from the outside though.

We didn’t fare much better at Independence Hall. 45 minutes for the tour. We did however get to check out George Washington’s personal copy of the Declaration of Independence. That was pretty cool!

Back to the hotel to check out. Harrison and I decided it was time to eat. We haven’t been eating enough you know. Well, where better than cheese steaks in South Philly? Nowhere! We headed off to Pat’s Steaks, “The King of Steaks”.

Let’s just say there’s no parking in South Philly. OK, there I said it. We circled a lot of blocks for a lot of time. Finally a space was ours, there’s only street parking in that area, so it’s tough. A short walk and there we were. Pat’s is pretty famous, being featured in tons of articles and a bunch of TV shows about great American food. We decided to judge for ourselves (there’s a surprise!).

We made a good choice. We waited in a line that wrapped around the building for our chance to order. According to the sign you only get one shot at it. Do it wrong and you risk getting sent to the back on the line! The pressure was on. My turn, and here’s wind up and the order: 2 “wit”, one whiz, one provolone. Ahhh, just like a South Philly pro!

After we got our steaks we found out we had to stand in a whole different line for fries and drinks. My steak was GONE by the time we got through that line, Harrison of course took his time.

After lunch we headed to the park. A beautiful sunny day! It was Photo Day at Citizen’s Bank Park. We were able to get down onto the field for a close up look at things. We got a chance to see most of the Phillies players. The kids on the field had a blast. We found our seats and waited for game time.

The singing of the Star Spangled Banner was highlighted by, you guessed it, thunder AND lightning. Quiet a show! As soon as the anthem was over, the skies opened, almost on cue. They actually made an announcement for everyone to seek shelter and leave the seating area. Good thing, it was pretty rough for a while.

We hung out for a while, then checked out the rest of the park. 2 hours later it looked like they were going to pull back the tarp and try and get the game in, when it started all over again. That was it. The announcement finally came that most of us thought we would hear an hour before. The game was postponed until September. We probably won’t be there for the makeup. If you need as seat, we have a rain check.

As soon as the announcement was made, the sun came out. It didn’t matter, game over. We headed for the car. Off to D.C.

Food Review:
Pat’s Steaks: Larry (10/10), Harrison (10/10)
No Game, No Hot Dogs

Let’s see what happens in the nation’s capitol!

More Later…

Well, we finally ran into our first tangle with Mother Nature that actually effected us directly (the tornado doesn’t count because we were just there for the cleanup, and party!).

We decided to catch up on a little lost sleep yesterday, we slept in. At least I did.  I got Harrison up at 11am and for those of you who know him or have teenagers of your own, you know that’s really just a nap. When I got up and looked outside it was pouring. Thunder, lightning the whole bit, but it ended pretty quickly and gave way to the start of a good looking day.

We walked out the door around noon and walked down the street to the Carnegie Deli. They say their corned beef and pastrami was voted #1 in the world! That’s a big statement and something that we felt we should probably vote on ourselves.

OK, the food was fantastic! I think the before and after pictures tell the story. We pretty much ate ourselves into a food coma. Walking out the door Harrison moaned that he didn’t think he would EVER be able to eat again. We’ll see.

We thought walking off some of the corned beef, matzo ball soup and potato pancakes might be a good choice. At least we thought it was better than going back to sleep. The Museum of Modern Art was just up the street. I had a piece of art I wanted to visit and it looked like it might rain again. The perfect time for a MoMA Moment.

The museum was great of course, an amazing collection of artwork. Up on the 5th floor I found the Dali I was looking for. Persistence of Memory, or as a lot of people know it, The Melting Clocks, is one of my favs. I even got a picture, with the picture!

Back outside it looked like rain. We figured we would hang out at the hotel for a while and see what happened. Sitting around the lobby we ran into ML umpiring legend Bruce Froemming. I, of course introduced myself. He was in town to work the Met game at Shea. I thought, hmmm. We didn’t have tickets yet and he obviously did, so…  No dice! Not even a photo op. He seemed as concerned about the rain as we did.

That ticket attempt having failed, we gathered our stuff and hit the road to Shea. It’s not too far, but everything takes a while to drive to in NY City. Once we were on the Triboro Bridge, it starting raining cats and dogs. It was pouring buckets full with a great lightning show. We figured we would go out and at least see what was happening, maybe Bruce needed a weather update phoned back to him!

