Back from the races

The family and friends had a mixed time at the first MotoGP event in the U.S. since 1994. Going into it we knew that it would be crowded, it was the only event at Laguna Seca that was sold out before the day of, over 55,000 tickets, but we didn't really expected, or appreciate what the reality would be. We got to San Jose well enough, there by about 3:30, and hit the pool then met Tansie and Brad at the Obon festival (the largest one in the U.S.)--different than I thought it would be--we got there too late to see some of the drumming, but we did catch about 800 people performing fan dances (don't know what else to call them). The Slavens got hungry and split, but we visited with Tansie for a bit (if you read this Tansie, thanks for inviting us and sorry we couldn't see each other more), afterwards we ate some sushi (although Jen order the assorted Nigiri, thinking she was being adventursome ordering rolls with real fish (she normally only eats the fake crab kind), but instead we get the sashimi (raw fish on top of rice), we both split it, and some of them were good, but not all. Ruby played (and ate a bit of) the octupus--she liked the suckers on the tentacles.
After getting back we crashed, knowing that we were planning on getting up at 5:00 to head out to Monterey for the race. And that is what we did, up at 5, out by 6, breakfast and then onto Monterey. We make good time, get to the hotel where the tickets are to be picked up, then someone tells us there is a shuttle from the hotel to the race, so we get and line and wait about an hour, not a shuttle in site. We finally decide to drive there ourselves and the first two miles took about five minutes, the last 4 miles took about 2 hours. There was so much traffic it felt like we would never make it to the track by the time the race started at 2:00. But we did, barely. And everyone was pretty good until we had to trek another 1/2 hour through the park to find a place to sit--Jen and I ended up stopping early--August was fed up and needed some boob, so we hung out close to the track and waited until the race started--got to see the bikes up close. Then we climb up to the mountain, or so it seemed, that Emily and Wayne had set up on--from there we watched the rest of the race, all 47 minutes of it--the MotoGP bikes go really, really fast. We watched the next race, got some bad, way overpriced food and then took off to leave--getting out was worse than getting in. We ended up sitting by our cars for over an hour, not even bothering to get in line to leave--it wasn't going any where, we finally got out, sitting through more traffic on each major highway we hit. Dinner was at McDonald's--yea. We didn't get back to the hotel until 10:00--Wayne drove all the way back to Middletown.
Oh, before I forget, note to myself, always ask for bottom floor of building 4 at the San Jose Hyatt.
This morning we relaxed by the pool then headed out.
If we plan it better, we'll do it again next year. This go around we didn't have enough food or drink and that didn't help waiting out the traffic. But the actual race was exciting--damn bikes are so fast and they take those turns so tight.
Ah well, back to work tomorrow, but we will be looking at the 190 acres that is for sale outside of Middletown--be interesting to see.