Cup Collection: Denver, Sunshine, & Ohio

Five more stadiums down and five more cups to add to the Souvenir Cup Power Rankings. The new souvenir cups are from Rockies, Rays, Marlins, Reds, and Indians games. Since all of these cups were acquired on trips where I attended two or fewer ballparks, they are in black font. 

Rankings after the Ohio trip:

1. Toronto Blue Jays
2. Cincinnati Reds
3. Kansas City Royals
4. Philadelphia Phillies
5. Houston Astros
6. New York Mets
7. Cleveland Indians
8. Colorado Rockies
9. Washington Nationals
10. San Diego Padres
11. Miami Marlins
12. Texas Rangers
13. Oakland A's
14. Tampa Bay Rays
15. Los Angeles Dodgers
16. Boston Red Sox
17. Baltimore Orioles
18. Minnesota Twins
19. Milwaukee Brewers
20. Los Angeles Angels
21. San Francisco Giants
22. Chicago White Sox
23. St. Louis Cardinals
24. New York Yankees
25. Detroit Tigers
26. Chicago Cubs

Notes on rankings:

• All five of the new cups are of the same style as 15 of the top 16 cups. As mentioned in previous Cup Collection posts, this cup style is superior from others in that it is structurally sound and has a large design surface.
• The Rays, Marlins, and Reds cups all included one free refill. The Indians cup had $2 refills, and the cup itself was one of the more inexpensive cups in the collection.
• The Rockies cup is a collage of tiles in the shape of the numeral "20", in honor of the Rockies' 20th year in existance. Each tile is has the date and opponent of a game along with a picture of current or former Rockies player. However, neither the tiles or the "20" are overly easy to read. The idea behind the design is well-intended but the execution was slightly lacking.
• The Reds cup is holographic and features star first baseman Joey Votto.
• The design on the Indians cup is a portrait of League Park, the Indians' home from 1900 - 1946.

Sunshine Trip: Day 3

On the third and final day of my tour in Florida, I took my talents to South Beach. I parked my car in Mid-Beach at 9:15 and immediately headed down the beach towards South Beach. The sand wasn't as white as the beaches in Clearwater but the beach was wide and seemed to extend forever along the coast. Luxury hotels lined the inshore side of the beach only buffered from the beach by a greenbelt and nice bike path. I was a little surprised in how few people were on the beach but that may have been due to being a Sunday morning and the menacing clouds overhead. As a walked south towards South Beach, the clouds began to clear and the beach started to become a little more crowded. Interestingly, most of the people of the beach were latin families and it was a rare occurrence overhear people speaking English.

By the time I got to South Beach I was very hungary and thirsty. I stopped at a bakery and had a kiwi smoothie, a ham and cheese empanada, and a custard filled churro. I then walked back north along one the main streets of Miami Beach and wandered into a few touristy surf shops. I was looking for a shirt that had something to do with LeBron James's quote from The Decision but couldn't find anything.

As I started walking back north. the clouds had cleared and it had turned into a wonderful day weather-wise. I went back to my car, put on my swimsuit, and sat on the beach for a couple hours. The water was very clear and the sand bar extended pretty far out. I put sunscreen on pretty heavily but still managed to get a little sunburnt but not too bad. I kept an eye on my watch since I didn't know how long it would take me to return my rental car and didn't want to risk cutting my flight close. Once I decided it was time to call it a day at the beach, I stopped at a restaurant and got an order of fish tacos en route to the Ft. Lauderdale Airport. I resisted my urge to eat my meal until I had returned my car, checked in, and gone through security. The tacos were good and certainly better than anything I would get at the airport.

We boarded the plane a little late and as soon as we were about to move away from the gate lightning struck in the vicinity of the airport. We ended up waiting an hour and a half on the plane until the weather cleared. This frustrated me since if we would have boarded the plane on time we would have been gone before the storm reached Ft. Lauderdale. Alas, I finally got home and went to bed for an early morning wake-up for work the next day.

Sunshine Trip: Day 2

I slept in a little on Saturday morning since Friday was such a long day. I really didn't have any plans other than the Indians vs. Marlins game that night in Miami. I figured I would take my time driving on over to Miami since I had the majority of Sunday to explore South Beach.

I started Day 2 of the Sunshine Trip by heading to the De Soto National Memorial. To be honest, I didn't know that this park existed until I check my national parks passport and found it was about 15 miles from my hotel. This memorial recognized the exploration of Hernando De Soto, a Spanish explorer who navigated through what is now the American southeast in search of gold and other riches. The lasting legacy of De Soto is somewhat split: some see him as a great explorer while some see him as a brutal conquerer and tragically stubborn. At the memorial, I took a short walk on the nature walk through the costal mangrove forrest.

I then headed south and east through Big Cypress National Preserve to Miami. I ate a very satisfying lunch at a hole in the wall barbeque place. I also stopped at the Big Cypress National Preserve visitor center to see what the preserve was all about. Essentially Big Cypress is a big swamp that is an extension of the Everglades. In fact, Big Cypress is often referred to as the Western Everglades. A big focus in the visitor center was that Big Cypress swamp is a important ecosystem that is home to many different animals (including the Florida panther and) and naturally cleans the drinking water for southern Florida cities. I walked along the boardwalk at the visitor center and saw a few alligators in the water below. I think Big Cypress would be a good place to backpack but the ranger said that it is only recommended to backpack in the winter month before the swamp floods and the bugs get too bad. I finished the day off by driving to my hotel, walking to Marlins Park (to be documented in an upcoming post), enjoying the game, and hitting the sack.

Sunshine Trip: Day 1

I left my apartment at 5:20 am in order to get to DTW in time for my 6:50 am flight. Aside from the reduced cost of the early Friday morning departure, the appeal of leaving so early was that I got in to Tampa before 11 am. I was a little anxious to get my rental car since I have never gone through that process on my own before. Thankfully the process was pretty straight forward since I had previously reserved as car online. I was out of the airport in a red chevy sonic by 11:15.

I had thought about heading directly to one of the many St. Petersburg/Clearwater beaches but I opted to head to downtown Tampa. I was planning on going to the Florida Aquarium so I parked in the aquarium parking lot for a small fee. Instead of actually going to the aquarium, I ended up walking around downtown Tampa and along the Tampa Riverwalk. I walked past the aquarium, the Tampa Bay Times Forum (home of the Tampa Bay Lightning), a history center, a bunch of hotels, and unfortunately a few free parking lots enroute to the business district of downtown Tampa. After walking through Poe Plaza (a green walkway between a few tall buildings), I ate lunch at a place with a   small replica school bus out front appropriately called the Taco Bus. After my tacos, I walked along the Riverwalk back to my car. The Riverwalk was nice but there weren't too many people around. That might have been because it was a weekday and the skies were getting pretty dark. In fact, I had to wait out a fairly heavy downpour for about 45 hours underneath a covered part of the Riverwalk.

After the rain had let up and I got back to my car, I headed across the bay to Clearwater to check out the beaches. I didn't have time to really enjoy the beach but I did get out of my car to walk on the white sand and stick my feet into the Gulf of Mexico. I then headed to downtown St. Petersburg to Tropicana Field for the night's baseball game. I have written about the stadium and the game in a previous blog post. After the game, I went across the Sunshine Skyway Bridge to get to my hotel for the night. The Skyway Bridge is supposedly one of the symbols of the Tampa Bay area but it was a little dark for me to stop and admire the bridge.