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I decided a few weeks ago to go to Toronto over the Canada Day weekend to catch some Blue Jays games. The Tampa Bay Rays would be in town for a Friday game, two games on Saturday and a final game on Sunday.

My original thought was to spend Friday and Saturday night to be able to attend perhaps all four games. Then I started to look at accommodations and found that they were too expensive for me. Irrespective of location (close to stadium or far on a subway line) or be it hotel or AirBNB I did not find it reasonable to spend ~500$ per night.

So I reduced my plan to catch the two games on Saturday, figuring I could take the train there in the morning and take the train home. The problem with taking the train is that the earliest train to Toronto arrives at 12h03 and the first game starts at 12h07, so that isn't ideal for getting to see the start of the game, but would have been acceptable had the departing train from Toronto not have left so early. To get home, the last train leaves at 17h02 which is over an hour earlier than the second game start time of 18h07.

I did not give up - turns out I rode on this:

It was ~70$ each way and conveniently for the purposes of attending the two games they have a night bus that goes in each direction. So I boarded the bus which left very early Saturday morning at 12h30 and got in to Toronto at around 6h30. To return home I boarded the bus which left very early Sunday morning which got me back at around 6h30. Doing this completely removed the need for any accommodations.

While I was in Toronto an extra travel option I hadn't considered was to fly Porter Airlines which flies directly into an airport on an island just outside of the city. Situated where it is this airport would be very convenient to get to the stadium. I just checked now and there is a flight in on a Saturday morning that is well timed (8h45 -> 10h04). However, their last flight back is too early. So perhaps to do this again I'd have taken Porter to get to TO and Megabus to get home.

With the bus arriving at about 6h30 and the first game starting at 12h07 I had plenty of time to kill. One plan I had was to play my Resources mobile device game to build some distant mines and to attack some mines other have built. I had pre-researched a spot to have breakfast and on the way there visited Jack.

While I was walking around I happed to see this:

And this:

I wondered if there was anything in Toronto, or, perhaps in all of Canada, that has been photographed more than this tower.

Eventually I made my way back to the stadium to find there were crazy long queues to get in. This did not make sense to me as the first pitch was scheduled to be thrown at 12h07 and doors would open at 10h so why would so many people queue up more than an hour before the game?

I worked my way through the crowd to get to my suggested entry gate (5) and queue jumped a little by finding a not dense of people spot in the crowd, perhaps 80 people from the front of the queue. A few people nearby grumbled a little and others were commenting about more egregious queue jumpers. I figured I was a single person and so it wasn't like I queue jumped with my family of 5. Later on I found out that the reason for queuing was because this was a Bobblehead day where a Vlad & Dad was given out to the first 15k attendees. I did not end up taking one.

This was my seat's view for the first game well before the game would start:

To my right were seated two Quebecois who I found out live in Repentigny which is just east of the island of Montreal and so we live not too distant from each other. Later on, but before the game started a second solo attendee sat down to the right of these two Quebecois and he (the other solo) was far more gregarious and talkative. Given this they were more engaged with him.

Before the game started the two Quebecois went to get food and I saw them come back with a nice looking burger, so I asked if they could keep an eye on my bag and went to get one. The burger with a coke and with a tip came out to ~25$. Crazy stadium prices.

And then the game started. At around the second inning the pitcher got struck by the ball in his shin area after a Rays player got a hit and hit the ball directly at the pitcher. He had to be pulled from the game as the injury had been sufficiently severe. There wasn't anything else really exceptional about this game.

At the end of the game they announced there had been 39,426 people attending the game. We had to exit the stadium as the second game was a differently ticketed event, and while exiting, announcements after the game were letting people know to not linger so that the clean up crew could attend to the stadium before the subsequent game.

As I had nothing better to do or any place to go I exited the stadium at the gate (11) that would be my entrance gate for game 2. Standing there also waiting were just a few other people who, like me, had nothing better to do. I started talking with this guy who I found out lives about 15 minutes away and attends many games. He was the one who explained to me that the reason for the long queue ahead of the first game was for the Bobbleheads (he had one).

This was my seat's view for the second game well before the game would start:

Unlike the Olympic stadium in Montreal, the Roger's Centre in TO has an operational open and closing roof.

When I got into the stadium for the second game the left semi-hemi-spherical roof shape (the left part in the photo above) had been fully extended to it's roof position and about half an hour before the game it started to move to the right where it would nest in with the other sections of the roof where the top one is a fixed semi-hemi-sphere shape. The photo was taken a few minutes after it had started moving.

To my left at this game were a threesome of elderlies who kept to themselves, to my right, a dad and his daughter, from New Brunswick, the dad sitting next to me. I spoke with him a little bit ahead of and during the game. Ahead of any of these people arriving I bought a poutine, a Coke and a water bottle, the latter to accompany me on the way home, all costing ~26$. Outrageous stadium prices. Fortunately I finished the poutine ahead of anyone else arriving so I wasn't encumbered with food when they arrived.

There's not a lot to note here about the game except that the starting pitcher allowed 12 hits in 4 innings of play. It wasn't a very effective day for Toronto pitching.

The game ended at 20h50 (24,180 attendance) so I had more than three hours to kill before my return bus home. I stayed in my seat for a while so I wouldn't have to deal with moving through thousands of people on my way out. Then I walked around the city a bit, doing some more Resources game stuff and made my way back to the bus terminal where I arrived with about 2 hours left. 

Queued up for the bus, got on, and this time was able to sleep for a fair portion of the ride.

A few thoughts after this experience. Having the first sleepless night due to taking that night bus made the day a little bit difficult, so if I was to do this on a future trip I'd either bite the bullet and spend on accommodations for one night, or now that I have researched it, take Porter Airlines into the city (at a cost of double what the bus was). I'd be okay taking the night bus home so long as the day I get home I have nothing else planned so can sleep when I get home.

If I was to go again I'd bring a pencil and a scoring chart. I bought a program during the queueing of the first game and in the center of it was a score chart which reminded me that this is something that can be done. I'd need to brush up on how the scoring works, but definitely this is something I'd like to do.

For sunshine avoidance it seemed to work out mostly well for the seat positions I picked; along first base line for early game and along third base line for late game. At all times the sun was mostly behind me and so I had to worry most about sunscreening the back of my neck and my ears. For the second game the sun very soon after the game started progressed low enough that the upper part of the stadium blocked it out, so I was in shade there for almost the whole game. What I might consider doing differently in the future is to buy a seat in a further row on the first base line for the early game as the back few rows are shaded by the stadium seating which is above it. This would be a less expensive ticket and so for the late game I could buy a more expensive ticket to sit closer.

A final thought was how helpful the CN Tower was for locating where I was wandering. I do not know the street names in this city or where they are located, but as seen from the photos above, the tower is adjacent to the stadium and so wherever I was, if I could spot the tower, I knew what direction I needed to head.