Stewart's 2019 Baseball Trip

Today, after popping down to EPIC Steak for lunch, I went out to the west coast, as I usually do, to see the Pacific Ocean.  Whilst I took the N almost all the way to the sea, for a change, I stopped short and took a bus going North up to Golden Gate Park, which also borders the coast. Whilst one part of the beach looks much like any other part of the beach, there were a few different views. I paddled for a bit, and then returned to the road and crossed over to the Golden Gate Park.  It's not that far from the road to the water, but the sand is so soft, it's quite hard work walking through it. There are some nice gardens at the ocean-end of the park.  I visited the Dutch Windmill, which is in the north-western corner of the park, but it doesn't work any longer and there wasn't actually anything to see other than the building itself. The park isn't very wide, but it is several miles long, so I crossed through only a little park of it and caught the Rapid...

Tuesday was a frustrating day, as I had to sort out my accommodation for Boston, as it's less than a week before I arrive there now.  I passed on the hotels that wanted $2000 per night.  Eventually, I found a decent enough hotel at the end of one of the T metro lines, which was still expensive ($1200, but that was the total, including taxes, for all 4 nights)  I'm going to have to leave early on the Friday morning to get to the airport in time, but at least I do have somewhere to stay now. I do not have game tickets yet for St Louis or for Boston, as the website for buying them appears to be down right now.  However, I did manage to buy the ticket for the one game I'm seeing in New York. I managed to miss the top of the 1st of tonight's game, which featured the first start of the year for Johnny Cueto, returning after a long injury lay-off.  However, I did arrive during the bottom of the 1st inning, just before the Giants scored the first runs of the game to...

Fortunately, I was able to buy my MUNI passport at the Walgreen's just around the corner without having to pay to travel to a station to buy it there - unfortunately, there is nowhere near the Caltrain station to buy these passes, so I'd had to pay last night to travel to my hotel - although I got a 50 cent discount because I'd come by train.  I'd looked up the tickets online from my hotel room to see what was available, and I was pleasantly surprised: inner club level tickets for only $65-$70 - this is barely more than the same tickets at the Baltimore Orioles a few days before!  Usually, it's at least twice that, but this is symptomatic of the Giants being a long shot for the wildcard this season, plus the Pirates are not a "premium" opponent.  However, Ticketmaster wanted to add $11.75 per ticket convenience fee, plus a $3.50 delivery fee (the tickets are electronic, deposited in my online account and shown on my phone). I went down to the sta...

I think it's fair to describe the breakfast a a rip-off here. I think I may have found the most expensive bowl of outmeal I've ever seen: £30, essentially.  There is only one breakfast option: the buffer, for $27 + taxes and that applies even if all you want is a small bowl of oatmeal.  It would actually be cheaper to have room service.  The waiter actually recommended that I go across the street to IHOP for breakfast instead!  On check-in the previous evening, as a valued Marriott Bonvoy Gold member, I was given a stack of $15 vouchers to use.  Except, it's not as simple as that, because it's not just a ticket for a $15 deduction.  It's $11.58 off, $1,74 gratuity off, and $1.68 tax off.  So, when he brought me the bill this morning, for $27+$2.30+$1.89, with a spot for adding a tip, he then had to write on a subtraction of $13.26 and calculate it by hand - which he did correctly and pretty fast, but this is just insane.  Surely he should ju...

Sunday was another travel day, with a 6-game Scrabble tournament squeezed into the middle of it. I walked to San Jose Diridon station from my hotel, which took 25 minutes, so I probably ought to have taken the light rail bus replacement service - yes, it wasn't running this weekend between San Antonio and the railway station due to the engineering works. It's fairly pretty, as I walked past the HQs of some large IT companies such as Adobe, there are some off-street walkways and parks with fountains. From here, I took the Caltrain to Hillsdale.  It was 8 minutes late leaving, but that was OK, as I'd left 25 minutes to get to the venue at the other end.  Worryingly, we sat at San Antonio station for 25 minutes, because they were using only one track that morning for maintenance reasons and we had to wait for the southbound train to come through first.  Luckily, the tournament had been shifted half an hour back to midday, so I still managed to get there in time. I m...

Saturday was a travel day, and there was a lot of travelling to get from Baltimore to San Jose.  Fortunately, it did not require a really early start, as I only had to leave the hotel at 11am. The Light Rail station is just one block from the hotel, so it's quick to get to, but then there was no sign on the departure indicator of the Penn Station bound light rail train.  However, it came anyway and 10 minutes later, I arrive at Baltimore Penn Station. From Baltimore, I got on the Amtrak train to Washington's Union Station, which is about 45 minutes travel. Next up was the Washington Metro, which is easy.  I took the Red Line, changed to the Yellow Line at Gallery Place and arrived at Ronald Reagan National Airport in plenty of time.  It's a far more pleasant experience than Dulles for flying in or out of Washington, but it only does domestic flights. My flight was 3 and a half hours to Denver.  On this flight, I was served a lunch of a chicken salad....

The sun finally came out!  It's been cloudy the whole time I've been in Baltimore, but just before sunset, we got some brightness which shone beautifully off the old warehouses along Eutaw Street. I spent quite a while chatting with Dan, the usher in my section, about the Orioles, baseball and Scrabble.  When it comes to this time of year, and your team is no longer in contention, talk tends to turn to reminiscences of past glories and future prospects.  Tonight's game marked the anniversary of Cal Ripken Jr breaking Lou Gehrig's consecutive games streak.  This was Ripken's 2131st game in a row, and after continuing the streak for over 3 more seasons, finished the record at 2632 - over 16 seasons worth of games! This was the second of two games in Baltimore, and I was in the front row of section 244.  We spread out as there was so much space, with very few people in again. This game had loads more runs than yesterday's game though.  Lots of ho...