On Revisiting on the Travel Day
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| The Ballpark of the Palm Beaches, 2017 |
Tuesday, March 14, 2017
New York Metropolitans vs. Houston AstrosThe Ballpark of the Palm Beaches
Grapefruit League (Spring Training)
West Palm Beach, FL
1:05 PM
Outside the Game:
As I was optimistically heading out on the road today, I commenced to packing up for the next couple of days and then headed out for the short drive the park. Since the Nationals and Astros shared a stadium, I had to hit the Palm Beaches ballpark twice to see both home teams.
I had a couple of extra days in case of rainouts, but after a bit of a shower with yesterday's game, it looked like I was clear sailing to head out for other Florida fun after the Tuesday game. As I usually pack these trips to a game a day, it was almost unique to have a couple of days off to do something besides baseball. I hadn't been to the Kennedy Space Center since I was a kid, so that was my first choice for a stop-in if I had the opportunity, so I was planning to head up to Cape Canaveral after the game and stay at a hotel in the area. Instead of rocket launches, the Cape is mostly used these days as a departure point for cruise ships, so the area is lined with hotels to service them, so it was pretty easy to find a hotel for the night.
It was a quick drive up to the park before the game, and parking wasn't a problem given that this weekday afternoon game had much more anemic attendance than the first weekend game I saw there. Getting out was similarly quick, and I was on my way north after the short game.
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| Hitting the road |
It was only about a two-hour drive up 95 after the game. It being mid-afternoon, there wasn't much traffic at all, and I zoomed straight up the coast with no issues except a stuck gas gauge on my mother's car that had me worried about exactly how much gas I had left until it shook itself free about halfway up. Once I got to the area, it became wall-to-wall tourist signs that got a little confusing, but I able to take the right bridge to Port Canaveral and down the main road to my hotel, which was at the north end of things.
I parked and checked in with no problems. It was early evening by the time I ventured out again. I stopped into the arcade at the hotel to get my game on, and then I went to the hotel restaurant for dinner. There must have been a NASA conference going on somewhere as well, because the restaurant was full of people with NASA stickers everywhere, and I saw a sign or two about a convention. What wasn't rocket science was the service at the restaurant. I was able to order and get my food relatively okay, if a bit slow, but then literally all the wait staff disappeared for about a half hour. Those that came out literally ran to where they were going and ran back to the kitchen. I made two attempts to call for their attention, which were ignored, and that was when I tried to remember how much my food cost, left that much on the table, and left. There was no one to stop me, and it was the first time I ever had to resort to such tactics. It was bizarre. No one came after me. I wonder how long until they noticed.
Being a sucker for mini golf, I walked down the street to check out a course that I saw, but upon closer examination, the mini golf course was decrepit and part of a tourist-trap store selling merchandise of questionable usefulness and taste, so I demurred. Back at the hotel, I went online and bought my ticket for the Space Center the next day, and started doing some research for my next proposed stop: Disney.
Rogue One was the Star Wars movie I had been waiting 30 years for, so I was back in the Mouse's good graces. I decided to try for Disney Hollywood Studios to see all the new attractions and merch from the movie as a reward, so I did some research and picked a hotel for the next night that was affordable but still close to the park. All the on-property hotels were sold out already at this late date, so I made due and hoped.
Not knowing how the next two days were going to go, I dropped off to sleep.
The Stadium & Fans:
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| Home plate to center field, The Ballpark at the Palm Beaches |
The Ballpark at the Palm Beaches hadn't changed much in two days, although it was much emptier. For a brand-new park to sell this poorly was not a good indicator of its long-term success, but who knows if the Astros' success will bring it a boost.
The suicide sun stroke carts were not out in the outfield for this game, thank god, and there were some new specialty kiosks by the main home plate concessions for this game. I don't know if the Astros and Nationals have different concessions contracts, or it was just a weekend vs. day game situation. Either way, there weren't any attendants passing out from being cooked in metal boxes, so that was a plus.
In taking in more of the stadium, it was easy to see a lot more incomplete parts of the park, like landscaping and most of the finishing touches of polish that were nowhere to be found. Once they finish the place up in the off season, it will probably be much nicer.
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| Orbit, damnit. |
As mentioned, the place was barely half full at best, and the visiting Metropolitans fan (whose team was located less than an hour to the north) were perhaps half of those fans. Orbit, however, made an appearance, and the poor soul in the big furry costume was out and about for the entire afternoon game in the sun. Regular between-innings contests pervaded as well.
At the Game with Oogie:
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| Shade scoring |
I got to the park early and was one of the first people in the parking lot. I did a full walk-around of the park, noting the incomplete construction around the park and the pre-game MLB network show setting up on the grass outside, and then ended up in the Astros training area before the gates opened. I hung around and watched some drills along with a bleacher full of minor leaguers who were watching the top team take their grounders. When the gates opened, I headed inside, taking another look at the incomplete park.
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| "Stix" |
At least the pressure cooker kiosks weren't in the outfield for this game, and I got a burger and fries from one of the concessions by home plate, along with a "Stix" (fancy name for shish kabob) and fires from another specialty kiosk in the area.
I got my seat for this game on the visiting Metropolitans third-base dugout side several rows back. There was a group of snowbirds to my right and a Hispanic family in front of me. The father kept telling his son and daughter what was going on in the game in a very appropriate, fatherly way.
There wasn't a lot more than that and watching the speedy afternoon game take its course.
The Game:
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| First pitch, Metropolitans vs. Astros |
This pre-season matchup of the Who-Knew-It-Was-Going-To-End-Like-That Astros and the visiting New York Metropolitans was a brisk affair of a rare pitching duel in a pre-season game.
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| deAwsome is what his name should be |
New York got back-to-back singles in the first, but stranded them in a fashion familiar to all Metropolitans fans, while the Astros' side struck out around a walk and a hit. Both sides went quietly in the second, but, in the process of striking out for the inning in the top of the third, the Metropolitans snuck in a leadoff single and a home run to left to jump to a 2-0 lead. Houston only snuck in a single in their half of the inning. New York got a single and a walk in the fourth, while the Astros snuck in a one-out homer to right of their own, closing the lead to 2-1.
And that was about it for the rest of the game. The Metropolitans came close in the top of the fifth with a single and a double not quite far enough to score the lead runner, while Houston went in order. Both sides went in order in the sixth except for a sole Astros' single, and both sides had a lone single in the seventh as well. New York had a single erased on a double play in the top of the eighth, while Houston stranded a two-out walk. The ninth saw a lonely walk for the Metropolitans and a single erased on another double-play for the Astros, leaving New York with the pointless 2-1 win established half a game ago.
The Scorecard:
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| Metropolitans vs. Astros, 03/14/17. Metropolitans "win," 2-1. |
So, the programs for the Nationals and Astros aren't just cosmetic changes on the cover. For example, the scorecard in the Astros program is completely different, a more traditional one-page design on cardstock that includes pitching lines and stats blocks. One mark against it, though, was the solid-color background which left little space for notes. There was also a $1 separate scorecard of nearly identical design, but I used the program version.
There weren't that many plays of scoring note. Besides an out to the overshift and a couple of gem catches on both sides, there was only one controversy to make it to the card. In the top of the fifth, there was a grounder to the third baseman that was clearly a butcher job by the ironically named Moran. For some inexplicable home-cooking reason, they changed it to a hit. I left the official record on the scorecard but noted the play and gave the player a parenthetical error in the tally area. That will show him.
The Accommodations:
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| Radisson Resort by the Port |
For this evening, I was at the rhythmically named Radisson Resort at the Port. It was obviously mostly a stop-over hotel for people going off on cruises from the Cape and less about visitors to the space center, although there were clearly some people there for a NASA conference.
My room was right off the main pool, so I worried about noise, but the rooms were pleasantly sound-shielded, so there were no problems on that front. I had an overstuffed king bed with end tables and an easy chair on one side of the room, across from a desk and dresser with TV. At the end of the room was the vanity and sink, right next to the bathroom that housed the toilet and tub.
I was only there for a night, but it was a pleasant-enough stay.
