HoHoKam

The Plan was simple, with an emphasis on fun . . . faced with a combination of opportunity and willpower, T and I made a last-minute trip to Mesa AZ to catch a couple of Cubs Spring Training games. For me, the last time I was here was years ago with Dad where I collected autographs from Ryne Sandberg, Andre Dawson, Schwan Dunstin, Ron Cey, and many others. In fact, it was that trip that inspired me to go on to play ten years of professional ball . . . in my mind. For T, this was the second annual trip . . . a number of her old coworkers from Wrigley spend time in Mesa every summer. The life of a Cubs fan!

In our attempt to keep the trip on the cheap, we opted against Hotels, and in an effort to keep it slightly civilized, we also opted against the bohemian couch-hopping that Tanya took advantage of last season. The middle ground: Camping at the Lost Dutchman State Park! What an awesome choice. The Lost Dutchman is the name given to the monolythic rock formation that allegedly holds hidden gold. Though folks have been searching for the hidden treasure in the shadows of the Lost Dutchman for the past hundred years or so, I was fairly certain that we would stumble across it during our couple of days there.

We arrived in the afternoon to learn that all of the campgrounds had been filled. Bummer. But there was room in the overflow area. We wound our way into the park, and pretty quickly found a great spot to set up the tent. Funny, even in the camping areas, the place was filled with RV's. We were the only people there without a vehicle to sleep in. Memories of the van . . .

I'm actually running out of time with this blog, so I'll leave you with the highlights and pictures-We saw two games, the "A" squad won, the "B" squad lost. We Tailgated with the Wrigley crew, and had a blast. We Camp-cooked several great meals. We spent an afternoon saving a lost dog (it had to happen). We saw some roadrunners, and heard some coyotes. On the Drive home, my car died on the highway, and had to have a new alternator put in. Ouch. We had a blast.

The Lost Dutchman Mountains

The Nearby Ghost Town

Our awesome campsite

Cubs Crew-In the grassy "Bleachers"

Mmmm. . . grub

Avoiding local beasties

Vancouver! Part 4

Whoops- Almost forgot to finish the story!

Thursday the 18th.

The day began on on more melancholy note . . . bright and early in the morning, I packed up my things and hopped off the Rumblebus.

I don't remember exactly what we had to do to get the RV "sea worthy", but it took very little time at all. As strange as it was to meet up with Dad in a random RV park in Vancouver, it was just as strange to watch him driving out . . . left in a parking lot with all my baggage. It had been an awesome few days, and I was sad to watch Dad pull away . . . and I also felt pretty sure that he had about a 30% chance of making it safely back into the USA.

Though bummed, I was determined to spend my last several hours in Vancouver having fun-good clean fun. In order to start the day on the right foot, it was back to the dojo for some intense cleaning. After a scrub and an intense re-packing, it was off to some delicious breakfast at the USA house . . . only, there was no breakfast at the USA house. For the first time on the Olympic Away Tour, the house of continual nourishment fell short, and I was brutally forced to wait for free food until lunch. I was able to leave my baggage at the luggage check, so, unencumbered, I took to the streets. That morning, I visited the First Nations House and witnessed some tribal dancing, followed by a trip to the host nation Canada's house. That was pretty cool, with some interactive displays about the history of winter sports.

After that, I ventured to the Vancouver downtown library . . . 'cause that's the kind of guy I am.

The library had a pretty cool interactive Peace art instillation thing.

It worked like this: you wrote down your key to peace on a piece of waxy paper, follow the folding directions to make a sort of stealth paper airplane, then stick the plane into an air tube to launch it.

The "planes" launched about three stories into the air, then "fly" down into a giant net that stretched across the pavilion. On my first attempt, my peace plane launched well wide of the net and hit an unsuspecting woman drinking a cup of coffee . . . whoops.

I guess that getting hit with a peace plane is not as bad as getting hit with the ugly stick, because she returned the vessel with a smile. International good will . . . you're welcome.

Back to the USA house for some grub, and who did I see, but Tony Dungy! For some reason, I got totally tongue-tied, and passed up the opportunity to shake his hand. He seemed to be just hanging out with his wife, no organized event or anything, but not saying hello to him is my one regret from Vancouver.

After a delicious-if-uneventful lunch, I grabbed my bags and headed out to the airport. The light rail took me right there, and I made it through customs with no problem! A smooth flight to San Fransisco, and about an hour drive brought me to Campbell, Ca, for another weekend of awesome shows.

As I was checking in on Sunday to fly back to LA, I noticed that I was right next to Gallagher-the watermelon-smashing comedian. He had a giant wooden mallet with him, which he had to check, but he was on my flight to LA. Weird.

I probably could have spent a few more days in Vancouver, but all totalled, it was an awesome trip. Sochi anyone?