After attending 17 sporting events in 15 days in three countries it was time to go home. Here were my stats:
I attended 12 games in England, 3 in Scotland and 2 in Finland.
I attended 10 soccer matches consisting of 4 English Premier League, 2 Champions League, 1 Europa League, 1 Scottish Premier League and 2 Carling Cup.I attended 2 rugby matches – 1 in the Guinness Premiership and 1 in the Magners League.I attended 2 county cricket matches – both Division I and Division II.I attended 2 NHL games …

When I originally planned my journey around the United Kingdom, I knew I would attend the Arsenal match versus Blackburn Sunday afternoon at 1:30 pm and Hospitality Jim had a ticket waiting for me for the game.
In order to partake in all of the festivities I needed to take an early flight as the Arsenal boys usually meet up for brunch three hours before kickoff. Thus, I booked an 8:00 am flight out of Helsinki that was scheduled to land in London at 9:10 am.
In order to get to …

For the first time in ten days, I was attending two games in as many days in the same city.
Pre Game DiningSince there was nowhere to eat around the arena before the game Friday night, I chose to eat at Zetor before getting on the train to Hartwall Areena. Zetor is just a couple of blocks from the Helsinki train station. The restaurant was recommended by Let’s Go as a good Finnish restaurant. I was disappointed with the “Finnish” meal I ordered at Zetor but overall the …

For only the fourth time this trip, I had a free day in the town in which I was staying. The other three were my first day in London, a day in Newcastle and a day in Manchester. Today I decided to do some site seeing since I was not sure when I would get back to Helsinki in the future.
My day started by eating the breakfast that was included in my hotel room. It was a great European breakfast.
After that I went touring around Helsinki for …

Even though my plane was on time I did not arrive at the hotel until 5 pm. After checking in, I left for the game immediately which started at 7 pm. In order to get to Hartwall Areena, I took the train from the main Helsinki train station to the Pasila train station (the first stop after the main train station). I paid for my ticket (2 euros) but quickly realized that there was no reason to buy one since nobody would actually check my ticket on …

In addition to booking hotels on Monday, September 28 while I was at the Britannia Hotel in Manchester, I did some research on buying tickets to the Blackhawks and Panthers games in Helsinki. Tickets were still available from Hartwell Areena where the games would be played. Since tickets were still available I figured I could show up at the arena and buy tickets on the secondary ticket market (I’m not sure why I was so confident I could buy tickets on the secondary market for the hockey games …

On Thursday night I booked my hotel for Helsinki. I normally book hotels at this last minute. First, it limits my options if not many hotels are available – making my decision easier. Second, it allows me to receive good deals if the hotels discount their rooms since nobody will be staying in them. Third, if I change my plans I do not need to cancel one hotel room and rebook.
I made a reservation at the Radisson Blu Royal Hotel. The rate was 67.20 euros per night which was not …