Cardinals @ Patrios
After a short night, the first highlight of the trip is today: going to a game of theNew England Patriots! We got up, had a very simple breakfast at Starbucks in the hotel and drove to the stadium. This is when we learned how much snow was fallen (and still falling) in the area. All the way to the stadium there was heavy snow, the roads were snowy, and you had to drive carefully. At the stadium we parked on one of the general parking areas and were amazed that even in this freezing and snow there are a lot of people tailgating. There were bbq’s all over the place!
First stop was at the ticket booth, to pick up our reserved tickets. Next: the Patriots Pro Shop. This is like Disneyworld for me -) Man, there was sooo much stuff to buy. We decided to come back tomorrow and stick with the raincoats and a sweater.
Then we went inside the stadium. Gilette Stadium is a new, bit open stadium So, with bad weather like this, it is cold. But hey, football is for ‘real men’, so let’s not complain! Our seats were perfect: 50 yard line, and about 20 rows from the bottom. We enjoyed the game, laughed at the crazy americans throwing snowballs after a touchdown (and there were quite a few).
We had a great afternoon: football, pizza, some coffee and hot chocolate to stay warm and look at Randy Moss, Kurt Warner, Matt Cassell, etc.
After the game it took a looooong time to get off the parking. So busy… I now understand why a lot of fans heated up their bbq again. Better have some burgers before you get in the car. But it was cold and the wind was quite strong. Worst thing was: after about an hour trying to get off the parking, some ran into our rental car. He said the car simple slid into mine, but he must have been driving too fast.
I got all his info (he apparently hit TWO cars…) and called Hertz to find out what else I needed to do. Turned out I had everything, but needed a report from the police. Well, forget it…. The police on the larking didn’t want to make a report because the damage was probably not big enough. They advised me to go to the police station. We did that (after we finally got off the parking), but the police over there was even worse. Very unfriendly, very aggressive, etc. O well, Hertz will have to do without the report.
By now we missed the planned Boston Celtics game, but we were tied anyway. We drove through the snow, over bad roads back to Boston. We saw a lot of accidents, cars slipped of the road, etc.
In the hotel we immediately went to the sports bar & restaurant in the hotel to watch the Celtics game and have dinner. Apart from the small accident, a very good first day!
Check out the pictures from the Patriots game:
