Chicago is one of my most favourite cities in the world. It’s a great eating and drinking city. It has stunningly beautiful art and architecture. It is filled with down to earth midwesterners who always make me feel at home. And, as a baseball fan, it has two teams, which means any spring or summer trip to the windy city will have baseball to watch.

When I made my original plans, it was as a solo visit, extending a work trip for a few days so I could get to 5 or 6 baseball games. The trip I planned wasn’t the one I ended up taking, and that was a good thing. Some last minute changes of plans meant my wife could join me for a week in Chicago. While she’s not a huge baseball fan, she’s always up for a game or two. As both the Cubs and White Sox were in town, we decided on two.

So, game one – on a spectacular April afternoon, here we are checking out the ballpark in advance of a White Sox game against the Tampa Bay Rays.

We spent a bit of time roaming around the park pre-game and I was amazed at this life-sized statue of Frank Thomas.  One of his thighs looks about the same circumference as my waist!

Baseball and beer go so well together and Guaranteed Rate Field has a really strong selection of craft beer. I settled on trying a Mango Guppy by Pipeworks which was great for the first few innings, and Gumballhead by 3 Floyds a bit later on. That last one was one I was hoping to try at some point in Chicago and there was no better place than at a Sox game.

One of the benefits of attending an early season, mid-week, afternoon game was the ability to get a crazy good seat for cheap. The announced crowd was a touch under 11,000, but I don’t think the actual number of people attending was more than 8,000. We were about 12 rows back behind home in what were close to perfect seats for the game.

The White Sox were taking on the Tampa Bay Rays, a team I was watching in person for the first time. You never want to make a snap judgement about two teams on the basis of one game in April, but in a 10-5 loss to Tampa, the White Sox looked every bit the team in rebuilding mode and the Rays looked like a playoff hopeful team with great offensive balance and pitching.

It wasn’t all bad news for the home town fans on the day. A highlight was the third inning home run crushed to deep right-centre field by Yoan Moncada. The Sox might be in the middle of a rebuild, but Moncada is going to be a star

With a bit of baseball schedule luck for this trip, we were also able to get to a Cubs game later in the week. We had made a pilgrimage to Wrigley a few years ago when I had what was easily the single worst seat I’ve ever had for a sporting event and I had been back here one more time on my own since. But baseball is always better when you get to go with someone fun, even if you have to wear a winter jacket to the game.

I’m not sure it’s possible to have a bad time at a game at Wrigley on a sunny Saturday afternoon. It really is a perfect ballpark to take in a game. The modern stadiums all have a certain sameness to them, but not Wrigley. One look, and you know exactly where you are.

We were bundled up in multiple layers for the game. The forecasted temperature for first pitch was a crisp 10C. Over in the sunny seats on the third base side, it was really pleasant. Sadly, these weren’t out seats…

Getting a ticket at Wrigley is a difficult task (a near sellout of 39,000 took in the afternoon game), so we ended up with seats down the first base line in the outfield. Not too bad a view from here, but certainly not quite like the seats we had for the Sox game earlier in the week.

We got an absolute gem of a ball game to watch. The Los Angeles Angels got out to an early lead then hung on to win 6-5. It felt like both teams could have had 10 runs each as there were 21 runners left on base through the game. A touch sloppy in places, and taking almost four hours to complete, what it lacked in crispness, it made up for in inning by inning drama.

I mentioned the weather earlier… our seats were in the shade with the wind blowing right into our faces all afternoon. With the windchill, the temperature over here was closer to 0C. Luckily, they were giving our Cubs-themed Star Wars blankets entering the stadium that day which we put to good use. Here we are, cold, but smiling, near the end of a beautiful day at the ballpark.