On Spaaaaaaaaaace
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| Kennedy Space Center |
Wednesday, March 15, 2017
Brevard County, FLOutside the Game:
I woke up in some place not my parents' condo for the first time this trip and dragged myself out of bed to shower, dress, pack up, and check out. One of the problems of being on an Air Force base is that Kennedy Space Center doesn't have an actual address, which prevents easy GPS directions. The helpful folks at the front desk reached back into the 16th century and gave me paper directions to the visitors' center, and thus dubiously armed, I set out into the day.
It was only one or two tricky turns and I was off to the visitors’ center with no problems. I parked up and headed to the entrance just before the gates opened. As I had pre-bought my ticket, I skipped straight ahead to the gates, and I was one of the first few dozen people in the park that day.
I made a fateful and prescient decision to go straight to the back when it opened. I managed to make a bee-line straight to the Atlantis exhibit. I was in the very first showing of the video they show every five minutes or so to control the crowds in the main exhibit area. It was just me and a handful of other people. The video finished, and the back of the screen opened up to reveal the shuttle Atlantis hanging from the roof of the giant building.
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| A shuttle into space |
Walking by later, there was a line out the door, so getting there at the very start of the day turned out to be a great decision. I was able to wander the exhibit at my own pace without any sort of crowd. It was here that I really started to get into the experience. Not having been here in over 30 years, and the relative doldrums of the space program in the interim made me wonder how I was going to react to the place. But as I was wondering around the exhibits, I was very much that kid again staring up at a real space shuttle and other exhibits.
There were moments of levity (as the simulators that had MS Windows errors) and being told that I couldn't go through the model space station and space slides because I was apparently "an adult," but there were other more somber moments, such as the Challenger memorial, which even had wreckage of the shuttle that blew up on launch so many years ago.
After getting my fill of that building, I did a short backtrack to grab a bus over to the Apollo Center further out on the Cape. Again, I had some pretty good timing, as I walked through seemingly miles of switchback gates that would probably be filled later in the day to have a relatively short wait to get on a bus out to Apollo.
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| Mercury Mission Control |
And that was a good thing, because being outside for my first extended period of time, I was struck by the fact that it was cold in northern Florida this day. Well, cold by Florida standards for March, not actually cold. We're talking in the high 40s. But, it being Florida and I being on vacation, and certainly not expecting anything like this, I had on pants, a t-shirt, and my over shirt, and outside of buttoning up my outer shirt, there was nothing else I could do except keep my hands in my pockets and think warm thoughts.
Thankfully, except for a small wait outside after our bus got to the Apollo center, I was back inside again at Apollo mission control and the rest of the building. Everything from Failure Is Not An Option came flooding back to me in the actual control room. This provoked a deeper child-like awe in me, from the last time we had a real-real space program with giant rockets and actual goals. Large rockets lined the long main expanse of the building, along with a wall of newspapers from the first moon landing, and a weirdly anachronistic multi-media display about the moon landing. There was also a more somber Apollo 1 memorial area.
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| Challenger memorial |
The future of space was perhaps on display, as one of the launch pads on the Cape was primed with a Space X launch that was scheduled for the next day. After seeing all there was to see and grabbing some overpriced lunch, I lined up to get a bus back to the main visitors’ center. I was right behind a Canadian couple who informed me that many of the visitors were people such as themselves who had a day layover on their cruises to the Caribbean. Some decided to take the short trip to the Kennedy Space Center, while others opted for the longer hour plus trip both ways out to the Disney parks. They were kind of space nerds, so they chose the space center, for obvious reasons.
After the bus ride back to the main area, I spent the rest of the afternoon visiting the rest of the buildings, including the Heroes and Legends hall, the rocket garden, and the hall of future developments in space craft. NASA apparently is officially ceding low-Earth orbit launches to the private sector and are now concentrating on long-haul flights in the solar system with a modular rocket design to get us to Mars and beyond. Yeah, it probably is all high-level propaganda, but after a day that tapped deeply into my youthful enthusiasm, I wanted to believe. I also apparently wanted to spend a lot of money in the gift shop. But what can you do?
As evening fell, and it got even colder, I retreated to my car and made the slightly longer than an hour drive over to Kissimmee and my hotel at the Quality Inn. After checking in, I went straight to the little booth that every hotel in the area has for tickets to the amusement parks in the area, and I bought a ticket for Hollywood Studios for the next day. I went up to my room and unpacked, and registered everything for my ticket online.
