I checked out of my hotel in the morning, left my car in the parking garage of the hotel next door, and walked back over to Camden Yards. This time, I got there early and the plan was to take some pictures. First, I went to the Sports Legends Museum right near the park. It wasn’t bad, but the Babe Ruth Birthplace and Museum a few blocks away was much cooler. It was a weird feeling standing in the house where Babe Ruth was born.

His 714 regular season home runs, and World Series homers.

There’s a Babe Ruth statue outside the park, as well.

Inside the park, there are baseballs on the ground marking all the home runs hit onto the street next to the warehouse.
  

The game itself was another Red Sox blowout of the Orioles. They were up 7-0 before the Orioles scored a run, and the final score was 9-3. The place was mostly full of Red Sox fans, so the crowd was happy with what was going on.

In the middle of the game, I moved myself down to field level.

After the game, I drove to Jason’s, where’d I be staying the rest of the time in the DC area.

As always, all pictures from the game in the set.

After arriving at my hotel and settling in for a few minutes, I walked over to Oriole Park at Camden Yards. I wasn’t originally planning to go to this game, but realized I’d be there in time and have nothing else to do. Also, the next game was a day game, so I wouldn’t have been able to get my standard stadium shot. The game was another Red Sox victory, and 11-5 blowout. It was a tie game into the 7th, though, and the Orioles led 1-0 and 3-2 at various points in the game. I didn’t have much time to do other photography before the game, but planned on doing that that next day anyway.

Fans of the Game

Oriole Park at Camden Yards

I drove from Tampa Bay to the airport in Orlando because that was a direct flight to the DC area, and a nice reasonable drive. If I had flown from Tampa Bay, I would have had to connect in New York or Boston and have a long layover, and it really just didn’t make any sense. After arriving at IAD, I drove about an hour to my hotel in Baltimore Inner Harbor. It was a Holiday Inn, and nothing special, but the location was great, just a two block walk from Camden Yards. I wasn’t originally planning to go to the game that night, because I didn’t schedule any games on days I was flying, but once I got there I had no reason not to go. Here are a few pictures from the day of traveling.

The view from the terminal shuttle at MCO. Not the one I was supposed to be on, it went to gates up to number 99. I was gate 101, but jumped on the wrong shuttle. Had plenty of time to get the camera out and get the picture on the way back to the main terminal. Glad I did.

The 6th of 14 planes I will be on during this trip

Sitting in nice leather seats, with plenty of power outlets, in the airport terminal

jetBlue engine

Everything I had been told about Tropicana Field was that it wasn’t a good place to watch baseball. While it certainly doesn’t have the feel of some of the newer stadiums, I thought it was a great stadium. It’s unique, and watching the game there was just as nice as watching a game most other places. Maybe it’s because I went in with such low expectations, or because it was too hot outside and nice to get into the air conditioned building, but whatever it was, I thoroughly enjoyed the experience.

During batting practice, a fly ball hit one of the lights hanging down, and it was shaking for a good twenty minutes. Oh, and I caught another batting practice home run.

I caught that ball one row behind and about a dozen seats over from where Wade Boggs’ 3000th hit landed. He is the only player to have his 3000th hit be a home run.

The ray tank is out past the right center field fence, and is open to feed and pet them until two hours after the start of the game.

Of course, I had to get my stadium shot. It’s a little different since it’s indoors, but it still came out nice. Had to get a shot of me there, as well.

The Rays beat the Jays 11-4, including a 6 run inning and a 2 run home run by Evan Longoria that was just crushed over the center field fence. The game played out pretty much like the final score would indicate, a blowout where it didn’t seem like the Blue Jays had a chance (though they were leading 2-0 early on). It was a meaningless game to both teams, but still fun to watch.

After the game was over, I had a nice view of the park at night. I’m glad I had my tripod sitting in the trunk of the car.

As I was pulling out of the parking lot, it started to rain. All of a sudden, there was lots of lightning. I tried to find a good place to try to get some good pictures, and ended up shooting this out of my hotel window. Glad I decided to put the tripod in the suitcase for the trip.

I’m falling behind on writing these posts. Late nights and early mornings, combined with internet connections too slow to upload images have made it hard. The pictures are now up to date, though.

