Great Lakes Loons

 

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After some great omelets this morning, off and running up to Higgins Lake.  We got a nap and a boat trip out of the afternoon, with rain early on.  Off to Midland, home of Dow Chemical and the Great Lakes Loons.  Funny enough, it is called Dow Diamond.  How creative. Round Rock (Dell Diamond), I am looking in your direction.  But the park was beautiful.  Another HOK design.  Had great lawn seating throughout the outfield, and a large space in right field, and it had a great row of adirondack chairs.  The concourse was very wide, with plenty of concessions for how few people the stadium holds at capacity (4500 ish?)  The team store also was spacious. And sold cool hats.  They had a picnic area down the left field line that reminded me of the GrandStand in Greensboro.  The field seemed like it had a lot of foul ground, and the way the dugouts were made you seem a bit further from the action.  But there was plenty of legroom, and that means a lot when I say that.  Not much of a view beyond the outfield fence, just a few trees in left and a chemical plant in right.  Great speaker system, had one posted every twenty feet all the way around the stadium(See Kalamazoo, not hard.)  It was ‘Polish Heritage Night’ at the ballpark, but they didn’t do as much for it as I had hoped.  The between inning entertainment was weak at best, but the fans that were there (~3012?) were into the game, and the stadium looked more full because it is smaller to begin with.The game itself, the Loons got out to an early lead, and ended up winning 8-0, and it probably should’ve been 15-0.  Also, the Loons pitcher threw a 3-hit complete game shutout, the first CG for the Loons franchise.

Houston Astros

 

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Well, I haven’t been anywhere to see a picturesque sunrise in quite a while.  I am glad I was awake for this one.  I went to the USS Lexington this morning, which is docked in CC.  It is a WWII era aircraft carrier.  It has some cool planes and quite an extensive tour and museum.  I kept finding more and more things to look at.  It did reaffirm the fact that I am too tall to have been in the navy.  Short bunks, short ceilings, it would have been terrible.

Some people have asked about how many hats I have, or past parks I have been too.  So when I get home, I think I am going to try and write something up about the past parks I have seen.  Although I believe my count for minor league ballparks is 46 and majors 13.  But some of those were before my hat souvenir binge, and some of the majors I just took tours(5) at, no games.

Houston- big city again, also non-conforming Texas toll again.  Argh.  Minute Maid Park is right downtown, and it is a dome.  Very odd, I had never seen a game in a dome before.  One foul ball actually hit the roof.  It was pretty nice, I got there when the Cubs were finishing up batting practice, so I waited in the outfield for a homerun, but none came near me, although one hit off the second deck’s facade above me.  Big concourses, lots of place to get food or souvenirs, A Train above the left field wall for excitement when the Astros hit a homer.  Not sure what a train has to do with astros.  Neat having the window behind it, seeing the skyline.  I sat in the second row of the upper deck, pretty good seats for $22.  But the stadium was 70%full (yeah right) so I was able to move down later, and the ushers didn’t care.

Zambrano started the game, but the Cubs couldn’t swing the bats, so they lost 3-1.  It is amazing how well cubs fans travel.  Everywhere you see a Cubs game, you see plenty of Cubs fans.  That was even true for the Iowa Cubs.  I remember when I saw them in Atlanta in 2003, walking in downtown before the game, Cubs jerseys everywhere.  Quite cool.

They opened up the roof after the game for some fireworks.  Still only 8 minutes worth, compared to the average 7 min for the minors that I have seen.  I thought they might go a little longer, seeing that they are the bigs and all.  But still fun as always.

Corpus Christi Hooks

 

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There were  a couple more missions to see in San Antonio before I left.  The one with the bells is San Juan Capistrano.  They are actually still functioning as Catholic parishes.  Traveling down to Corpus Christi, I decided to get off the interstate again.  I think there are less people traveling back roads here than in IL. The roads are in better condition in IL.   A town here looked like it had all dirt roads.  Through Corpus Christi (a surprising population of 277,000) to Padre Island, my site for tonight.  That picture is my tent on the beach.  Cool, huh?  Just wait for the sunrise pictures tomorrow.

