Yankee Stadium

Major League Baseball Park # 3

Date: August 9, 2009

Park: Yankee Stadium

Teams: Boston Red Sox at New York Yankees

Score: New York Yankees 5 Boston Red Sox 2

This stadium wasn't planned for the summer of 2009. Ruddley and I went out to western New York to visit his grandfather for the weekend. While at breakfast on Saturday morning we got talking about the ESPN Sunday night game which happened to be the Sox/Yankees in New York. I can't remember who's idea it was but one of us came up with the brilliant idea of trying to get tickets and go to the game "on our way home". Keep in mind, the Bronx is far from "on our way" in fact it's very out of the way. Oh well, I never said I don't like adventure. 

Long story short, we were able to get tickets using the iPhone, made a trip to Best Buy to print the tickets and we were golden:-). The only problem is that we had brought our dog along with us and I was almost certain that even though she is a Boston Terrier, there was no way I could hide her in my purse. Ruddley's grandfather was kind enough to volunteer to watch her for the week until we could come back and pick her up. 

Instead of parking at the stadium, I decided it would probably be best to drive to CT, park there and take the train in. This is what I usually do when I am visiting NYC. My uncle lives in Darien, CT and so I tried to get in contact with him. Unfortunately he was busy that night and wasn't able to meet up with us before we had to catch our train. He did tell us about a new route called the Yankee express. This route only runs on game days and goes directly to the stadium. The train then doesn't leave until the game is over and I think it runs for an hour after the game. Uncle Mac was kind enough to pick up a pair of round trip tickets and left them behind one of the signs in the parking lot at the train station. 

Maybe it's because I am a Red Sox fan and I'm kind of biased to Fenway but I wasn't impressed with the new Yankee Stadium. We walked in and it seriously looked like a mall. High end restaurants that over look the field where you have to put your napkin in your lap and white wine glasses were set on the table. No. No. No. Baseball is spilled beer, hot dogs, peanuts and ice cream served in the miniature team helmets. Of course Ruddley thought it was the best thing ever and had a million and one reasons why it was better then Fenway. This is just how we live. I live in Red Sox Nation, he lives in Yankee Universe.

Just inside the main entrance to the stadium

Since it was an ESPN Sunday game with the Red Sox and Yankees and we got last minute tickets we didn't have the best seats. I think we paid 90.00 each to sit waaaayyyyyyyy up top in the outfield. I know some of you are reading these blogs and can't believe how much we spend to go to these games. Haha. I can't remember exactly anymore, but I think we got 2 beers, 1 cheeseburger and 1 french fry and spent 36.00. ahhhhh this was not an inexpensive date.

Red Sox warming up

Watching batting practice in the outfield

Remember how I said this was a Sunday night game? Yeah, that also meant we had to be at work Monday morning. Red Sox/Yankees games have the reputation of lasting a looooong time and could easily go into the wee hours of the morning. I spent most of the game doing the math in my head. I knew we needed to leave Darien, CT by midnight to be back at home by 6:00am...just in time to shower and leave for work. It was about an hour train ride I think and if the game started at 8:00, that meant it needed to be over by 11:00 and we needed to be on the first train home. Like I said, the train didn't leave until the game was over so it wasn't like we could leave early. 

I remember watching the final outs on the HUGE tv by the main entrance and as soon as the game was over we ran to the train. We made the first train, got back to our car and hit the road. By the time we got to Kittery, Maine we were dragging (duh!). I think we would each drive 15-20 minutes and then have to switch drivers. We pulled in to our house just in time to take a quick nap, jump in the shower and head to work. 

Yea, the next day we were tired but we had so much fun. I'm glad we did it.