That’s how much my flight to Philadelphia cost me. Return. It was a direct transatlantic flight, no transfers. They checked in my bag, there was a personal in flight entertainment system there was drinks and meals on board, I went on a Wednesday afternoon and came back the following Monday. What I’m trying to say is there was no corners cut, everything was as you would want it.
Now maybe I’m wrong but to me that all just seems insanely cheap.
How can they provide all that and turn a profit? I certainly hope and would have nothing but respect for them if they do.
People have spent more on a night out than that.
Now there’s plenty of people out there who are good at saving money but it’s a two way street. You gotta be good at spending it too.
I challenge anybody to spend €299 better than I did on that flight.
So what I’m going to say next was that it was an amazing trip and everything went perfectly. Of course it didn’t but for the money I spent on the flight I couldn’t really go wrong could I?
It’s all personal preference I suppose but to me I think the best way you can spend money is on experiences as that’s the whole reason for being on this planet as far as I can see it and travel is certainly nearly always guaranteed to be at least that, an experience.
So how was the experience? Isn’t this supposed to be a blog about NFL? Why are you on paragraph ten and you haven’t even mentioned the whole reason for this blog yet?
I’m getting there. I’ve a 6 hour plane journey home to kill.
I’ll start off by saying I much preferred Baltimore to Philadelphia.
Philadelphia is an aggressive city. You walk out of a train station and stop, someone’s on you. You go to a coffee shop get something and stand outside, someone’s on you. I don’t think I’ve ever been accosted as much in my life as I was in the three days that I was in Philadelphia. And they were loud too. Everyone on the hustle, everyone wants a dollar and everyone wants it from you. I don’t think they have any concept or respect for personal space in that city. I certainly left it with a newfound thankfulness for mine as I was something I had sort of taken for granted my whole life.
Towards the end of it I just felt like screaming “FUCK OFFF” at the top of my lungs to the next person that interrupted me in the streets unsolicited. A man should be allowed to get on with his day without constantly getting interrupted in both a forceful and aggressive way.
But the reason I went wasn’t to form an opinion on the local street beggars in their hometown but to go to the Philadelphia Eagles game which very deliberately happened to coincide with a Super Bowl victory presentation.
The game itself was tremendous. The atmosphere was as aggressive as the city itself and despite being low scoring the game itself was a hum-dinger that went down to the wire. I watched it back a few days later and it was just as compelling second time around. The NFL never ceases to throw up weird and wonderful ways in which the games themselves ultimately come to their conclusions. The back and forth nature of it really lends itself to nail biting finishes much like what we would have seen down though the years in the GAA and the way that their championship games usually finish. But to see one second left on the game clock and the game still very much in the balance is almost like something you’d see in a movie and that was the finish I got. I’m glad the Eagles won it. I had a bet on them and I have a bet on them to win the Super Bowl again this year so it was the result I wanted. Plus you kind of feel partial to the home team once you’re there. And it was quite the home crowd. I don’t think I saw one falcon fan in the stadium up until the 4th quarter. Maybe they had their jerseys covered up!
Maybe I got a bad impression of Philly but I was happy enough to leave it after that. I must give a shout out to the bus driver though who let me get on at 03.30 in the morning somewhere near the stadium with no Uber’s or taxis in sight despite the fact I had no cash and only cards which he couldn’t take. The city of brotherly love was very much on show on that occasion.
I did get to the golf on Friday which was cool as I’d never been to a PGA event before. Or any golf event for that matter. To see the superstars of golf who I watch week in week out up close was quite a thrill and it was a nice way to spend an afternoon in what was a gloriously sunny day.
The next day I was Baltimore bound and heading to the train station the heavens opened. There had been storms at the Eagles game and again the following night after the golf but this time they were here to stay and didn’t leave for the rest of my trip.
To say I would end up getting soaked at the Ravens game the next day would be putting it mildly. I got absolutely saturated for the entire game. No let off.
It proved to be not just a washout but a near shutout too with the Ravens winning 47-3. I really enjoyed the atmosphere in the Ravens stadium they put on a great show with things like the players entrance's, screen displays for things like MOVE, THOSE, CHAINS and TOUCHDOWNBALTIMORRE they really help get the home crowd on-side and loud. I found Baltimore to be a much, much nicer city. Far prettier, far cleaner far better looked after place with a much more comfortable atmosphere generally for a tourist walking around the streets a bit like Dublin or Manchester or some other suchlike European city that’s not massive like London or Barcelona which was what Philly felt like but with just the worst parts and not the good parts as well.
I’m not sure how I’m going to rate the cities and the teams as I go along because there’s so many different ways in which you can rate them but I do feel like I should probably keep some sort of log for the purpose of cross comparisons and so as to compare each city and team’s experience as I go along.
I would have much more of a personal preference towards the Eagles than the Ravens but I must admit having done this trip I have a much better appreciation towards the city of Baltimore and the Ravens now than I did before and if a neutral was to ask me which city to go to out of the two I would definitely recommend Baltimore for both the city itself and as a place to watch a game as I found the game-day experience to be better in Baltimore after what I must admit was a very good experience too for the game in Philly.
I had a lot of small chats over the few days with various people that I met along the way but two that stood out in particular was getting to meet Eagle fan Justin Kelly just inside the gates of the stadium at the fan benches who proceeded to frighten the life out of me when he told me a Scottish guy had already done something identical to what I had been doing and it had been very popular and well embraced in a way that was like when Fr. Ted was in the lift and heard his Eurovision entry was in fact a very well known song from yesteryear that just about everyone had known bar him and would think he had just copied despite being completely innocent. Also nice to meet Rick Noppenberger (and his wife Joanna) who runs the Baltimore Ravens fan page on Facebook and who very kindly agreed to meet me at halftime and let me sit with them for the second half and make me feel like I was at home there.
So my trip one scores are as follows.
Philadelphia - City 4/10.
Philadelphia - Eagles gameday experience 7.5/10.
Baltimore - City 6.5/10.
Baltimore - Ravens Gameday experience 8.5/10.
So that concludes trip one.
I expected going into this trip that the vlog would be really weak and the blog would be good but in actual fact I think it’s going to be the other way around. It is far from Martin Scorsese I can assure you but I think there’s some good stuff in there that will hopefully show up on screen. Should also be a better way of getting a feel for my trip than what I have given here. The beauty of being able to do a blog and a vlog is that even if one isn’t great the other one should make up for it and I think that will the case with the vlog below.
Enjoy!
