Ball Park Visitors on Right Off The Bat
Bret and Mayra Breeding lived every baseball fan’s fantasy this season when the Texas couple visited every major league park. They will be my guests on Right Off The bat Tuesday at 2:50 PM Pacific right here on loveofthegameproductions.com, the A’s web site, and 610 AM KFRC here in Northern California. This will be an interesting show as they tell us the ins and outs of their favorite stadiums.
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Marty,
I really appreciate the opportunity to come on the A’s pre-game show and tell our story of the trek we have made around the US, Canada, Mexico and Japan.
As a bit of an extra, I wanted to add a few additional items that the audience may find useful for such a trip. If anyone would like to contact me, they can do so at bbreed67@yahoo.com. Our website is at the following address (http://bbreed67.tripod.com/index.htm ) but it does not contain any highlights of our 2002 trip. These will be posted soon. Here are some other interesting items:
Best Overall Ballpark: Camden Yards
Most Picturesque Parks: PNC Park, Miller Park, Comerica Park, PacBell Park
Best Foods: Garlic Fries at either San Francisco or Oakland, Cha-Cha Bowl (San Francisco), Poutine (Montreal), Super Nachos (Oakland), Fish Tacos (San Diego), Gates BBQ (Kansas City)
Weirdest Foods: Poutine (Montreal), Chicken in a waffle (Jacobs Field), Rocky Mountain Oysters (Denver), Fried Dough (Boston)
Best Places to get food outside the ballpark: Any hotdog vendor in Toronto (try adding corn, olives, and jalapenos to the dog), Skyline Chili in Cincinnati, Clam Chowder at Quincy Market in Boston, Gray’s Papaya’s Hot Dogs (Recession Special) in New York
Best Side Trips:
Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland
San Diego Zoo
Solvang/Gilroy on the way from San Francisco to LA
Negro Leagues Museum in Kansas City
Trip Oddities:
Getting to meet Peter Guber who is the ex-Sony President and producer of films such as Rain Man, League of their Own
Guy outside Toronto’s SkyDome with the sign that reads “Beat the Crap out of me for $5†– of course that’s $5 Canadian
The crowd in Minneapolis chanting Eddie, Eddie, Eddie for Eddie Guardardo – sounded like they were throwing meat to the lions
Massive amount of bees in Miami that necessitated the closing of almost a whole section
Cornfields in Iowa at the Field of Dreams
The basics of such a trip:
Plan the trip by cutting the country into geographic segments and plan from there
Manage costs on the trip – we used Orbitz and Priceline – we got hotels with lots of complimentary breakfasts
Pack Light
Try to go around promotions (these trinkets will form the basis for lots of memories in years to come)
Pay homage to the history of the old ballparks in each city
Approximate total overall cost is estimated between $6,000-$7,000
Lessons Learned and what we would do different:
On the trip take lots of music and reading, all the talk is finished after 2 hours
Try to limit driving to less than 4 hours a day – if you can, make stops in minor league cities to break up the long driving distances
You may want to break the trip up – it is very difficult to complete in 45 straight days
A lot of luck is needed because you may get rainouts and that will make you re-plan right on the fly
Make sure that you visit some player museums in addition to the baseball HOF – Ted Williams museum in Hernando, FL; Bob Feller Museum in Van Meter, IA, Cal Ripken, Yogi Berra, etc.
Above all, this is a once-in-a-lifetime trip, so make sure to invest in quality photographic equipment – be sure to take lots of videotape and pictures – we took on average about 50 pictures per stadium and shot about 40 hours of film on the whole trip.
Hope this additional information helps and if anyone would like to call me, please contact me at bbreed67@yahoo.com.
Bret Breeding
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