I then walked down the road for a bit and grabbed dinner at some place or other. I considered going to a mini-golf place, but there was a long line, it was cold, and I was tired. I went back to my room, did a little more research for Disney the next day, reserved a Fast Pass or two, and then hit the hay.
The Accommodations:
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| Quality Inn & Suites |
For the night before Disney, I was at the Quality Inn & Suites at Kissimmee by the Lake, which fit in as many whistle words for "Disney-adjacent" without getting into trouble with the Mouse lawyers. The hotel itself looked a little run-down, and I'm always inherently suspicious about "Quality" Inns, but the room turned out to be quite nice. There was a king bed and desk on one wall, across from a small sitting chair, refrigerator, TV, and dresser.
The vanity and sink was at the end of the room, outside of bathroom with toilet and tub. While it was heavily populated by budget-conscious holiday makers, it had no noticeable Spring Break contingent, so I was able to have a peaceful night's rest before heading out the next morning to the Maus Haus.
On the Crowdiest Place on Earth
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| Me and some close friends |
Lake Buena Vista, FL
Outside the Game:
And so I found myself going back to Disney for the first time in a decade-ish, more or less.
I really can't overstate how important Rogue One was in dragging me back to Star Wars fandom, mostly against my wishes. But it was the best experience I had in a movie theater since Jedi (Return of the, not Last), and I wanted to see what Disney was doing with it.
So I got up early, packed up, cleaned up, checked out, and drove to Disney about a half hour before the gates opened. With my band around my wrist, I went through the first surging crowd and found they were letting people into the park, but not into the rides a little early. It was still cool for Florida, but not nearly as chilly as the day before, and I waiting in the first line of people held back by a bank line barrier until the moment the park opened.
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| I feel like I could crush him. |
This free-for-all is, among Disney insiders, the biggest push of the day. It is pretty much the only time you will be able to get on super-popular rides without a Fast Pass, and you have about two rides before the lines back up to the regular wait times. I went straight into Star Tours, which was right by where I was, and was on the first car of the tour. It had been sadly updated for the prequels, but not Rogue One. I then made a beeline over the Tower of Terror, and although I had a half hour wait by the time I was out of Star Tours, it was well under the normal 2.5 hour wait you get without a Fast Pass.
After Tower of Terror, the park was already filled. It was a Spring Break Week, and the park was filled to capacity. I made my way to a Fast Pass station on my way to the Muppets theater, and I was already blocked out of getting Rocking Roller Coaster Fast Passes for the rest of the day. (I would later find out that you can do your Fast Passes days in advance now, which wasn't the case the last time I went. Technology passed me by.)
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| It's time to get things started |
I went to the Muppets 3D Theater nevertheless, as its high capacity is one of the few rides that you can go in at-will for most of the day. I headed in and waiting in a short line. Outside of updating the waiting area of the theater with some memorabilia of the now-thankfully-cancelled The Muppets, the attraction hadn't changed much at all. It was the same (what would now be called) 4D experience that I enjoyed again. Sadly, the Muppet store, although still the same on the outside, was only half of the store inside. The Muppet half was basically trying to sell off remaining The Muppets merchandise, although retaining some of the old decorations of the backstage of the original Muppet Theater, but the other half of the store was mostly a generic Disney merchandise store now.
The new Star Wars area was under construction, right next to the Muppets theater. This was part of the new immersive Star Wars park that was going to premiere sometime before the turn of the decade and include stuff on the misbegotten sequels as well as the original trilogy and prequels.
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| Cassian's convertible blaster |
The park was pretty much wall-to-wall by this time of the day, and only more crowded when the stormtroopers march through the park happened, which just compressed the crowd more. I went over to the other Star Wars area of the park, which was filled with Rogue One props in addition to other smaller exhibits and short films on the movies. I then spent way too much money in the gift shop, where I may or may not have purchased a build-your-own droid toy.
I was able to grab a Fast Pass for the Great Movie Ride. I would find out later that it was being torn down to make space for more of Star Wars land, and I know a lot of people hate the ride as hokey and not worth the wait, but I always liked it. It was goofy fun, and you're in Disney for Christ's sake.
