Sunday we took in a Chicago White Sox ball game at U.S. Cellular field. One lady explained that the park name is spelled Cellular Field, but pronounced Comiskey Park. Old names die hard! We bought our tickets a few days ago as the game was projected to be a sellout; well the Yankees are in town, so go figure. Anyway, our tickets were nosebleeds to be sure and were "obstructed view". Along with the game tickets we bought a parking pass for the "green lot". The game start time was 1:10 PM so we left way, way early due to the construction and the expected traffic for lollapalooza. The traffic turned out worse than we expected! We had planned to stop somewhere, for breakfast, on the way, but once in traffic we figured we best sit tight and just get to the ball park.... and it took that long. We arrived at the ball park around 12:15 PM and found the parking directions to the "green lot". When we finally got to the lot entrance Brian handed the guy the receipt we printed out from our online purchase of tickets and parking. The guy says "where's your coupon?" to which Brian says "What coupon? I purchased parking online along with our game day tickets; there was no mention of a coupon!" Buddy was baffled; he said that we should have gone to the box office to get the coupon! "WHAT!... we bought the tickets online so we wouldn't have to go to the box office!"... so buddy waves us on to the next gate attendant and yells "they don't have a coupon, just some receipt!". We drive up to the next gate attendant and show her the receipt. She takes it, has a quick look and waves us in. So we are there! To be honest, these folks are in no position to turn any car away as all streets/lanes at this time are 'one way only' on the way into the park. A short walk to the main entrance where we saw an ATM like station where we could print our own "will call" tickets. Nice touch!
Anyway, we made our way into the stadium, bought the usual souvenirs then headed towards our seats. We tried to go onto the main level concourse and were blocked by a young man who told us that since the game was a sellout they were only allowing people with tickets for the 100 level to enter the concourse. So we had to walk up an exterior ramp to level 5 where our seats were. When we got up to level 5 we went to guest services and told the guy that we are touring all MLB parks and here is the only place we have been blocked from the main concourse where the better food courts typically are. He immediately said "come with me" and took us over to the (guarded) elevator lobby, called up the elevator and told the operator to take us to the concourse. So we got to the concourse and found a seated food service area where we asked another couple if we could share their table. Nice people and very "south-sider". No love for the Cubbies there! Huge sandwiches for lunch.
After grabbing the bite to eat we went back up to level 5 and found our seats... man were they ever "obstructed view" seats...
... Kris could see the catcher and the umpire but not the pitcher. Brian could see the pitcher but not the catcher or umpire. So after the first inning we moved down a few rows and over a section to much better seats...
... although the crowd was still filing in so we had to move a couple of times when latecomers arrived with their tickets. One group didn't show up until the 5th inning. What's that all about? We ended up having decent nosebleed seats for the most part and watched the Yankees put a beating on the White Sox. It started with the second pitch of the game when Jacoby Ellsbury put it over the left center field fence for a quick one run lead for the Yankees. The Yankees built up a 12-1 lead before a couple of the White Sox batters hit solo home runs in the later innings. After each White Sox dinger the fireworks went off (although in the nighttime they would have been quite a bit more spectacular...
... final score 12-3 New York. After the game we decided to try to avoid the heavy traffic by just heading west from the ball park. Took a couple of hours to get back to the KOA stopping at a Fresh Market for a roasted chicken and broccoli/kale salad for dinner.
That night we had a fabulous lightening light show put on by nature. First the "red sky at night" as the sun started to go down over the horizon...
... then a couple of hours later, as dark clouds started to surround us, the sheet lightening show started. Here's a pic of the darkness, followed by a camera click, seconds later, trying to get a single shot, rather than a video, of the sheet lightening...
... it was quite the show and lasted well over an hour. The interesting thing, it was like we were in a diorama. The sheet lightening was all around us but directly overhead the sky was clear and we could see the stars there. Very neat!
Monday we headed north to Milwaukee. We decided to avoid the interstate directly north and take the smaller highways along the coast. We thought we might drive through some cool resort towns along the western shore of Lake Michigan, something like South Haven on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan. Not so much. We drove through numerous small towns that look like they have fallen on really hard times with empty store fronts along the main streets. Although in one place where there were numerous boarded up buildings there was one open business with it's sign advertising "Bowling Ball Repair". Now, that's interesting. Wonder how this business manages to survive when so many others could not? So not the most exciting drive along the coast. We stopped in a little roadside bar for a chef salad and burger for lunch then grabbed some deli fixings for dinner before we arrived at the Jellystone RV Park in Caledonia (a souther suburb of Milwaukee).
Tuesday started with Brian taking the car into Gordie Boucher Nissan for an oil change and check up. They found a leaking oil pan gasket so we had that changed along with the engine oil. Afterwards, we drove into Milwaukee to explore the Historic Third Ward...
In the area there is also a very nice Public Market, much like Granville Island Market in Vancouver but only about a quarter of the size of Granville Island. Lots of cheese though (we are in America's Dairyland after all)...
For dinner that night we stopped in at the recently opened Water Street Brewery not far from the campground, where we grabbed a couple of seats at the bar, chatted with the bartender, watched the Brewer's ball game while sipping some mediocre local wine to go along with an excellent burger and sausage plate.