I took a long walk on the beach.  There was a ton of seaweed out, but no oil!  Lots of little crabs scurrying around, and gulls above.  I actually walked far enough to get blisters on my big toes.

The stadium is called Whataburger Field, after a fast food chain.  I am going to go home and see if we can get our stadium Cookout Field, then maybe we can get shakes all the time!  The exterior wasn’t brick, and not particularly inspiring.  But once inside, there are some nice touches.  You have the bridge past centerfield, and part of the scoreboard is mounted on this seaport-looking metal hut thing, which was nice.  There were tons of things to have kids do so you wouldn’t have to have them watch baseball, even a basketball court.  And lots of the restaurant seating was where you couldn’t see the game, also odd.  But the game was good, the Hooks beat the dreaded Springfield Cardinals into the ground, 8-1.  I’ve noticed a few stadiums recently that have an organ playing.  I don’t know for sure if it is really an organ, or a recording of one.  I think it is real though.  They still have their piped in music too, but it is great to hear an organ at the park.

San Antonio Missions

 

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So I decided to get off the interstate today, and used some back roads, since Austin –> San Antonio isn’t too far.  I ended up near Canyon Lake, which finally gave me a little bit of the look I was hoping for in TX, the low scattered brush on gray hills that you tend to see in the movies. In San Antonio, saw a mission that is part of the National Park, then the Alamo, which isn’t.  The commercialism at the Alamo was a little sad, but they did have plenty of good historical signs around as well.  I was warned that it wasn’t much to see, but I was impressed none the less.  I then toured the Riverwalk, which I could imagine to be quite nice on a Friday night.  Wednesday at 4, with it being 90 degrees, it was ok, and even kind of stinky at points.

Onto the game.  Nice park, but no cupholders at any seats.  I am beginning to enjoy everyone’s “who cares you bought the $5 grass seat, sit in the $15 front row” policy.  Another nice hat, has the Alamo on it.  Good game going on, decent show and such.  Then you hear a little rumbling.  I thought maybe it was a plane or something.  Then I look over the 3rd base stands, and it looks a bit dark.  Well, it is 8:30 pm.  The San Antonio pitcher is throwing a hitter through 6 innings, and then a gust of wind comes up.  And by gust I mean a sustained 40 mph wind that blows everything everywhere, knocks out power to the stadium, and sends people running for their cars.  I didn’t, because I like seeing a little rainstorm every now and then.  After about 2 minutes, I am looking for shelter to run to if a tornado dropped down.  Seriously.  Thankfully it didn’t but it was fun to watch the ground crew get the tarp down in the dark and the wind.  I think some of the players actually helped.  They did a good job considering.  After about 45 minutes of monsoon, I run out to the parking lot only to realize I can’t see in the dark parking lot.  So A) where is my truck and B)where are all the puddles.  I was able to answer these by B) stepping in all of them and A) Running from end to end of the parking lot. So I was wet.  Oh yeah, and I left my sleeping bag in the back of my truck.  Good thing it is warm here.

Driving back to the campground, I realized that I had left my tent windows down to promote airflow.  So I got pretty worried that I was going to be drowned out.  But blessed Walmart tent held up quite well, just a few drops here and there.  Note the picture of the pond about 4 feet from my tent.  As of 11pm, I’m still dry!

Round Rock Express

 

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Well, I had the highlight of my trip today.  But we’ll get back to that.  I hustled to break camp early, to get to the Rangers Ballpark in Arlington for a tour.  With poor signage on the roads, I barely made it, but it was a decent tour.  Got to see the clubhouse, press box, suite, dugout.  Not bad, although I would have like to see a view from above like we got in SF.  The new Cowboy Stadium is next door, and is awfully large, but looks good.

Hitting the road, poor signage once again had me take a little longer than necessary to get on the interstate.  At one point, I had signs on either side of the street pointing to different directions.  Down towards Waco, I had some free time and went to the Texas Sports Hall of Fame.  For how much history there was here, I was a little disappointed.  Baylor is also in Waco, and the 3 minute driving tour, it looked nice.

