A Star Spangled Spectacular

I may be a little biased but Baltimore was looking quite snazzy this weekend!

Baltimore Happenings

Because of the whole Ray Rice shabang, Maryland has been getting quite a lot of bad press over the last week.  Between the Ravens losing terribly last weekend, and the Ray Rice craziness, you'd think Maryland was a terrible place to live with nothing but bad things happening.  This week, that couldn't be farther from the truth.  There are actually tons of fabulous things happening but you'd never know it based on the national press.

First up is the Orioles!  I'm not a HUGE baseball fan, but judging by the quality of the Ravens last weekend, I'm switching to rooting for the Orioles this season.  For the first time in a very long time, they're playing well.  In the last few years, they've gotten increasingly great under Buck Showalter.  And this year they seemed to have finally hit their stride. They're in the race for Division lead.  As of this moment, the magic number is 8.  They only have to win 8 more games to win the division.  How awesome is that!?  Seeing as there's virtually no chance for a super bowl win this year, the Orioles getting to the World Series would be really what these sports fans in Baltimore need - a team to root for!

If I'm going to keep bringing up the Ravens, I suppose I should mention that their rivals are coming to town for Thursday Night Football tomorrow.  A Ravens Steelers match is always dirty and rough and really brings the fans out.  I'm hoping, with everything going on in the NFL, this game will follow the same pattern.  It'll be interesting to see if the team can rev up the same level of energy they usually have when the steel city boys come to town.  If Terrell Suggs is any indicator, tomorrow's game should be quite fun!

Then we have the biggest event of them all, that is completely non-sports related (though sailing is a sport so I suppose one could make the argument...) - The Star-Spangled Spectacular kicked off today with the arrival of a few tall ships into the harbor.  By weekend's end, there should be 33 ships from Navies around the world docked in the Inner Harbor.  There will also be fireworks, the Blue Angels, tours and festivities at Fort McHenry all to commemorate the writing of the Star Spangled Banner 200 years ago.  I spent a lot of time at the Sailabration that followed the same theme in 2012, and was super impressed by everything.  Because of that, I'm super excited to see what they have planned this year.  Be forewarned, I took TONS of pictures in 2012.  You should probably be prepared for another onslaught this weekend : )

So Long Tall Ships!

Today was the last day of the Start Spangled Sailabration here in Baltimore, which meant 2 things.  1. I got to sail from Annapolis, to the Inner Harbor and back on the Schooner Woodwind (Thanks Captain Ken!) and watch the majestic (and totally awesome!) tall ships sail out of Baltimore.  And 2. If you're not a boat fan, today is the last day you have to see pictures of boats on this blog... for at least a little while (This is summer and Annapolis is the sailing capital of the world, so never say never : ).

Between the Bay Bridges

 Notice all the sailors, on whatever those things are called.  Holy moly!

Artsy fartsy sail shot

Visually interesting Baltimore