Wednesday morning we drove into the city to pick up tickets for Thursday's Brewers baseball game. We found our way to the ticket office at Miller Park where we were welcomed by a very friendly young ticket agent. We requested a couple of seats in the shade and, if possible, somewhere between 1st and 3rd base. She told us that the entire right side will be in the shade. So we looked at some semi-nosebleed seats up behind the dugout on the first base side. We had decided on the $25 seats not quite as high up when she asked if either of us was a senior. Well one of us is so she said the ticket would be half price whereupon Brian asks "does that go for his companion as well?" to which she responds "We can do that, but if you want we can get you seats much closer in a lower section if you'd like... so we ended up in $42 seats looking right down the third base line (half price being $21) along with a preferred parking lot reservation for $16. An MLB game with preferred parking and good seats for $58 ranks as one of the best deals we have had in the 29 parks to date! Nice! Leaving the ticket office we stopped for a couple of pics outside the park... (one of the park and one of the statue of "Hammerin' Hank Aaron")...
Leaving the park we had a bit of shopping to do so we headed to a northern suburb where we had the usual excellent lunch at California Pizza Kitchen. Later we stopped at the, newly opened today, Meijer grocery store and picked up some pork chops to be grilled for dinner.
Thursday morning we lounged around a bit before heading into Milwaukee for the ball game. Easy peasy off the interstate into the preferred parking lot and only a short walk to the main entrance. No issues at security and in we went. First stop was the team store for the usual souvenirs then to a food stall for a couple of "brats" each. These were the best bratwursts we have had. Kris even had two so that says a LOT! Our seats were even better than the ticket agent suggested they would be and they were indeed totally in the shade. Bless her heart!...
... these were the best seats we have had in a long time, maybe even better than the ones we gave up in Detroit! They were close enough that we could very clearly hear the "crack of the bat" when the batter hit a pitch. Funny, sitting right behind us was an elderly man whose eyesight was apparently not what it used to be, but his hearing was ok... almost every time a batter hit a ball (the crack of the bat) we immediately heard, from behind us, "Where the hell did that one go?" On this day our home team mojo was full on for this day. Thanks to two 3 run home runs by Khris Davis the Brewers blew away the visiting San Diego Padres 10-1. Beautiful day for a ball game, so the retractable roof was wide open...
...although the number of empty seats sort of says it all as to how the Brewers are doing this season...
...fun ball park though! We rank this one right up there with Arlington, Texas as one of our favourites.
Friday it was time to pack up and head north and west. We had planned to get to Green Bay early afternoon, spend a few hours there then head west to Marion our destination for the day. We stopped in Sheboygan for lunch at the Highland House where the quesadilla and burrito were both so large that we took half of each home for later. Leaving Sheboygan we headed for Sheboygan Falls in Kohler County, home of Kohler kitchen and bathroom fixtures and Magpies Cottage, another yarn store where Kris had a nice look around while Brian had yet another nap in the car.
It had been raining pretty well all morning but it really started just after noon. Our destination for the day was a campground near Marion WI, about an hour west of Green Bay. We estimated it would take us about an hour from Sheboygan Falls to Green Bay, on I-43, then we could spend a few hours in Green Bay before heading west in the early evening. We found out different! In the pouring rain folks still drive like idiots! We cruised at the speed limit (70 mph) in the slow lane while others passed us in the fast lane; sometimes several vehicles no more than a car length apart would go past at the same time (remember this is in the pouring rain). Well it happened.... about 20 minutes north of Sheboygan the traffic ground to a halt. We inched in a stop and go fashion for well over 2 hours before being diverted to an off-ramp where we could see (just up the freeway) a whack of police and ambulance vehicles and numerous cars just up ahead. Looked like a brutal accident scene. The diversion through the country side with the heavy traffic load took us until after 6:00 PM to get just to the outskirts of Green Bay. It was still raining so we stopped for a break in Starbucks. While there Brian phoned the campground to verify our reservation. Good thing! The woman there said to disregard all GPS instructions (Brian had been using our GPS to find the best way there from where we were and it did seem to take us on a rather circuitous route of more than an hour and a half) so she gave us instructions that were easy to follow and took less than an hour and, thankfully, the rain had stopped by the time we got there. Farmer Gene's Campground is absolutely huge. We were placed in site #471 and were not at the end yet! We decided to try their onsite bar and grill, "The Barn and Feed Trough" (go figure), for some dinner. The burger and baked haddock were pretty good but the wine - YIKES - best stick to beer in this place!
Saturday it was a tad damp when we got up so we elected to pass on making our own coffee since there was a Starbucks about an hour away in Stevens Point. The skies cleared and it turned out to be a nice drive through the Wisconsin country side on secondary highways. We stopped in Stevens Point for a leisurely sipped coffee then found a grocery store for some dinner items (since this was likely to be the biggest town we would pass through today). By then it was lunch time and on the outskirts of town we spotted a Perkins Family Restaurant so headed in there for a late breakfast. A tomato and spinach omelet for Kris and a "hearty man's" eggs, sausage, bacon, ham and toast with peanut butter for Brian. You can always get a decent breakfast at Perkins!
The rest of the afternoon continued to be a pleasant drive along US-10 as it cut across Wisconsin. The vast corn fields and soy bean fields through the whole of this part of the country continue to amaze us. They just go on forever! Our stop for the night was the KOA midway between Alma Center and Hixton. Once there and settled in, Kris wanted to phone Marian, our friend back in Vancouver, but quickly realized that there was no service for her AT&T cell account. So we drove into Hixton, still no service, so tried Black River Falls about 10 miles further down the road. Still no service so we settled on going into the Orange Moose Bar and Grill (in a Best Western) for a couple of glasses of wine, as a compromise. This place gets terrible reviews but the wine was pretty good and the service not bad considering a single waitress/bartender for a fairly busy place. Apparently this area of Wisconsin is very popular with ATV enthusiasts. We chatted with one guy from a group of three couples who, he said, come here quite often for the off-road trails and to get covered in mud. The trucks with trailers and very muddy ATV vehicles in the parking lot attested to that!
Well, we finish this week with only one MLB park to go, so on to Minneapolis next week to catch the Twins at Target Field...
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