I woke up way too early, on way too little sleep, and got a ride to Logan. I was pretty much sleepwalking through the day, and just crashed a few hours after checking into my hotel in St. Petersburg. Woke up, had dinner, and then went back to sleep. It was a much needed recovery day. I’ll probably need a few more on this trip. I did get a picture of the nice hotel room with my Pre before ruining the beautifully made bed.

I didn’t just go to baseball games while I was in Boston, I did a fair bit of wandering around the city. Of course, I took some pictures.

Daisuke Matsuzaka made his return from the disabled list, and pitched brilliantly against the Anaheim Los Angeles Angels (of Anaheim) to defeat John Lackey. Lackey was pulled with two outs in 8th inning, and the reliever promptly gave up a home run to David Ortiz. I really wanted Lackey to stay in there for the final out of the inning, and throw a complete game loss. I’ve never seen one of those in person. I spent the day walking around Boston before the game, and I’ll have another post about that, with pictures, of course. I then took the green line to Fenway, getting there a couple of hours before the game as usual.

I went to the game with Adam, a friend from college I haven’t seen in quite a while. It was good to get together and catch up, and Fenway Park was a great place to do it.

Of course, I had to get my souvenir ice cream helmet.

More pictures in the set, including Dice-k warming up, Wagner in a Red Sox uniform, Lackey with an insane pitch count, and more.

Thanks, jetBlue!

Monday was a travel day, leaving New York and heading for Boston. It was a quick and easy flight, and then some easy public transportation to meet up with Byron. The jetBlue terminal at JFK is incredible.

Byron brews his own beer. It’s good.

I took a short detour from baseball on this trip to go to a football game. How could I pass up the Giants season opener, when I was going to be in New York, anyway? The Giants kicked a field goal on the opening drive (though they should have had an easy touchdown), and won the game 23-17 over the Redskins. It was a great game. Brad was on the sidelines shooting, so we drove in together, and parked in the media lot. Unfortunately, his paper didn’t have a credential I could use to just be on the sidelines with him. I originally bought two tickets near the top of the upper deck, but then couldn’t find anyone who could go with me. I randomly checked the game on Ticketmaster, and found a single ticket at the back of field level. I bought that, and then sold my other tickets to some tailgaters (for my cost). I’m glad I did, my seat was great. Covered and out of the sun, and a good view of the game.

Before the game, I wandered around the parking lot through the tailgaters. It’s crazy before a football game.

The old and new stadiums are right next to each other.

The view from my seat was great.

I moved forward a little bit to get a picture where the lighting was good on both me and the field.

Of course, I did have to go up to the top deck to get my stadium shot, though. I wish I had done it a little later in the game when the sky was darker, but it still came out great.

The Mets continue to lose games I go to. We’re now up to 9 in a row, for a season record of 2-10. If you do the math, you can figure out that means I actually had a winning record of 2-1 at one point this season. It has been downhill from there. I decided to borrow my father’s car and drive to Philly instead of take the LIRR, Metroliner, and subway to get there. I think it was the right decision, as it was certainly easier than lugging all my stuff around with me between trains. A little traffic and rain made for a fairly relaxing two and a half hour drive. I got to Citizens Bank Park about three hours before game time, and took a nice walk around the place, and took a few pictures.

Then I went inside, and took some more. It was raining lightly but steadily all night. The tarp was on the field before the game, and there was no batting practice, but there were no rain delays, and the game played as scheduled. It’s a beautiful park, as are most of the newer ones these days. I like the bullpen location, though I should have gone back there again during the game for another shot.

I got my ice cream helmet, to add to my collection. The empty helmets are the souvenirs I am bringing back from each stadium. I’m going to be eating a lot of ice cream this month. In Philadelphia, they had soft serve Turkey Hill ice cream, not the Carvel they have in Yankee Stadium and Citi Field. It’s good, but it’s just not the same. Also had an excellent Tony Luke’s cheesesteak before the game.

I had some friendly Phillies fans (really, I swear!) sitting behind me, so I was able to get a picture of me at the park. Despite the rain, I was also able to get my standard stadium photograph, as well. The stands are unfortunately a bit empty due to the weather, but it’s a nice shot regardless.

The back of this shirt sums up the Mets this season perfectly, especially at a 4-2 loss where they had plenty of chances.

As always, more pictures in the flickr set for this game, and the baseball trip collection.