Tropicana Field

On our trip to Florida, we decided to head over to Tampa to cross off another baseball stadium from our bucket list.  The Tampa Bay Rays were playing the Oakland A's (Bart's original team before saying his vows!).  I usually rep my San Francisco Giants wherever I go, but I decided that since they were playing a local team, I thought I would support our American league team.  You know, to support my husband's roots. :)

Tropicana Field is actually located in St. Petersburg, which is on the other side of the bay from Tampa.  It's a super cute little-big city.  Remember this photo above?  Yeah, that's St. Petersburg. What you can't see are the big sky scrapers right behind it.

The most unique thing about this stadium is that it is a dome.  Since it was so hot outside, it was really nice to be inside a nice air-conditioned building, but it was really strange to hear the echoing of the bat hitting the ball and even a ball or two hitting the ceiling during batting practice.

The turf looked a little strange, too - it didn't have the pretty hash lines like the Angels have.

For the food, we of course had a hot dog (because you just have to at a baseball game), but we also had the most amazing pulled pork nachos.  One of the guest service ladies recommended it to us and she was spot on. It was sooooooo stinkin' good!  Seriously, just thinking of them right now makes me want to go back.  Single best ballpark food item I've ever had.  If you go there, you MUST get these.

Tropicana Field is also known for its mascot races (or drink races? they weren't exactly the mascot) in between innings.  There was the Lipton Iced Tea, Diet Pepsi and Pepsi all racing down the third baseline.  

Now, the very best part of the stadium (besides the nachos, of course), was the huge sting ray tank in centerfield!  Oh, it was so awesome!

You could pet them and feed them...it was so fun!

Definitely my favorite part of the stadium.  

The A's won the game and we got to check off another ballpark from our list!  That's 11 down, 19 to go!  I guess we'll have to make it back to Florida so we can catch a game in Miami.