Today was Grey Cup in Canada. It’s the Super Bowl of Canadian professional football and this year, for the second time in the past three seasons, it was in my hometown.
This was done out of a promise from the league when we were proposing to build a new stadium, that Hamilton would get hosting rights twice in the first 10 years and we squeaked this second one under the wire.
Tara was supposed to come with me but she has been working crazy hours so in the end, the biggest football fan in the house is my step-daughter Hayleigh, and she is also a Green Day fanatic and they were performing the halftime show.
We got there around 4:30, intime to catch a bit of the block party being held with various musicians sharing the stage over a 3 hour time span. This also meant we were a couple of hours early for the game, but it meant we could take our time, check out the festivities, grab some food, and simply enjoy the view of Hamilton from our nosebleed section.
It wasn’t as cold as it was two years ago when the event was pushed into December due to COVID, but it was definitely late fall weather.
The halftime show was amazing and the crowd seemed to love it, and the football game itself was thrilling with the decision going down to the final seconds. The home team was knocked out last week, so we routed for Montreal who ended up winning in the end.
We stayed for the trophy presentations, and then made the 15-minute walk home.
Hayleigh and I both have lots of videos and photos of our day together, and frozen toes to remember this day for a few more hours yet.