I tried to get a reservation for the Sci Fi Drive In, but by this time, they only had standbys for the last seating of the night, so I passed. I walked around to all the other areas of the park to see what I could see, and after witnessing the food lines, I decided to take a walk outside the park and head to the nearby Boardwalk, Disney's old-timey, turn-of-the-century boardwalk area, with old-timey shops and luxury resorts that started at $200 a night. I grabbed lunch on the pleasantly deserted Boardwalk before hopping on a ferry back to the entrance of Hollywood Studios.
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| It almost looks peaceful from a distance... |
I used the Fast Pass I had for the final showing of the Stunt Show, another somewhat-hokey but enjoyable-to-me program at the park. I wandered in and out of shops for a while, spending my money on all the new Rogue One and Rebels merch I found, before heading to a food stand for dinner. I got some overpriced chicken tenders and fries, and already all the tables were full up. I made the best of it and sat down on a curb to eat my food and contemplate whether I would stay for the next hour or so to see the fireworks display or not. As I was finishing my fries, a kid came through and stepped directly in them and ran off. I figured that had made my decision for me.
Carting all my ill-considered loot out to the parking lot, I tossed all my gear in the trunk and headed out to my destination for the night in Melbourne, FL. I didn't want to drive all the way back to my parents' condo that night (I didn't know how late I would be at Disney), and there was a zoo in Melbourne, and the Dodgertown complex was nearby.
After clearing the park traffic, it was a fairly relaxed hour and a half drive to my hotel. I overshot the exit due to some construction, and it took a bit to get turned around, but I eventually got sorted out, checked in, soaked in the tub, and hit the hay, exhausted from my Disney extravaganza.
The Accommodations:
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| Extended Stay America |
For reasons that seemed pretty good the night before, I had booked myself in the Extended Stay America by the Melbourne regional airport. I had absolutely no need for an efficiency apartment, but here we were.
The room had a short entrance way off of the bathroom to the right. The main room of the apartment had a full kitchen on one side, opposite a work desk. It was separated from the bed area by a kitchen table, and beyond that was the king-sized bed across from the dresser and an easy chair.
I only really made use of the tub and the bed, but it was quiet, and therefore I had a good stay there.
On Decaying History
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| Nature reclaims |
Friday, March 17, 2017
Vero Beach, FLOutside the Game:
I slept in good and late this Friday, getting a solid night's sleep after soaking in the tub and feeling quite good about the world upon waking. I felt so good, I had a second nap after I got up the first time just to be sure.
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| The rare turtle not having sex in front of me |
Solidly sure how much I'd rested, I got up, packed, showered, and checked out of the hotel. It was a short drive to the Brevard Zoo, a zoological park I'd never heard of but ended up quite impressed with. The park was quite extensive, and it had a lot of activity areas, such as kayaks, paddleboats, and rope courses. It was certainly more extensive than I was expecting.
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| The chosen one |
I had a pleasant late morning and early afternoon wandering around. I grabbed lunch at one of the concession stands and just sat around enjoying a not too hot/not too cold Florida Spring afternoon. After lunch, I grabbed the mini-train for a ride around the park while enjoying the breeze.
Once I'd seen everything, I headed out for my next destination. Instead of going all the way back to my parents' condo, I decided to stop off after an hour at Dodgertown in Vero Beach, which was right on the way back. Dodgertown and Holman Stadium were the first real "modern" post-war Spring Training facility in the MLB. The stadium was built in the mid-50s, and the Dodgers were the first team to build up a whole Spring Training complex, where all the affiliates of the team would practice in one location, with housing and training facilities for all the players, and even the idea of a "Spring Training complex" was developed. After sixty years, the Dodgers finally did the unthinkable and pulled up stakes to go out to Arizona in the great Cactus League migration, leaving Vero Beach high and dry, and taking the Gulf Coast Dodgers minor league team with them.
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| Home plate to center field, Holman Stadium |
There was a lot of hand-wringing about what to do with the facility. It had a great deal of historic value in a state that had no real use for history. Plans for other teams to buy the complex quickly evaporated with the costs it would take to "modernize" the facility, and it still, to a point, sits in limbo, getting some sporadic use while still slowly falling to disrepair.
