We made it into Maryland...and promptly got swallowed by the thongs of traffic and turned around. We eventually made it to the hotel, got checked in, dropped our belongings in the room and proceeded to layer ourselves in as many articles of clothing as humanly possible. It was cold out there, after all! Once we were ready to go we went back down to the lobby, met some pretty colorful fellow MSU fans, and got lucky enough to catch the Hotel Shuttle to the Stadium! There was no way we wanted to venture back out in that traffic behind the wheel! No way, Jose! Navigating through that shit was INSANE!
The shuttle trip proved to be rather interesting. We rode there with the colorful fans I just mentioned...learned they were brothers who seemed to have a pretty rocky relationship, and that they drove most of the way to Maryland while drinking in the car. One was ragging on the other so badly I thought at one point he'd start tearing up! Also...did I mention they purchased tickets from some guy they didn't know and whom they had to track down and meet about 5 minutes before the game started!? Yikes! We were not sad to never see them again...to say the least!
Once we finally got to the Stadium, we jumped out of that shuttle, tipped and thanked the driver and scooted right over to the line to get in! But first, we had to take a photo so everyone back home could see what we looked like in Maryland!
See for yourself! Here we are!!! Yay!!!! Best Friends for Life!
Then we started our journey up, up, up, way, way UP to almost the tippy top of the arena, which was three whole tiers high! It was a little terrifying being up that high, but once we were seated we were okay, just had to be careful not to move too much...or fall! To give you some perspective, the birds that flew past were flying lower than where we were physically located! And, at one point, we were so high up, a helicopter was hovering pretty much parallel to our seats. We were definitely thankful that we hadn't participated in any tailgating prior to the game!
The game was good, with some extra excitement in the fourth quarter, leading to a MSU victory! Here's Allison celebrating and showing her Spartan Pride!
The halftime show was also pretty awesome! Maryland's band did Broadway Classics with songs from The Lion King, Les Miserables, and Wicked! They even formed out these awesome visuals to go along with the music!
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| Top: Ruby Slippers, Middle: Broomstick, Bottom: Witch Hat (All obviously from Wicked!) |
And, I discovered a new hobby whilst among the birds: Fashion Sniping!
Basically, I just took pictures of things I saw girls wearing that I really liked!
Like these boots:
Or this hat:
After the game Allison and I headed through the campus and out to what we assumed was one of the main streets in search of beers and grubs! By then it was Midnight and a lot of places were closing, or didn't seem to be serving food any longer!
We found the inspiration for Bob's Burgers! Hah, just kidding! Wo else loves that show?? But you never know...I mean, it could be! You decide!
Then we came across this place called
The Board and Brew! We could see a food counter from the window, it appeared they were still serving and brew was in the title so we made our way inside to further investigate! Score! They were still serving food!!! We sat down and were instantly greeted by the most adorkably clueless boy server. He had a blonde bowl cut and glasses, and we loved him! We asked about the beer list and he brought us a list and then proceeded to tell us they only just started serving beer a few nights ago! I ended up ordering a Root Beer flavored beer, which I would never recommend to anyone! It was disgusting! Allison made a much better choice, although I don't remember what she had.
Adorkable Clueless Server Boy Memorable Moment: When he brought our beers over, Allison asked for a glass. Then he proceeded to ask if we wanted ice and/or a straw! Awww!
We ordered some sandwiches, which were surprisingly really good, then decided to try out a game while we were there! The "Board" of the "Board and Brew" is for Board Games....and a TON of them! They had three, two-sided book cases almost floor to ceiling full of different games to choose from. They charged $5.00 per person to play, but you could choose any game, switch as often as you liked and stay as long as you wanted!
Allison chose the game Pandemic for us to play. I had played the electronic version and had previously defeated the world with my Smegina virus. But the board game version is totally different! Everyone plays as one team against the board and the goal is to save humanity from outbreaks of different viruses. It's a little confusing to start out, but once we got the hang of it, we LOVED it! Unfortunately
The Board and Brew had to close before we could find out if we saved the world, but I ended up getting the game for Christmas (thanks Santa Mom), so we're planning to play here in Michigan soon!
On our way home the next day, we were back on the brewery trail and quickly came to the fourth brewery of our trip!
4. DuClaw Brewing Co. in Bowie, Maryland
From what we could tell, DuClaw has several different locations, and is kind of like a Chain Brewery...if that's even a thing?! We went to the one in Bowie, which was inside of a shopping center. We each did a flight here, and made friends with some of the locals, who proceeded to give me Fantasy Football advice and made us promise that we would only make two brewery stops on our venture home! Allison also finally talked me into joining Untappd here. After over a year of trying I finally gave in and started checking in my beers, beginning with this flight! I've got 73 check-ins now! Woo HOO! Look at me go! ☺
Atmosphere: Very friendly. The booths were super deep and comfortable looking, and the bar was nice and big! It almost had kind of a sports bar type vibe.
Decor: There was a very modern, metally/cook feeling here. Tons of TVs all over around the bar area.
Brews: The beer was good! They had a ton of options and some pretty interesting flavor combinations.
Food: The food all sounded really good. We didn't order anything, but Allison made friends with some locals who ordered an entire appetizer they weren't going to eat, so they passed it our way when the server brought it out. It sounds weirder than it actually was, I promise!
Then we were back on the road and headed toward our fifth and final brewery stop of the mini-vacation!
5. Antietam Brewery in Hagerstown, Maryland
Another strange type of Maryland Brewery! This one isn't a chain-gang style but the brewery is actually inside of another bar, Benny's Pub. Here Allison and I shared a flight!
Atmosphere: This was very much a locals hang-out type of place. As much so that as soon as we walked in the door we instantly became the source of many stares and whispers. We were very obviously the out-of-towners in the joint! But don't get me wrong, the folks there were also very friendly!
Decor: Typical small town pub décor, including tin signs and beer posters. There were several smaller rooms that you could pop into, including the back room which held all the brewery fermenters and stuffs!
Brews: We enjoyed the beer here too! There were a few different styles that we had yet to experience on our Maryland tour to date, like some farmhouse and dunkels brews. I think our favorite was the uber-fruity Otto's Orchard Boysenberry!
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| Boo! |
After we left Benny's Pub we got back on the road and headed back home! The homeward story is so much less exciting than the getting there story! We really just focused on driving - it was a work day for both of us Monday and we were already aiming at getting home pretty late! We ran into some weather, stopped at a couple truck-stops on the way, ate a little McDonalds as it was literally the only thing left open at the last one (we did share a 20-piece chicken nugget, so I can cross ordering one of those bad boys off my bucket list), ran into some more weather and then finally arrived home safely!
If you have a chance to go on a road trip with your best friend(s), even a short weekender, do it! It was an awesome adventure and we had a great time being silly and experiencing some new things together!
If you missed Part One of the Adventure, you can check it out
here!
What's a fun trip you've been on with your besties?
