Jackie, C.J. & Jackson: Notre Dame and Chicago

On Friday morning Jackie dropped me off at the airport bright and early. I met my friend Jake and we were off to Chicago. For some reason we had a lay over in Long Beach. Our plane ended up not arriving for some reason and they had to fly another plane to LB for us. We were at that airport for over 5 hours. By the time we arrived in Chicago it was already 8 at night. We just went to the sports bar at the hotel and watched another amazing Jazz come back. We had some great food as well.

Saturday morning we woke up early and it was a good thing we did. I had always wanted to see Wrigley Field. We stopped by there and took some pictures. It was awesome. It's just in the middle of a neighborhood and has tons of sports bars surrounding it. I really wish it would have been baseball season so I could have watched the Cubs.

Standing out front of the stadium.

Statue of Ernie Banks who is known as "Mr Cub."

Here is the back of the stadium.

If you look close enough you can see the bleachers that are on top of an apartment building across the street.

The view just behind left field. Have to love their old school scoreboard.

Next we started on our drive to Notre Dame Stadium. On the way we passed Soldier Field where the Bears play and Comiskey Park where the White Sox play. After finally finding a place to park, we headed toward the stadium. Here is my buddy Jake in front of "Touchdown Jesus."

Here is me in front of the famous stadium. It was such a cool atmosphere. It's what the people in South Bend live for. It was an once in a lifetime experience. The people were great for the most part and there were tons of Utah fans.

Here is another picture of the famous building.

In front of one of the statues of one of their famous coaches.

I thought these were cool, they had them all over. They are replicas of their national championship rings. We both ate a Brat hot dog and they headed for our seats.

We got inside and had amazing seats. We were just above the players tunnel. After the ND touchdown in the second half we almost caught the extra point ball. The guy that caught it, gave the ball back and since he did, they let him down on the field. He was so excited.

It was awesome that everything was for the most part old. They have the original wood bleachers from 1930. No video jumbo tron. Just this scoreboard below. I do have to say that the ND band was amazing and were a lot of fun to watch.

Here are some pictures of the Utah section. The guys behind us said it was probably the biggest visitor crowd they had ever seen at a ND game. Ute fans were everywhere. Before the rain started and everyone put on ponchos, there was even more red in the stands.

I couldn't even fit the whole Utah section in one shot and then the rest of us fans were scattered through out. Before the game one guy remarked, isn't this our (ND) home game.

Sadly though, the game did not go Utah's way. Things just never got going for us. Oh well though, it was such a cool game day experience that even with our loss, the trip was way worth it.