Royalty Tours USA

Monday, February 15, 2010

Flyers trick the Canadiens, 6-2!

The Philadelphia Flyers went North of the border to face the Montreal Canadiens in the back end of their home and home series. The Flyers had won 3-2 in Philadelphia on Friday night. So they came in looking for the sweep.

Royalty was also in attendance to witness it. My partner Michael Casiano aka "The King" and I left in the morning and we drove all day to get there. I rented a car from Avis which is located a mile and a half from my house. I picked up the King at the Grand Central Station Post Office where he works. He was working overtime probably for the last time for the time being. Needless to say, he needed the money.

Traveling from place to place does get expensive especially when you do it as often as we do. I always do my best to minimize cost and maximize enjoyment.

In this case, we took a ride up the "Northway" I-87 up through New York State. Once we got halfway up there the traffic thinned out to practically nobody. Unlike most states in our country, state troopers were in full force. Luckily for us we weren't victimized. We didn't need any unexpected expenses.

With that being said, we still needed tickets for the hockey game. Before we actually arrived in Montreal at 5:25PM we stopped to check into a hotel in Plattsburgh. We also got a bite to eat at Wendy's. We took it out since we were pressed for time.

We then proceeded to get to the border to go through Customs to enter Canada. Unlike previous visits, no hassle this time. We were questioned if we had tickets to the hockey game though. We responded not yet. We hoped to pick up singles at the box office. We finally arrived in Montreal on schedule at 5:25PM when the car was parked.

Actually that was 5 minutes earlier than I wanted to be there. We then had to feed the parking meter until 6PM and we were good for the night. Once we got out of the car it was freezing cold and windy.

I said to myself this is going to be fun trying to get tickets. Off we went to the Bell Centre, home of the Montreal Canadiens. We get to the box office hoping they had cancellations at the window. No such luck. Time to good to work.

After searching for 45 minutes or so, I came across a few different people from the States. After asking different people who mainly spoke French. Thankfully for them we got in relatively cheap considering. The scalpers which there were many wanted 3 or 4 times as much for a single ticket. We were willing to pay a price if necessary but not what they wanted.

We wound getting 2 separate single seats so we didn't get to sit together. I was very lucky because the young lady I bought the first ticket from was really nice.

Her name was Chrissy Capp. We both exchanged stories throughout the game which made for a very memorable night. I gave her my business card in hopes we can stay in touch. We'll have to wait and see about that. She's a big hockey fan.

As for the game itself, it started with a fight only 4 seconds into it when Ian LaPerriere and Ryan O'Bryne squared off. Things settled there after. The Flyers started fast. Daniel Briere opened the scoring with his first of 3 goals which included a penalty shot. The Flyers lead 3-0 after the 1st period and never looked back. They went on to win easily, 6-2!

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