On the Road Again...

Just can't wait to get on the road again...

I guess it's about time to dust off our travel blog, since we're hitting the road again! Destination: Arizona, to catch some Cactus League spring training games and maybe even a few national park sites!

I was a little concerned that how we started out our trip this morning was a foreshadowing of things to come. RAIN! Ugh. We saw an overturned truck before we even got out of town! And three more accidents (likely due to hydroplaning) on the freeway on our way through LA. But thankfully by the time we reached Palm Springs, we had gotten in front of the storm so it was clear the rest of the way to Phoenix.

Our base for this trip is Mesa, spring training home of the Cubbies! Nice to see this when we pulled into the hotel parking lot...

The Cubs house their minor league players here,
but we haven't seen any yet

But we weren't really prepared to display our Cub fan-dom, unlike some other guests...

After a quick hop in the pool for the kids, we decided to head out to the Peoria Sports Complex to watch the Kansas City Royals play the San Diego Padres. I did not realize how much sprawl there is to the Phoenix area - it took us nearly 45 minutes to get there from Mesa without traffic!  

We walked up and bought tickets in the outfield box section ($17) just as the game was starting...

Great seats!

It was an productive 5-run bottom of the 1st for the Padres. The Royals worked their way back into it by the 8th, but we didn't stay until the bitter end (too cold and tired!), so I'm not sure who won. Nice stadium to take in a game! And the food offerings weren't too bad either...

Iowa breaded pork tenderloin sandwich and fresh cut waffle fries

Cotton candy!

The boys found Autograph Alley and were excited to get players to sign the baseballs we brought. By the end of the night, they had collected autographs from Padres RHP Edinson Volquez (#37), C John Baker (#21), and OF Cameron Maybin (#24), as well as Royals OF Jeff Francoeur (#21). The cherry on top would have been catching a foul ball, but alas, it was not to be (at least for this game).

More adventures in road tripping!

We have tickets for tomorrow's Angels vs. Dodgers game at Camelback Ranch, so our fingers are crossed that it doesn't get rained out (and that we don't get rained *on*!)