Last year I attended my first Bama game in Tuscaloosa vs. MSU. My wife and I left home at 4:30am on Thursday to catch a 6:30am flight from Halifax to Toronto then 9:30am flight from Toronto to Atlanta. We picked up a rental car at the airport in Atlanta around 12:30pm and drove from there to our hotel in Hoover where we arrived at about 7 pm (Mrs. Fundy wanted to shop at the Summit on the way) that night.
We drove to campus from Hoover early on Friday to see campus then back to Hoover that night around 10pm and the same on game day. On Sunday morning we left Hoover at about 9am for Altanta to catch a 2pm flight to Toronto then a flight from Toronto to Halifax and were home around midnight before going back to work the next morning. Flights were about $1200, hotel was about $450, rental car $220 or so and probably a few hundred more on food and Bama gear we brought home with us. Boo Radley was kind enough to give us two tickets to the game at no charge despite our efforts to pay him at least face value. We very likely would not have made the trip without his help and generosity- just too expensive.
So, we traveled about 15 hours each way and spent about $2,000 for the trip. I've been a Bama fan for 30 years and had been longing to go to see a game in Bryant Denny for a very long time but with that kind of expense involved, I could always find a financial reason not to do it in those years when it was even financially possible.
Needless to say, it was a thrill of a lifetime and worth every penny. We would love to go to a game this year but its just not in the cards this year. But in my limited experience there is simply no comparison at all between watching at home on TV and being there live. Maybe it gets old after awhile (I'd love to find out for myself) but I still get chills just remembering being there.