The game at Round Rock was against the Iowa Cubs, so another chance to see our future stars.  And Ryno.  This time I was able to get there a bit before game time, and he was singing autographs near the dugout.  I had brought my Cubs cap and a sharpie in anticipation of this.  So I stood in line, not knowing what to say when I got there, but it ended up something like this- “Can you sign this?” (no response) “Thank you sir”, Ryno-“Sure” And those 5 seconds were the greatest moment of this trip and I now have a Ryne Sandberg autographed Cubs hat, that I will never wear again, and will be displayed in a glass case. (maybe not a glass case)

Round Rock has a nice stadium, although kind of small for AAA I think, it did start out 10 years ago as a AA stadium.  Has a lot of berm in the outfield, which the Cubs hit two homeruns to, and a cool Homerun porch in LF.  Nice scoreboard, and two RHE boards on both 3rd and 1st base sides.  The people seemed to be into the game a bit more, and the stadium was maybe 2/3 full at best.  And the Cubs won 3-2, with Micah Hoffpauir getting a 9th inning HR and Schlitter saving the game.  Compared to Nashville where Hoffpauir got tossed and Schlitter blew the game in the ninth.  GO CUBS!

Frisco Rough Riders

 

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Started the day by going to Little Rock Central HS, the site of the school desegregation battle, which is now a national historic site.  So there was a small visitor center, with a museum.  Nicely done.

On the road to Texas, for the first time!  So part of the reason I came to Texas was to mark it off my list.  Crossing that border(which doesn’t have a big Welcome to Texas sign), I hit #37!  Unsurprisingly, I have a spreadsheet that lists what states I have been in, and also tallies how many I have built in (12) and done some sort of baseball-related activity(26)  I had always counted AR, but had really just driven through on the short stretch of I-55 on a work trip in college.  So it is fully legit now. All states touching the Mississippi River and east, I’ve been too.  I need to head west.  Unfortunately, road trips from NC are expensive to go to Idaho(sorry Tim) Someday, though.

Anyway, after a solid drive to Frisco, I got to Dr Pepper Ballpark.  It is next to a mall, so plenty of free parking!  Thats good, since I had to pay $3 in tolls to get there. (I’ll get back to that).  The stadium was really cool.  Another new one(I think 2008) but it is different.  Instead of a normal suite level, they are individual buildings, with cupolas on top of each.  Very neat.  I don’t know if that is Texas-y or what, but a cool change of pace.  There was even a pool past the right field fence.  Nice having the scoreboard being in a different place than the video screen, makes it seem a little more old-school.  The mascots were fine, and the inbetween entertainment was fine.  They had a $10 meal plan, where you could get a burger and fries and a Dr.Pepper product, so I thought, yum, maybe a burger instead of a hotdog.  Bad idea. After a couple of bites, I actually double checked to make sure it wasn’t a veggie burger for its lack of taste.  Nope, it was meat(sort of) that was just bad.  One bad thing about the stadium was there were no overhangs, so in the brutal Texas sun, it was hot.  So after a little bit (game was a 4:00 start) all the fans were sitting on the 3rd base side to get what little shade was offered by the suites. It was odd having half the stadium full, and the other half virtually empty.

Decent game, Frisco won 9-6.  8 runs in one inning pretty much sealed the deal.  Although the game wasn’t close, this was still the lamest group of fans.  Very quiet throughout the game, even when they were knocking the ball around that inning.  Love the hat though, simple, yet more than just letters.

Drove through Dallas on my way to the State Park.  Absolute ghost town.  I know it was 7pm on Memorial Day, but really, it was kind of creepy.  And back to the tolls.  I don’t mind tolls at all, they are underused in America, and most people have figured out the I-Pass or whatever they call it in your state.  But in TX, they don’t want to play with others so their ‘Tolltag’ isn’t compatible.  Boo.  Get with the program.  And why don’t you have a sign up to welcome me into the state? I was stoked about getting a picture of it, #37 and all, and then nothing.  Just construction. Lame.  TXDOT, you are on my list right now.  You have 5 days to redeem yourself.