Dodgers everywhere!

Even when I'm not even close to LA, I had some Dodgers related encounters during USA visits.

Van Ramblings of a Dutch Dodger

Dodgertown 2006
It wasn't on my itinerary, but when the road signs said 'Vero Beach' I had to go and take a peek. It was in November so there wasn't much action. As it turned out it was one of the last winters before the last Dodgers Spring Training in Florida. Good timing!
It felt weird to pass the VB Dodgers gates onto a piece of land that had been Dodger Town for so long. No groundsmen were active, not a soul kept me from going into Holman Stadium. It was a ghostlike experience. Not soon after I visited Vero Beach, the lights went out in Dodger Town for good.

Van Ramblings of a Dutch Dodger

Van Ramblings of a Dutch Dodger

Brooklyn 2008
I'd been to NYC but never off Manhattan Island. It was time to expand my horizon, so I visited Brooklyn. Great place. Very New York City, but it has a tranquil quality. And the neighbourhoods sound easy: Flatbush, Bensonhurst, Crown Heights, almost Bostonian. I strolled through Prospect Park and on my way to the subway found this mural. I don't have a lot with the Dodgers pre-LA, that's so long ago, but I felt proud when I saw the painting and it felt like the people from Brooklyn never recovered from their move to the West Coast.
At the end of my walk along the boardwalk of Coney Island I visited the stadium of the Brooklyn Cyclones, a nice little park that's flanked by a bigger than life statue of Jackie Robinson and Pee Wee Reese.

Van Ramblings of a Dutch Dodger

Portland 2010
Okay, this may be stretching it, but when I visited America's biggest book store I went straight for the baseball section and to my surprise found a hard copy of 'Out of the Blue'. Hadn't seen any of those, ever! I also got a nice hard copy of 'Koufax a lefty's Legacy'. So a little bit of Blue in that trip after all.