Manchester United Red Devils Forever!!!!!!!!!

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I have arrived in Manchester which is now the farthest north I have ever been in the United Kingdom. I spoke briefly with the border person who asked why I was in England. I explained that I was there to see my favorite band The Primitives. I was a bit disappointed to hear another person tell me they had never heard of The Primitives, Oh Well.

I was not sure how to get into the city center or Old Trafford stadium but after wandering around a bit I found the train station where a nice railway employee advised me how to take a train to Manchester Picadilly station and from there a tram to Old Trafford. In case you are not aware Old Trafford Stadium is the playing grounds of the Manchester United football team.

Tram ride only took 20 minutes to get to Old Trafford. I was advised by the railway employees that it is a straight walk to the stadium and if I get lost just asked anyone where it is. Old Trafford is over 100 years old and has a 75 000 seat capacity. It is an impressive building and I can see the building itself is a big tourist draw because there was a large crowd of tourists wandering around the outside along with a number of people selling hats, scarves for the Manchester United/Manchester City game which was tomorrow.

I had time before my tour of the stadium so I ate some breakfast at the red café. Food was decent but it was say the glasses and utensils were not that clean. After this disappointing breakfast I made my way to the museum where I wandered around for awhile looking at all the memorabilia that Manchester United has. I have only seen more trophies at Real Madrid's stadium. There is also a whole section dedicated to David Beckham who was scouted when he was young by Manchester United. He was trained all the way through the Red Devils youth teams. It was impressive timeline for the most famous player to come out of Manchester United. The museum also has a timeline of Manchester United itself. Going all the way back to the 1880's when the team was first started. I walked through it and saw through most of their history they were not the big deal they are today. It was only in the 1950's and afterwards did they become the powerhouse they are today.

The tour started at the ground floor of the stadium and we were led around the stadium stands. Once you are inside the stadium you can imagine just what it is like on game day when 75 000 screaming fans are in there all at once. The stadium itself does not have a lot amenities which is not a surprise since it is from the previous century. Our tour guide did emphasize that the stadium is accessible to the disabled. Whole sections are setup to assist disabled/visually impaired people. I was most impressed by the one section for wheelchairs which the team setup to allow one helper to accompany each wheelchair bound person. This was done at no extra cost to the disabled. There is even a clubhouse for the disabled which is full of pictures of players hanging out with the disabled.

We continued our tour wandering the grounds and you can sense the history for this team. The saddest section was about the Munich air disaster that detailed how the team plane crashed and killed a number of players, team officials and reporters. We made our way to press conference area which strangely enough had a waxed statue of Sir Alex Ferguson sitting at the press conference table. I thought was very weird because the man is still alive and they were charging 10 pounds to take a picture with his wax statue.

We didn't get to run onto the pitch through the team tunnel because there was some construction work going on at that time. We did get to see the home teams clubhouse and locker room. It was not that posh because the team does not spend that much time at this stadium. The clubhouse had folding tables and chairs and the locker room just had hooks on the wall for the jerseys and that was about it.

We ended the tour at the gift shop and I bought a keychain and some candy, everything else was too expensive. I was considering a custom newspaper clipping that would have displayed a picture of me with the newspaper headline "Huot Iv signs with Manchester United for 20 Million pounds". I held off because I had no way of bringing home the framed photo with my carry on.

I made my way back to Manchester city center. I had some plans to meet a friend there but they fell through so I ended up eating some food and wandering the city on foot. It was an interesting place and I spent some time in a park just people watching until it was time for my train to Glasgow.

One of the things I love most about the UK is the efficient rail system they have. You can go anywhere in a good time using the trains. My ticket to Glasgow cost $40 and took about 3 hours. No wifi on this train so I fell asleep at my seat and had a strange dream about the Loch Ness monster. I woke up with a start and I must have been mumbling in my sleep because a number of people were staring at me strangely.

I got off the train at around 9PM and it was pitch dark in Glasgow. I heard that Glasgow was a rough place so I was nervous to be wandering around in the dark with all my carry on luggage. Even though I saw a lot of people stumbling around drunk no one bothered me so I made it my stop for the night which was the Blue Sky hostel.

I got to my hostel and was promptly informed that my bed was in a separate building which had no wi fi. It was a bit disappointing because I like to type out my travel blog as I lay in my bed. I wasn't up to going out that night because it was late already so I sat around the common room and watched some Germans and English people play a drinking game. It was called Fuck the dealer and if you have never played it before here is how it goes. One person tries to guess the card the dealer is holding and if he guesses it wrong he is told higher/lower and if he guesses it right on either of these two tries the card is placed in the middle and the dealer has to take 5 sips of alcohol. If the player guesses it wrong than he has to take the equivalent number of sips that he is wrong. So if he guesses a 2 and the card is a 5 than he has to take 3 sips. It is called Fuck the dealer because by the end of the game it is easy to guess which cards the dealer is holding so the dealer will be doing a lot of drinking.

I watched for about an hour before deciding it was time for bed and I fell asleep quickly and I reminded myself to wake up early to catch my tour coach to Loch Ness the next morning. It was a good day and a good start for my vacation.

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