We went to another baseball game today with friends from Grass Valley, Rich and Sylvia Aunger, who own a winter home in Sun City West, a community in the NW suburbs of Phoenix, AZ. Staying with them for a week are mutual friends Chuck and Carol Elizondo. Rich and Sylvia made the arrangements to attend the spring training game this afternoon between the LA Angels and the San Diego Padres at the Peoria Sports complex near their house.
The field is not bad and looks to be fairly typical of most of the Arizona spring training parks. One thing that is different is that it is the home field both the San Diego Padres and the Seattle Mariners. Each team has its own practice fields and coordinates its game schedule to avoid conflicts. We had good seats under a shade canopy. The crowd today perhaps filled two-thirds of the 7,500 seat stadium and was relatively quiet compared to the Giants game last night. The temperature today was in the high 80's so the sun canopy really came in handy. We had lunch at a nearby In-N-Out Burger restaurant prior to the game so we really didn't get to sample the ballpark food. The park did appear however, to have more choices than the typical ballpark food available at the Giants park in Scottsdale - and the beer was cheaper.
It was a good ball game. The Padres came back to score three runs in the 8th inning to win the game, making the home team fans happy. There were a lot of exciting plays as well as a lot of Spring Training mistakes by both teams, but it was a very entertaining experience.
After the game, we went over to Rich and Sylvia's house to relax a little before dinner. We had dinner around 6:00 pm at a very popular and very good Mexican Restaurant close to the ballpark. There are lots of good restaurants nearby and they all seemed to be thriving. With an active snowbird population, a large 17,000 house Sun City retirement/winter home community, and two spring training fields in the immediate vicinity, there appears to be a very large market to draw upon.
Tomorrow, we are all going to the Musical Instrument Museum in Phoenix. This might sound a little hokey but it has good reviews and is ranked as one of the top 10 things to do in Phoenix . Rich and Sylvia have been there several times and say they see something new every time they go. It seems to be a favorite spot to bring their visitors. We'll see, and add our discerning critique after our visit tomorrow.
Day 9 Pictures
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