Finding Entertainment on the First Leafs Road Trip of the Season

Some things are planned, and then others just happen out of spontaneity.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — I’ve made it a point to be more disciplined when it comes to staying in while travelling on the road this season. But looking at the Detroit Lions football schedule gave me a sudden change of heart.

Before packing for the Toronto Maple Leafs’ longest road trip of the season (five games and 11 days), I was enthusiastic about the Detroit Lions’ convincing 20-6 win against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. As a longtime Lions fan, I was excited to learn that the team was playing in Baltimore on the same day the Leafs were scheduled to have the day off in Washington. I had to go to this game. Seeing the passionate Lions fans occupy a lot of these road games reminded me of what Leafs fans have done on many of these road trips.

But it wasn’t easy. I had already booked a flight to DC for 11:07 am and the game was set for kickoff at 1:04 pm. The drive takes about 90 minutes from Washington-Dulles airport and that’s not including expected football traffic. Cancelling and rebooking to Baltimore’s airport was going to cost me about $400US. So I decided to let fate decide things.

With the help of one of my credit cards that I use for travel (yes, I have a lot of them and yes I pay off all of my bills on time and in full), I booked a rental car with National. With the US version of the American Express Platinum card, you get status with the rental car company that lets you pick any car in a section and simply drive away without going to a counter. I was lucky. my flight got in about 10 minutes early and I was on the road by 11:20. Through some quick driving and the help of Waze, I managed to a parking lot right next to M&T Bank about 15 minutes before kickoff.

Now I had to buy a ticket, and this is where stuff begins to kind of go to shit. Prices were high so close to game time, I ended up buying a seat up in the 500s for about $250 US on SeatGeek. The ticket is transferred through Ticketmaster’s online system. But yeah, the barcode will not come up. I’m in conversation with both SeatGeek and Ticketmaster who both tell me to see the ticket office for help. Thirty minutes later, I finally got my ticket and I missed roughly half of the opening quarter. I’m still debating if I should get Ticketmaster to partially refund me the cost (or at least the exorbitant service charges since their actual “service” didn’t work.

I finally get in and the Lions are down 7-0. Little did I know that it was going to get worse. Much worse. I left late in the third quarter after the Lions went down 35-0. In the past, I would be so down over this kind of experience. I received many texts from friends during the game feeling sorry for me that I went all the way down to watch the Lions get absolutely spanked. But I’ve become quite zen about these things. The journey of trying to make it down there in time was a story to tell in itself. I met some great Detroit Lions fans and we commiserated over the experience. I sat next to a lovely couple who live in nearby Virginia and were originally from Michigan. One of them was able to detect immediately that I was from Canada and then, Toronto. I was astonished. I’ve always felt people from Toronto don’t really have a uniquely Toronto accent.

One of the positives of leaving a sporting event is completely avoiding the mass exodus of traffic.

The following day, some work colleagues asked me in jest how the game was. Honestly, I had a great time and I was happy I went. Life is all about the experience and this was certainly one of those. It was my first chance to see the team since they moved out of the Pontiac Silverdome ages ago. And hey, they’re still 5-2 this season.

As the Maple Leafs left the ice following practice at MedStar Iceplex on Monday, Tom Guilitti of NHL.com causally mentioned that the Leafs were practising at the Washington Capitals’ practice facility because Depeche Mode was using Capital One Arena tonight. I’m a big Depeche Mode fan but have never seen them live before. My previous attempt to see them in Toronto was difficult since the price of the tickets was insane.

Excited about possibly going, I did a search and saw nothing reasonable. I remembered a trick a friend of mine in the concert business taught me. Always check about 3-4 hours before doors because more tickets are expected to drop as guests of the band or comped tickets get released to the puck. I searched again around 3:30 pm and found a ticket in the first row of the 100 level near the stage for only $156 and that’s AFTER Ticketmaster’s service charges of a $109 face-value ticket.

Next time you are trying to get tickets to a show, do your best to wait 3-4 hours before the event to see if reasonably-price tickets become available. These are the kind of tips I hope to share on the paid version of this newsletter. Consider signing up. We’ve already had some good dialogue in the chat portion of the Substack app.

The show was fantastic. They played all the hits. My favourite song by them is ‘Policy of Truth’, but unfortunately that was not performed.

Next up. I’ll talk about how I booked the upcoming six-day trip to Sweden including flight and hotel for just $600.

Until next time,

-David.