Baseball Hall of Fame

I know I'm not chronologically up to the time of this particular post, but the pictures were just too good to ignore. Also, I am sitting in a Super 8 hotel in Moose Jaw Canada right now watching the snow fall and wondering how many days until spring training. Right.

Anyhow, the week the tour was in Utica, NY, Brian drove up to visit for a couple of days and we decided to take a day trip to Cooperstown (only an hour away) to see the Baseball Hall of Fame. It just so happens that we were there the day the new "artifacts" from the most recent World Series made their debut. Apparently the museum does one formal presentation before the World Series paraphernalia is catalogued and put into its glass case, so we lucked out and were among the first 25 people to have the 2010 World Series Preview.

Of course, I was most impressed by the Red Sox history that kept popping up all over the museum.

Featured: The Bloody Sock

The ball from the final out of the 2004 World Series

Any of you who love baseball, this trip is completely worth it!

Spamalot- Halloween Party

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving yesterday! We are in Canada, where they celebrated Thanksgiving in October. In honor of Canada, here are some pictures of my favorite October holiday...even though it's not Canadian Thanksgiving.

Nolan (as Sir Robin's Musician), Ami (as a baseball player) and Emma (as an actress hanging out backstage) at the Halloween party in Brampton, Ontario. Thanks to Phoenix for the excellent party!

Jose (Our Company Manager) with the tickets for the door prizes

Sean (Sir Not Appearing) and Thomas (Historian)

Looks like Thomas was in a great hurry to get to the party and Sean may have had one too many...

And finally, Suzanne (Stage Manager) making her first appearance as the Lady of the Lake

Spamalot- Week 8 (Part 2)

London, Ontario

London gets an entire page because it was such a fantastic place to visit! The hotel was a historical building and used to be the town Armory, so it looked like a castle from the outside. There was an excellent year-round farmer's market with all kinds of fresh fruits, breads and snacks, which happened to be located right across the street from the Labatt Center. The Labatt Center was decked out with a stage for our Knights of the Round Table, but is usually the home arena of the London Knights hockey team. And Kevin, Emma and I took some time out on our last day to go tour the Labatt's Brewery! Truly an entertaining city!

The Delta London Armouries Hotel

These people take their library VERY seriously. (Mom, I knew you'd appreciate this one!)

The Farmer's Market

The Labatt Brewery Sign

Spamalot- week 8 (Part 1)

I'm a couple of weeks behind, so in an effort to catch up I'll make this post a quick one (with lots of pictures- which are the best part anyhow)!

Binghamton, NY

The river running through the middle of town, The "road" leading to the pit and The random guy just hanging around on the building across from the theatre

Kitchener, Ontario

Victoria Park

Spamalot- Week 7

We were only in Burlington, VT for one show, but the area was so beautiful I wish we'd had a few more days. It was the height of leaf-season and the walk from the hotel to the theatre went past the University of Vermont campus and on into town where the very first Ben & Jerry's was originally opened! That location has been made into a parking lot, unfortunately, but the replacement is still there and serving up scoops to longs lines of people on a daily basis.

Church Street Plaza, Burlington, VT

The "new" original Ben & Jerry's!

After our short stint in Burlington, we headed for a couple of days in Flint, Michigan. The

company was thrilled to find a fantastic Farmer's Market right across the street from the hotel.

The second day of our stay, I went to check out the local museum (the Sloan Museum by name) which was, of course, weighted heavy on automobile history. It was very interesting to see the timeline of the factory and the museum full of cars.

Thanks to Flint for a wonderful time! Next up...Binghamton, NY then back to Canada.

(By the way, I apologize for the poor formatting of this blog...I haven't figured out how to line everything up with the pictures yet!)

Spamalot- Week 6 part 2

From St. John, we moved to Fredericton, NB and then back to Halifax, NS. Fredericton was a little stressful because the night before we headed out of St. John, one of our cast members dislocated her elbow and was sent home to recuperate. Fredericton was the first city for the cast to try out the choreography changes to cover for the missing person.

(They did a fantastic job, by the way, and the show didn't lose any of it's effect. Although we all still wish Keleen a very speedy recovery.)

It rained for much of the time we were in Fredericton, so we didn't get to explore the town very much, but the band and many of the crew managed to slog out to the local Boston Pizza for a few drinks and munchies.

Kim (wardrobe), Nolan (keys), Emma (trumpet), Alex (trombone), Kevin (MD), Rizzo (carpenter/flymaster), Addison (props)

The most interesting thing for the band in Fredericton was that this was the first venue with no actual pit, so we sat in a room behind the stage for the entire show. Luckily, we each have our own microphone and headset, so we could hear what was going on and our sound guru out front could just mix us in with the singers. I never realized how much of a bummer it is to not be able to see the show as it's happening. The trade-off was, we had our first official "Hawaiian shirt day" in the pit!!

After Fredericton, we headed back to the coast to play in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Halifax was our first chance to play a, real, honest to goodness, hockey arena! I'm not kidding, they lay some plywood over the ice and build the stage on top of that. It's a little chilly, but my Dad will be excited to learn that they open the concessions a half hour before the show starts. Oh yeah, there's finally a venue where you can buy popcorn at the intermission!

Kid with the popcorn cart before the show in Halifax.

Halifax Mooseheads (Hockey Team) Locker room

Halifax was a great place to visit. The boardwalk by the water is beautiful, the Citadel is right in the middle of the city on top of the hill (for you history buffs) and the city is still home to the old Alexander Keith's brewery.

I spent most of my day off wandering around the Maritime Museum and learning about the many shipwrecks that have happened through the ages because of the treacherous Halifax coastline. What an interesting way to spend the morning!

The Museum Entrance

CSS Acadia (One of the exhibits associated with the museum)

Next up...Burlington, VT.

Spamalot- Week 6

St. John, NB, Canada

There was really too much of St. John to explore in just a few short days. From the City Market to the Reversing Falls to all the many restaurants and museums, St. John really does have something for everyone!

I spent hours on the first day just wandering around the town, taking in the sights. To the left is a picture of the city market which has fresh fruit and seafood, hand made scarves and hats, jewelry made from sea glass and all kinds of other interesting items for sale.

The second day I got up and took the 10AM boat tour to the Reversing Falls. This unique natural occurrence is caused by the fact that the Bay of Fundy rises/ falls about 30 feet between low and high tide. When the Bay is at high tide, it is actually higher than the water at the mouth of the river, basically causing the river to rush backwards. At low tide, the Bay is so low that the water rushing from the river moves fast enough to create all kinds of white water and whirlpools, shown in the picture to the left. (The picture really doesn't do it justice!)

I'm falling a couple of weeks behind, so I'll try to post more pictures from St. John later in the blog. For now, I'll post this and move on to the next location!