It’s not too often I have a bad a stadium trip, but this was one of those rare occurrences where everything seemed to go wrong. On a recent trip to Florida (see “Wrapping up a Trip to Florida“), I planned on seeing a UCF Football game at Bright House Networks Stadium. The process began when I went to buy tickets a month before and UCF posted on their website “ALL tickets to the South Dakota game are $25”. So when I tried to buy them, it was surprising to see eight different pricing structures ranging from $25 to $130. I emailed the ticket office only to get the lame excuse that it’s non-priority seats which are $25 (and of course, those are just the upper corners and upper ends). I ended up calling the ticket office to order my tickets, which still didn’t arrive the week before we flew out. After another call (they must hate me there), they said the tickets would definitely be there Friday. They weren’t. So they just ended up canceling them and holding at will call…which is cool, because that’s how I usually do it if I have to buy tickets before hand when worrying about a potential sell-out. Fast-forward to game day and the general parking garages are about a mile from the stadium. Even though I was prepared for that, it’s quite a hike when the sun’s blazing and it’s 95 degrees. We get to the stadium and the main ticket window says nothing about will-call. So, I do some more walking and circle the entire stadium to find nothing and learn that where it says: “Tickets Available” is Will-Call. And there were only four windows with one line and the line quadrupled in size. Well that one line went slow because other people just started coming up to the other three windows until finally everyone realized “Gee, let’s make four lines”. Finally, we’re inside. At halftime, we grab some food, which was regrettable (especially for me later in the night). While eating, I proceeded to drop my plate and spill ketchup all over my leg. At this point it just became comical. We left the game, only to get lost traversing campus and trying to find the correct parking garage. After finally arriving at the garage, the elevator was broke and we walked up the four flights and then circled around the entire top deck as we came up the wrong side. It was nice to put UCF in the rearview mirror, but it was really the night that needed to end as we stopped off at Sonic for a “Sonic Blast” only to be stuck in the drive-thru line for 20 minutes…with a total of three cars in line! (20 minutes may not seem long, but think about that for a second while in a drive thru). The topper of the night came when we arrived back at the hotel, at the exact same time a bus-load of teenage steppers (like tap-dancing) were dropped off. In the elevator, I knew where they would be going…right to our floor. So if I ever return to Central Florida and make a visit to UCF Arena for a basketball game, I may be rooting for the visitors!
Stadium and Arena Visits 