Parked at Shea and sat in the car while the monsoon continued. Harrison had a friend, Chris staying in NY from the UK. He and some friends of his were taking the subway to Shea to see their first Major League Baseball game. They were already there when we arrived. Harrison found out where they were and went to meet up with them. I decided the car was far drier. After about an hour the rain was letting up. So, raincoat on and out the door. I met up with Harrison and his friends at the farthest point from where our car was parked. The raincoat helped, at least that’s what I’m going with.

It was Merengue Night at Shea Stadium. Complete with a real Merengue concert following the game. I hope they brought their raingear. Another friend of Harrison and Chris’s from LA came out to the game, that made 7. We bought some upper deck box seats and went inside.

Shea was great. Another old historical park that’s about to be torn down. I walked around but to be honest there isn’t much to see there except baseball. We made the trek up to the seats and surprisingly, for as high as they were they were great seats. You had a great sightline and could still even hear the sounds on the field.

The rain finally ended and they game went on a planned, although it was delayed by an hour. The first pitch was 8:05pm. Hopefully the Merengue concert would be pushed back too, or that would be starting in centerfield about the top of the 7th!

We ended up seeing a couple of firsts for this trip. A grand slam, by former White Sox player Jose Valentin and a complete game shutout thrown by Mets starter, John Maine. During the game I conducted a class on Baseball 101 for our British friends. Man, the game is way more complicated than it needs to be! Anyway, they had fun, we had fun and the Mets had fun, winning 7-0 over the Houston Astros.

We said our goodbyes and headed off to Philly. Things were looking good until we navigated our way to the highway. Once on the fast track it started pouring again and didn’t let up until Pennsylvania. I guess the car needed a rinse anyway.

Oh, I almost forgot food review time:
Carnegie Deli: Larry (10/10), Harrison (10/10), I would like to open one in Sarasota!
Hot Dogs: Larry (8/10), Harrison (8/10), Nathan’s just like Yankee Stadium
They also had really, really good popcorn.

That’s it for now. We have the Phillies and Braves this afternoon at 4:00pm, weather permitting.

More Later…

Today, we started off the day in White Plains, NY and drove into Manhattan to check into our hotel for the night.  The drive was pretty uneventful and went pretty much as planned for once!  The traffic in the city was pretty awful, but we got through it.

Shortly after we arrived, I had to head to Union Square for lunch and an advertising meeting for my website, LiveSide.net.  I had to rush back to the hotel afterwards to walk down to the Ed Sullivan Theater, to see The Late Show with David Letterman.

We had to show up at the theater between 2:00 and 3:00.  We got there on the early end, so we got a great spot in line.  We cycled through the line and I got ticket #111.  They told us to come back at 3:30 for the taping.

We walked back to the hotel and hung out there for a little bit, then headed back to the theater.  We lined up in the 111st and 112nd spaces in line and waited to go in.  After a long wait in the cold inside of the Ed Sullivan Theater, we finally go to go inside.  Luckily, they put us in the stage level seats.  Even luckier, we got to sit in the third row, right in the middle.  Unfortunately the cameras, .etc were blocking our view a lot of the time, but it was still cool sitting that close.  If you really want to watch the show, there is probably a better view from upstairs, but it can’t beat being right in the action.

Dave had Martin Short on the show and he was absolutely hilarious.  If you can, definitely check out, tape, TiVo, or do whatever for the show tonight because it’s a good one.  Make sure that you look for us in the crowd as well!  We’re both wearing blue and white striped shirts, 3rd row center.  My dad made out Letterman saying, “I am not singing” to Martin Short during a commerical break.  You’ll see what he meant if you check out the show.

After the show, we took a walk down Broadway to Times Square.  We didn’t really go in anywhere, but just walked around and checked out the huge screens, shops, and ads.  We decided to go to dinner at Rue 57 on the reccomendation of a friend and it was absolutely incredible!  I had the Steak Frites while my dad had a rare tuna dish.  It looks like a good time for the food ratings, so here we go!

Steak Frites: 9/10 (It would have been a 10, but a steak with melted Reblochon (French cheese) in Paris just edged it out.
Tuna: 8/10
Macaroni ‘n Cheese (at Chat ‘n Chew, Union Square): 8/10 (Definitely one of the best Mac and Cheese’s I’ve had.  It’s their specialty.)
Corned Beef Sandwich (Stage Deli): 10/10 (Larry says: Just as good as Manny’s!)