Hamilton County Tour: Colts Training Camp

Well, after having months and months of sporadic county tours - sometimes going six or more months between them - we managed to see two counties in the space of one month! WHAT?!?!?!

This past weekend, we knocked Hamilton County off our list. This was county brimming with both possibilities and challenges for us. It had much possibility because it's the county directly north of the county containing Indianapolis, so it has so much to do. The whole county is basically an Indianapolis suburb. It's been developing in wonderful, full-of-life ways in the last few years. There are so many things to do, how could we possibly pick, right?

But it was challenging, because it's really only about 45 minutes from us, so we have gone there many, many times throughout our marriage. We've gone on many dates and seen much of what it has to offer. So how could we pick something meaningful that was also new?

Well, we did it!

In case you were wondering...this county was named after Alexander Hamilton. And if you weren't wondering, that little tidbit was just a freebie.

I've been trying to think back over our marriage to think of all the places we've been to in Hamilton County that we've already told you about! One of the cute little towns in this county is Cicero, and that's where we go see fireworks every 4th of July. (Here's a link to this year's recap.) The fireworks are over a beautiful lake. (There are a couple of lakes and reservoirs in this county that make it a popular lakefront/water sport area.)

Another city in this county that we visit often is Carmel. (Isn't that a delicious-sounding city?) We spent quite a bit of time there in our date inspired by the letter N. That day, we got cinnamon rolls from Lisa's Pie Shop, shopped and had lunch at Clay Terrace, and had dinner at Bub's Burgers. (To be fair, Lisa's Pie Shop is in Atlanta, Indiana, not Carmel, but it's still the same county.)

Ryan took me to a cooking class at Sur la Table a few years ago on Valentine's Day, and that was in Carmel as well. That, by the way, was a very fun date that we really enjoyed!

Last winter, we went to the Christkindlmarkt down in Carmel, and it was outside some of the beautiful buildings in their downtown district.

So this time, we decided to try a couple of things we'd never done in Hamilton County before!

First up? Colts Training Camp!

Back when Ryan and I were dating, we made our own bucket list of dreams, and one of the things Ryan put on the list was attending Colts Training Camp. He had been once with a couple of his friends, but he wanted to take me. Back in those days, the Colts trained at Anderson University, which is in an entirely different county. Now they train at this huge athletic facility in Westfield, called Grand Park. We'd never been there before, so this was a first!

I had no idea what to expect, and I must say that it was nothing like what I imagined it would be...but in good ways!

I should say, for any of you who are from around here and are thinking of going in the future, the camp itself is free to attend, but you do have to pay $5.00 to park. (That's no big deal, but we hadn't seen that listed on the website. Perhaps we are very blind, but I'll throw that out in case you're on a budget!) You do also have to have a ticket to get in, but you can get them from their website, and like I said, the tickets are free.

We arrived about 8 in the morning and we found the field where they had all kinds of fun games and photo opps. It's mostly for the kids, but there were a fair number of adults playing the games too! (You could catch footballs or do other drills, for example.)

We did have fun with the photo opps!

Then we made our way over to the practice fields. Since I didn't know how this whole thing worked, I thought they were going to play a mock game, but the whole morning was set up with different drills and scenarios that stayed on a very tight and strictly-adhered-to schedule. I cannot even tell you how happy that made me! I love a schedule!!

(There were two fields beside each other, and they used both throughout the practice. Some fans ran back and forth between the bleachers, but we just stayed put and watched back and forth.)

They had an autograph session after the practice, but we didn't stay for that. We were trying to beat the traffic to our next adventure.

It was really fun - even for a not-real-football-fan like me. But I did get to see my own personal favorite quarterback. (I happen to be a Jacoby Brissett fan, and he was practicing that day, so I was happy!)

So there you have it! The first part of our Hamilton County tour!