The Chiefs got to take a break from hockey on Thursday as they took off from Kitchener and traveled to Toronto to take in the sights of Canada's largest city.

The team started the day eating lunch at Wayne Gretzky's restaurant. It's in a great location just down the street from the Skydome, where the Toronto Blue Jays play.
From there, it was off to the Hockey Hall of Fame. It was beyond expectations.

At the main entrance, which is in a mall, there's a collection of old goalie masks and various pucks from teams all over Canada and the U.S. Jessica Brown of The Spokesman-Review won the most observant category for finding the Spokane Chiefs puck from the last season in the old Boone Street Barn.

The displays were awesome. So many jerseys, sticks, helmets, gloves, skates and pucks, it was overwhelming. The retro display was my favorite, showing all the old jerseys of the defunct California Golden Seals, Cleveland Barons, Kansas City Scouts, Winnipeg Jets, Atlanta Flames, Quebec Nordiques and my favorite, the Colorado Rockies. The memories came flooding back the moment I entered the Hall.

The team enjoyed the interactive displays where you could shoot pucks on a goalie, or play goalie. It led to some pretty good natured ribbing among the guys as well. There was also an area to call highlites. I nailed mine..so well that the computer locked up! Guess no one will ever hear my call of Lanny McDonald's Cup winning goal against Montreal in '89!

All of us got a chance to see the Stanley Cup as well. It was a replica...but it sure looked the part. The original Vezina, Art Ross, Lady Byng and Conn Smythe trophies were there though. Having never seen those...that was cool!

As if the Hall of Fame wasn't enough, the team headed to the Skydome, now known as the Rogers Centre, for the Blue Jays-Angels game.

We had great seats down the third base line. Some of the guys were bored silly by baseball, while others had a great time. Major props to David Rutherford, Justin McCrae and Trevor Glass for their Blue Jay outfits. They were classic!

The Jays even put the boys on the Gamevision screen in the stadium. Very nice gesture by the Jays and it was an experience the team will never forget.

Now the good times are put in the background and the team gets back to business Friday with a full practice. There's business to be taken care of on Sunday and the Chiefs fully know that.

Here's to hoping they do so!

1 Comments

Ashley said:

My best team of MLB is The Toronto Blue Jays . This why I always fallow their games especially whenever I have some time. I’m always trying not o miss any of their game and hear about the team’s news. But The Toronto Blue Jays tickets get more pricy especially when there are some hot games. But, if we’re really good fans we should try not to be mean when we’re talking about a favourite teams. It’s not only the Blue Jays tickets that got pricy, but there are other major teams too, so the team needs our support and we should provide as much as we can.

June 27, 2008 4:00 AM

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