Take Me to Coors

Driving to Denver from the Springs, I did take a brief detour to rest from the driving. I arrived into the Mile High City, and headed to the InnKeeper of the Rockies, the hostel that I would be staying at. I checked in, and the hostel did look a bit rundown. The location was out of the downtown area. Instead of a key, the way to enter a room, is punching a code on a keypad.

I thought about taking a bus to downtown, and even walked to the stop. But it just took too long, so I drove to downtown. And I ended up finding free parking, since it was a holiday. So it worked out.

I walked around the Capitol area, looking at the building and a few monuments. The building not open, because of the holiday. Then I walked to 16th Street Mall. Pretty much a pedestrian street with shuttle buses, a nice place to stroll on. I remember visiting a food court in 2002 there, and it looked like it has closed down since then.

I hopped on the shuttle bus, as it was starting to rain. The bus being full of people in Rockies gear. I rode it to the end of the line. After getting out, it rained even harder, and I waited under a booth, hoping the rain will pass. Don't want to have another postponed game ike I did in St. Louis.

After a while, I just walked through the pouring rain, and got soaked as a result. I did take cover for a bit, and continued until I got to Coors Field. I went to one of the kiosk to retrieve my ticket. Once that was done, I walked around the ballpark, seeing the clock above the entrance and a statue of some player in front of it.

I entered into the ballpark, and walked around it. There was a wall of records and firsts in Colorado Rockies history, like the first home run and most RBIs in team history. This place has a manual out-of-town scoreboard, and water fountains in the outfield, which goes off whenever a Rockie hit a home run. The field was covered with the tarp, and I got to see it removed. The rain would cause the game to be delayed by 30 minutes, but at least there will be baseball. So I'm definitely not complaining.

My seat was in the upper deck, so I went to the top. I had to go to the Purple Row, which are the only purple seats, that mark the spot of being a mile high above sea level, and go around the stadium. All the other seats are green. My seat was further down, and still wet. Luckily, someone next to me, offered me their towel, to wipe the seat dry. I heard about seeing the Rocky Mountains, but from where I was at, I could barely see it.

The game between the Colorado Rockies and Arizona Diamondbacks, featuring 2 teams that are relatively young, with not much of a history. The scoring started with a Clint Barmes solo homer, giving the Rockies a 1-0 lead. They would go up 4-0, until the Diamondbacks slowly chipped away, closing within 4-3. Then in the top of the 8th inning, the Diamondbacks exploded for 6 runs, taking a 9-4 lead. The Rockies scored 3 in the bottom half, coming within 2 runs. Then the D-Backs scored a couple more in the 9th, putting the game away. The Diamondbacks defeat the Rockies, 11-7. A high scoring game that I would have expected at Coors Field, considered the most hitters-friendly ballpark.

After the game, there were postgame fireworks, which are always great to see. In the tune of songs about America, since this was the 4th of July. After the show ended, I left and walked to the car, with the buses being way too full. It turned out to be quite a distance. I drove back to the hostel.