Royalty goes to Los Angeles to see the Mets play the Dodgers!

Tuesday morning August 13th we woke up after getting a good night sleep. We checked out of the Carson Valley Inn in Minden, Nevada. We bought gas at the Shell station which was right next to the hotel. It was a wise decision because the gas prices in Nevada are a lot cheaper than they in California. Once we filled up we made our way towards Los Angeles which was still about 400 miles away. We left there at 9:50AM.

We drove a few hours on scenic route 395 into California. We stopped off in Bishop, a town along the way. We were told by Tike that there was a place he saw on Yelp. He strongly suggested that we go there. He said he hasn't been there. With that being said, I planned accordingly. Ironically when I went to the team store in Reno to get my minor league pass-port book stamped, I overheard a gentleman say he came from Bishop to see the game. I asked him about this place that Tike told us about. He said it was a must see. He warned me it could be crowded. As we approached the town of Bishop, I did notice a billboard on the side of the road saying that Erick Schlat's Bakkery, home of the original sheepherder bread since 1938 was just up the road. I had the address thanks to Tike and we found it with no problem. We turned in to the parking lot and we waited a minute as a few cars were pulling out. The lot was packed. When we got out of the car and we walked towards the entrance. There was a seating area outside too. It was quite a set up. They have an area for sandwiches where we got on line just in time. The line wasn't terribly long when we did. After we were paying at the end, I noticed the line grew and grew. It was a madhouse. It looked like a bus load just pulled into the parking lot.

Erick Schlat's Bakkery

As for the sandwiches, we all got carved turkey on their famous sheepherder bread. It was a tremendous sandwich to say the least. My sandwich had dark green lettuce which was excellent it should be noted. We sat inside and ate. After we finished I noticed they had a separate pastry area with no one on line so I decided to get a cinnamon twist which was scrumptious. Duck took out some cookies as well. It turned out to be a great stop. Once again I have to thank Tike for telling us about it. If he didn't I probably would have drove right by it.

After we got back in the car, we continued on our way to Los Angeles. We drove on route 395 until we saw the cut off for route 14 which we took until we got to I-5. We did make a quick stop in Lancaster to check out Clear Channel Stadium where the Lancaster JetHawks of the California League play. It was conveniently located right off the highway so I decided to get off & take a look.

It should be noted that the drive we took was amazing as we drove through mountains and cannons on different elevations. It was truly breathtaking.

As we approached the Los Angeles area, we surprisingly didn't run into too much traffic. As a result, we got to Dodger Stadium around 5:30PM. We wound up parking the car on the street just before the entrance to the stadium parking lot. We proceeded to walk over to the stadium.

We didn't have tickets yet so we just went to the box office and bought them. We picked the wrong game to attend though. For whatever reason, this game was deemed a three star one. That meant the ticket prices were higher. We wound up paying $20 for Top of the Park seats in the upper deck. It should be noted that Monday night was a one star game for $8 and Wednesday night was a two star game for $10. We got our money's worth when we walked and they gave us a skull cap. I didn't realize it got that cold in Los Angeles. Apparently it's for fashion purposes. You got to love LA. Honestly speaking, I don't. It's one of my least favorite cities to visit.

Once we went inside the ballpark we were limited to where we could go. We could have gone down to the reserve level below us but that was all. That's the drawback of being in the upper level there. As a whole, Dodger Stadium is a great ballpark. Unlike the majority of today's modern parks, you're there mainly to see a baseball game. We decided to eat there too. By doing so, we had the famous Farmer John Dodger Dogs. It was nice to return there. The last time the King & I were there was in June 2008. As for Duck, it was his first time so it was a treat for him.

View from the Top of the Park 

As for the game we saw, the Dodgers were hosting our New York Mets. It was an intriguing pitching match up as the Mets had their young stud Matt Harvey on the mound against the Dodgers' rookie Hyun-Jin Ryu from South Korea. The Mets drew first blood when Juan Lagares, the second batter of the game hit a solo home run to give the Mets an early 1-0 lead. It stayed that way until the Dodgers finally got to Matt Harvey who escaped trouble as he got the Dodgers to hit into three double plays in the first four innings. In the fifth inning, his luck ran out as shortstop Nick Punto hit a two run double to give the Dodgers a 2-1 lead. They added two more runs in the bottom of the sixth inning when catcher A.J. Ellis drove in two more with a two out single to make it 4-1. The Mets managed to get one back in the top of the ninth inning off Dodger closer Kenley Jansen but they couldn't get anymore as they fell to the Dodgers, 4-2.

Stay tuned as the journey continued as we made our way to the desert for a mid week doubleheader in the state of Arizona. Please bear with me as I try to find the time to play catch up.

Thank you for reading and following along.

Yours truly,

Gary Herman