On the day I visited, there was some manner of baseball tournament being held on the grounds. The gift shop was still open, but only the very front of the stands were being used for the small crowd. And for good reason. The rows of colored seats were in various stages of being reclaimed by nature in the other areas of the seating bowl. Even the press box and area behind home plate was slowly falling apart. Plaques dedicating the facility and honoring all the trans-Pacific games played between the Dodgers and teams from Korea and Japan were slowly fading to nothing.
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| Disrepair |
The concession area behind home plate was still nominally open and running, but the first and third base cafes were slowly rotting where they stood. The once proud Hall of Fame Walk was nothing but two arched gateways, and the wall poster of the Hall of Famers was even started to get washed out. The "love seat" that was a magnet for picture-takers for decades was still in good repair, however, and all the newer training fields and facilities that the Dodgers put in the years before they left were still being used.
There was something bittersweet about the wrought-iron gates with "LA Dodgers" on one side and "VB Dodgers" on the other that were slowly falling to rust. Hopefully, someone will be found who can keep this place alive and back in sporting shape. There are enough Brooklyn Dodgers fans living in the state now who could be moved to action, one would hope.
After my visit there, I made the last of the hour and half drive back to my parents’ condos in the fading of the afternoon. I had a shower and a nap back at the condo, and then I ordered in some Chinese food with my dad, as my mother was off visiting relatives for a night out that evening.
I lazed around the guest bedroom for the rest of night before hitting the sack early again. Something about Florida, man.
The Accommodations:
I was back in the guest room at the condo, again. Fighting to clap hard enough to turn the lights on and off as necessary.
On Another Zoo & Family
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| Demure |
Boynton Beach, FL
Outside the Game:
I woke up early again, which was not much of a surprise given how early I went to sleep. It was my last day in Florida, and I hadn't had a ton planned out, but the day before, I discovered there was another zoo I hadn't been to that was literally fifteen minutes from my parents' condo, so that seemed as good a plan as any.
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| Lazy kangaroo |
I breakfasted up and head out to get to the zoo as it opened. Even though I was there early, a lot of animals were sleeping in the hot Florida Spring. It was a nice little zoo, and I got in my time with animal photography and watching, along with grabbing some lunch and seeing Martin the Albino alligator. I went into the animal stage show after I had been around the park and watched trained animals do their thing before heading out to the car for the short drive back to the condo.
Back at the condo, I did laundry and took a nap, and then packed up for the trip home the next day. This evening was the yearly pizza party with my extended family at the condo. Pizza was had, awkward conversations were survived, and desert was intook. By the time everyone cleared out, I was quite ready for bed, and I hit the sack early again, as is custom in these parts.
The Accommodations:
I was in the condo guest room again. All relevant details have already been covered.
On Heading Home, Again
Sunday, March 19, 2017Jersey City, NJ
Outside the Game:
Sunday had me again up early, to shower and finish packing up. My father drove me out to the airport, and we said our goodbyes, and I went off to check in to my flight and deal with an inordinately long wait through security.
I grabbed some breakfast and waited to board. It turned out it was a full flight, with Spring Breakers and families visiting Florida for childrens' Spring Breaks all looking to go home. I managed to board early and got an overhead slot for my rucksack, and then I settled into my seat for the flight.
A late-arriving special person was making noise even before she got onto the plane. She was huffing and puffing about how it was insane that she had to wait to board the plane, and that she was something or other. To be honest, nearly everyone had tuned her out, except for her no-doubt long-suffering husband, who was just nodding along. She kept on being outraged about things, so you can imagine her surprise when her full-sized suitcase didn't have anywhere to go in the overheads. The cabin crew, clearly sick of her already, told her she had to check her bag. She refused. Not having any of that, the lead steward told her she could either check her bag or be removed from the plane, and suddenly she was more willing to listen to reason, although she bitched about it loudly while she sat down.
I just grinned and put in my earphones and slept the way back home. She was still being offended by things as we landed and deplaned. I threw her husband a sympathetic look as he went past. I was off with my rucksack and in a cab home pretty quickly.
Back in the apartment, I did some laundry, cleaned up, and tried to mentally prepare myself for going back to work the next day.
The Accommodations:
Sweet home, Jersey City
2017 Spring Training
