8/18/08 Lambeau Field and the Green Bay Packers

8/18/08 Lambeau Field and the Green Bay Packers

Green Bay was only about an hour from camp, which was good since we didn’t get an early start today. Beautiful little rapids in a beautiful little river were the cause for the large noises of rapids that we could hear from the campground. Easy to see why it is part of the National Park system.

Fireworks must be a big deal here with free fireworks given away at the bp gas station if you took your receipt into the store. Guess that is a technique for getting people into the convenient store in this day of credit card gas pumps with no need to go inside. Didn’t work on us!

Lambeau Field, home of the Green Bay Packers, was very easy to find. Due to a huge renovation finished in 2003, the stadium is a destination spot for tourists as well as Packer’s fans. The tour took us to a luxury box that would cost about $80,000 per year with a seven-year lease for 16 tickets, 4 large flat screen TVs and a grand view of the field. The super luxury boxes are about $120,000 per year and have their own bathroom. All food and drink for the suites must be purchased through the stadium. This and many other ventures helped fund this awesome new upgrade to the smallest team base in the NFL. Yep, I learned a great deal of useless, but interesting trivia about the Packers. I’ll admit, I did get goose bumps as we walked out of the tunnel that the players use to get onto the field. As we walked down the tunnel, the guide started a audio recording making it sound like we were being announced as the football players are on game day. Those Packer fans are really tough to sit on aluminum seats with no backs in the frigid weather of Green Bay. I sure can understand why they say that the weather is such a factor in Green Bays winning record. To go to a game here would be an awesome experience!

In Curly’s Bar we had a beer in the spirit of the place. It is said that beer is only rented here. Most of it is returned before the end of the games. We saw a few players leaving the stadium and we decided not to wait the two hours to see them practice where fans can sit on the sidelines close enough to hear the coaches yell at the players. The tour guide said that Green Bay is the only place fans can sit on the field during practice. We laughed at that but didn’t tell anyone about the Seahawk’s practicing for all those years at Eastern WA University.