Hello, hello!
I honestly didn't know if I'd get to make another post this year with the MLB strike happening at the beginning of the year. After Christmas, I started planning our big baseball trip for over spring break. The plan was to go to DC, Philadelphia & Baltimore, spending a total of 2 days in each city and seeing a home game. We were going to knock out 3 parks in one go. It was going to be amazing.
When I started planning in December, I booked our rooms/houses and even bought tickets to a Philadelphia game (all the other fields didn't have tickets available yet). When I told my dad that I got Phillies tickets, he said "Oh, you should have waited because the MLB is on a lockout." Oh.
So, we waited. And waited some more. It got down to almost less than a month before we were scheduled to leave and it didn't look like a deal was going to happen between the owners and the players, so I canceled everything (because we were running out of time to get money back on rooms/tickets). Of course, a week later, the group came to a deal and baseball was back on, starting the week before spring break! We had already decided to go down to the Gulf Coast for vacation instead. In 2020, we were going to go to Manasota Keys in April and everything was obviously shut down, including our vacation plans. When I canceled our trip to DC/Philly/Baltimore, I went ahead and found a little house for us down on the Gulf. When baseball came back around, I realized we were only an hour from St. Pete/Tampa and we could knock out at least ONE stadium on this trip. We were in luck, too, as the Rays were playing at home all this week. Honestly, it was nice being somewhere warm, too.
Most of the week was spent on the beach, which was so nice. That area is known for it's shells and sharks teeth. We had a fun time sifting through the shells on the beach finding things. We found around 10 sharks teeth, too, which was so cool! Lucas was like a little fish out in the water. He knows no fear about swimming and loved being in the water. The water was a little chilly, but we did go out in it on the last day (Luke was in it EVERY day, any time he got near it).
We ate at some really good restaurants that overlooked the Gulf and our little house we rented was pretty nice. We were able to take our dogs too, which was really nice.
The game we attended was on April 13th against the A's. There were hardly any people at the game and we spent $20 bucks a pop on seats that were almost on the field (way different than being at an Atlanta game.) It was an evening game so we left around 3:00 from Venice and drove up to St. Petersburg. We didn't have money for the toll (smooth move) and had some beautiful views.
When we arrived, the first stop was guest services, where they gave the kids a pin for their first Rays game. Then it was off to the gift shop to gather up what we wanted to remember the game. We then found the "touch tank" that overlooks the field. This was SO cool.... they have a ray tank with sting rays that you can touch. We then had some dinner and found our seats. We were able to make it to the 8th inning, which is pretty good with two little kids. Unfortunately, the Rays lost, but we did see one home run from their team which lit up the entire dome.
So, how would I rate Tropicana Field? 10 out of 10! Parking was EASY, tickets were CHEAP, it was AIR CONDITIONED! My dad told me that the Rays have the lowest attendance of any MLB team and I just can't understand why. The parking is located right outside the field (unlike Atlanta where we had to walk a mile to get to the stadium). Tickets close to the field were only $20 a piece. Tropicana Stadium is under a dome and so it doesn't matter if it rains or if it's a bajillion degrees outside, it's always 73 on their field. Honestly, I almost want to become a Rays fan to support them more. All of the staff at the stadium were super nice. I just don't understand why more folks don't go to their games.
I'm also thinking that maybe instead of going to a bunch of different parks on one trip, we should just hit up each park individually. I like being able to spend some time in each area and focusing on one team. It may take us a little longer, but I'm ok with that. I think we've also decided that anything further than an 8 hour drive constitutes flying. Yesterday, coming back, we spent over 13 hours in the car. Traffic was terrible (I guess Easter break?) And it was just difficult.
Next up will be Cincinnati in July! We're going with my mom and dad and have rented a house up there. My dad is an old hat at Cincinnati games so it's a little bit of a relief because he'll be able to tell us where to go and which seats to get. There's also been some talk of me potentially having to travel for work on the West Coast for a week. If that happens and it's over summer break, I may just pack up my family to go with me and see an LA and Anaheim game. (We'd knock out 2 that way!) Maybe we could also go to a DC game when we travel to Richmond to see family... I think part of this may be that I need to just relax and not plan so much. We'll have to just enjoy the ride wherever it takes us!
