Winter Classic Trip - Part 2

The next day of our trip was the actual day of the Winter Classic Alumni Showdown.

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We checked out of our hotel in Frankenmuth bright and early and then started making our way toward Detroit.  We took a little detour first though, so Jessica could show me the town she grew up in.  She showed me the house she used to live in, the school she went to, stores her family used to walk to, and a few other places.  It was so fun to get to reminisce with her.  Then we drove along Lake St. Clair as we headed into Detroit.

You can't see it, but Canada is on the other side of the lake

There were a LOT of nice houses along the lake!

Check out that huge Christmas tree!

We arrived at Camerica Park and checked out the Fan Zone.  Then we headed inside the stadium, grabbed some lunch and hot chocolate, and finally found our seats.

We were all bundled up, but it was freezing!

My hot chocolate wasn't very hot after a few minutes.  Thank goodness for HotHands and heated bathrooms, or I probably would have ended up with frostbite or hypothermia!  It didn't take long for us to end up like this..

The Alumni Showdown was a double-header, and the Red Wings won both games!

The last game was determined by a shoot-out, and I would not have been happy if Toronto won!  The time clock froze for a while around the 4-minute mark, and then the Maple Leafs ended up scoring within the last few seconds.  If the clock hadn't stopped, the Leafs wouldn't have had a chance to shoot the tying goal...cheaters! Ha!

After the game, we had planned to get some dinner and then head over to Ann Arbor for "The Puck Drops Here" New Year's Eve event.  However, after going to a few different restaurants and seeing how packed they all were, we decided to just head back to the hotel and order room service.

The next thing we knew, we were all cozy warm in our beds watching House Hunters and didn't want to go back out in the cold.  We decided we would just go to the hotel bar for the ball drop instead, but then someone ended up falling asleep..ha!  She woke up around 11:30 and right after midnight, I asked her if we could put on our pajamas and go to bed.

What a wild and crazy New Year's Eve we had!  Are we getting old or what??