Big 10 Football Tour

Without seeing the other 10 stadiums, you have to think that Happy Valley is one of the best tailgating venues.  There are miles of open fields, mountains in the background, and lots of space to get your grill, games, and beer out from the bed of your truck. 

If you are getting beer, we recommend getting it from W.R. Hickey's.  It was so great to exit off the highway, pull into Hickey's, tell them what we wanted while sitting in our truck, and have it walked out to us!  We wish we had something like this in Milwaukee!

At the crack of 8 AM, we were out cooking burgers/brats and everything else you expect to eat early in the morning.  If you forgot an ingredient, someone near by is sure to have it.  Please excuse the water shown in the photo to the right, we don't know how it got there.

We were really impressed with how tight of a ship they run with the tailgating.  Trash bags and recycle bags (demo'd by Justin Shelley) are readily available everywhere.  There are teams driving around on carts to make sure everyone has what the need.  Lastly, officers patrol the grounds so that there aren't any beligerent underage drinkers.  In fact, a young man was drinking beer near our tailgate when an officer came up and asked him for I.D.  After conversing for a few minutes, it was clear that this young man wasn't 21 and then suddenly we see him take off running.  The officer says into a microphone on his shoulder piece, "We've got a flee-er!" and took off after him.  Long story short, we saw the kid in the back of a squad car a few hours later with 4 citations rather than one.

It didn't take long for us to bust out the tailgating games.  We played the ever-so-famous Bean Bag Toss (aka "Cornhole") and the newly popular football toss. You can pick up these same games at TailgateToss.com and if you enter the promo code "Big Ten" you'll receive 25% off your order. 

What we don't like on the Big 10 Tour, assigned parking spaces.  One of the friends we made liked wearing navy high socks/tights in 80 degree weather.  Someone parked in this poor guy's spot.  Strangely enough, when he told security, they did nothing about it...so he took action into his own hands - he left a note on their car.  We applaud him for his restraint, because we would have smashed the windows in with a baseball bat.  The same guy who parked on "Socks'" spot later returned to the car, backed out of the spot and ran over our cooler.  Let's just say there was retaliation.

Business really picked up when we busted out the "Tailgate Pong Table."  While it is more commonly used for "Beer Pong," on this day it became the venue for our "Flip-Cup" tournament.  We had 8 teams of three people and in the end, the team known as the "Purple Cobras" took home the title.  Congrats to Brad Cieszynski, Matt Dennis, and Jason Kent!  Check out the video below for their title match!