Tuesday, February 07, 2012

The Super Bowl Tickets III

Well, I’m back. I’m not exactly a conquering hero but I’ve lived a tale to carry back to the east coast from the heartland.

Let’s start with the game. I only read one article prior to the game by a sports writer that spoke about facts and myths surrounding it. I remember specifically his closing line predicting the game was “going to be epic.”

Well he got that one right didn’t he? Was it better than Super Bowl XLII? I wouldn’t go that far but it was a hell of a game. Talk about a roller coaster ride and heart palpitations. I’m really glad Belichick decided to let Bradshaw score because, if it had come down to Tynes having to kick even a chip shot field goal, I don’t think my heart could have taken the strain.

So the Giants win 21-17 and turn back the Patriots once again.

Now on to the experience.

The trip out went as well as trips out can go. There were a number of folks on the flight from Newark to Chicago that were headed for Indianapolis.

Chicago was Chicago. We caught some lunch in Chili’s since we had about a three hour layover and then found out our flight to Louisville was delayed due to “Operations” for 20 minutes. In other words it was raining like hell in parts of the Midwest.

When we finally arrived it was pouring. Nothing I could do about that so we grabbed our Hertz car and headed north on I-65. It was an easy drive to Seymour and I was entertained along the way by my daughter's various reactions to the Indiana countryside. She had never been west of eastern Pennsylvania before and if taking a farm girl to the city is a culture shock, then taking a suburban girl to farmlands is also a culture shock.

It took us about an hour to cover the 55 miles to Seymour and the Knights Inn was easy enough to locate about 300 yards from the highway. I was a little surprised that it consisted of single story room blocks. You know the kind where you park right in front of the room. I had two rooms but my daughter decided she didn’t want to stay alone. Finally she slept on the couch in my room and was quite content. I couldn’t cancel so I ended up paying for a empty room for two nights but that didn’t bother me one bit.

Right next door was a K gas station with a convenience store and an eatery called Ryan’s which was a buffet place. We ate breakfast at Ryan’s on Sunday but hit Applebee’s down the road for dinner Saturday night.

When we got back we went over an e-mail with a traffic survival guide I had gotten from the parking garage where I had a reservation. We fired up Google Maps on my travel laptop and traced and memorized the route they gave for locating the garage with the least hassle. The e-mail was a life saver. If they hadn’t sent directions I might still be wandering around trying to get to the parking garage.

We headed for Indianapolis Sunday around 10 AM under overcast skies but along the way the clouds broke and the sun came out. By the time we covered the 62 miles on I-65 North to Indianapolis it was bright sunshine.

From I-65 from got on I-70 West and got off exit 79B as instructed. Instant gridlock. I couldn’t even turn onto McCarty Ave to follow the “Super Route.” I finally figured out that much of the issue was cars attempted to enter a parking area and skirted around in the right lane. Turning onto Delaware was exciting because cars going north on Delaware were literally ignoring the traffic light on the corner of McCarty and Delaware. An Indianapolis police officer showed and put a quick end to that though.

All in all it took no more than ten minutes to turn left onto Delaware. We took that to Michigan, then turned left on Capitol in search of Maryland Ave. The e-mail had warned about pedestrian congestion at Capitol and Maryland and it was right. But with a little careful navigation we managed the left and the garage was right on the corner. We presented our voucher and the girl asked if we planned to be out by 6 AM. I blinked. 6AM!! Yeah, I think you can count on that. Along the way we had seen parking offers for anywhere from $60 to $175. I was more than content with my $99 prepaid parking.

The location was perfect and put us right in the middle of the activities.

My only real complaint was the idiotic arrangement for getting into the stadium. Basically they had the entire area closed except for one small entry. I asked one of the volunteers whether they were actually going to let us into the stadium or were we just going to admire it from afar.

The security was tight. Not only did they pat us down but we had to do the airport take everything out of your pockets and go through a metal detector AND they did a wand search after the detector. In an exchange that could only occur in the naïve Midwest a security type asked about if I had measured the lens on my camera. I assured him I had done so after reading there was a six inch limit and the lens was only five inches long. I suppose since I knew there was a six inch limit, he decided to take my word for it (I really did measure it and it really was five inches).

We had arrived in Indianapolis around 11 AM and spent about 4 hours taking in the party atmosphere around the stadium. I got saved by Jesus at least four times and had my first personal experience with the Westboro Baptist Church morons but generally it was pretty calm. I got a kick out of St. John the Evangelist Catholic church which was right in the middle of the chaos providing free face painting and inviting everyone to come in and take a rest. Above us were people sky lining between two towers constructed for the event. There were tents with food and bars, an ice sculpture and various decorations all over. In general the crowd was quiet, polite and thoroughly enjoying itself.

There were stages set up from local and national media including a big glass booth with the ESPN crew from which Chris Carter playfully teased the crowd outside. On one radio stage someone was doing an interview with a pro-Patriots analyst and Giants fans couldn’t resist drowning out the whole affair with chants of “Let’s Go Giants.” The female interviewer looked pretty upset about the whole thing.

I even got to introduce my daughter to the joys of White Castle burgers although I’m not sure she completely appreciated the experience.

Lucas Oil Stadium is gorgeous and I couldn’t believe how good our seats were. The Terrace Level was basically the mezzanine with five rows of seats. There were two permanent rows and three folding chair rows in section 520 located at the corner of the end zone on the Giants side of the field. We had row 1, seats 1 and 2 which were the seats most toward the center of the field. Sitting in the first row was great. Being on the end wasn’t so great as you had to get up every time someone exited and entered. We also had lots of company as standing near the bottom of the steps was a favorite picture spot.

There were rest rooms and concession stands right in back of our section and, since it was so small, there were no crowds at all.

Since the Giants won we stuck around for the trophy award ceremony, collected some souvenir confetti and wandered out around 11 PM. It was easy enough to find our way back to the garage which, surprisingly, was still pretty empty and we were out onto Maryland Ave in about two minutes. From there it was a short run in little traffic to I-65 South and the hour or so drive back to Seymour.

On Monday we ate in a Waffle House, where the waffles are as good as I remember them, and rewound the trip. The only complaint was the 40 minutes it took to get the luggage to the carousel in Newark. My limo driver told that it’s an intentional slow down by employees unhappy with the Continental and United merger. I have no way of knowing how true that is however. We got home around 11 PM.

So now I can say I’ve been to a Super Bowl. It was fun but there is no way you could get me to do it again.

How much did it cost? Good question. Tickets: $1,800, Airfare: $1,143, Lodging: $489, Rental Car: $85, Airport Limo: $250, Gas: $22, Parking: $99, Program: $20, Lanyards: $30, Beads: $5 (don’t ask), Food and Drink: $120. Add it all up and we’re talking around $4,042 for the two of us.

That’s more than it costs me for my three season tickets including parking which I’m sure is going to go up next year. I’m figuring at least $25 a ticket plus an extra $5 for parking.

And I’m not anywhere near the 1%.

Am I embarrassed that I splurged on something that millions of people in this country couldn’t afford? A little, but then again, I earned every penny of that $4,042 so why the hell not?

In the meantime my daughter has decided she wants to volunteer for Super Bowl XLVIII in the Meadowlands. I wish her luck. I'm watching from my recliner.

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