Back from Gatlinburg, TN where I spent my first full vacation week of the calendar year.

My parents mark 50 years of marriage nine months from now and asked the family to meet them in the Smokies to celebrate the milestone anniversary in advance. My Mom and Dad have fond memories of a family trip to the Smoky Mountains in the 1970’s and wanted to bring the kids (and their kids) back for an encore.

The two towns that serve as gateways to Great Smoky Mountains National Park from the north are Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge. Both places have congested main drags that are crassly inauthentic; aimed at trapping tourists who crave fudge, miniature golf and other schlock-type stuff.

The real attraction here is the national park which is one of just a handful in the US that doesn’t charge a fee to enter. Great Smoky Mountains National Park occupies a half-million acres of land straddling Tennessee and North Carolina. It draws by far the most annual visitors of any national park in the US.

Our home base for the trip was a sprawling cluster of cabins equipped with modern resort-like amenities on private land north of downtown Gatlinburg. We only made two significant park incursions during the week. The highlight came on Friday, our last full day of the trip. In two vehicles, ten of us went up to Clingman’s Dome which at 6643 feet is the highest point in the Smokies. To reach the concrete observation deck atop the peak, you walk up a paved, half-mile trail that’s pretty steep but not unbearably taxing physically. Visibility was low when we reached the top. Passing clouds obscured the view although the 20-degree drop in temperature up there felt really good compared to the hot and sticky we were feeling down in the valley.

The big parking lot that collected cars driven by Clingman’s Dome visitors offered great views below the cloud ceiling although I found it jarring to process the apocalyptic sight of dead Fraser Firs up and down the mountains for as far as the eye could see. A non-native bug is blamed for destruction of most fir trees in the Smokies. There’s also said to be linkage between global warming/environmental degradation and the demise of the forest.

We didn’t see any bears as we moved around inside and out of the park but we did see a turkey. And lots of flying insects.

Our best meal of the trip came on the vacation’s final night when my youngest brother grilled pork ribs and chicken over charcoal in a Weber kettle. We had nightly cocktail hours and lots of leisure time which was nice. My room had cable television so I was able to see a week’s worth of World Cup action on ESPN. Ian Darke drives me crazy with his statements of the obvious and determination to make himself the focal point of the broadcast. Not to be xenophobic, but there are at least two esteemed soccer play-by-play guys with deep ties to the sport in this country who deserve the role as primary voice on English language World Cup telecasts in the US ahead of Darke. If JP Dellacamera doesn’t do it for you, why not Steve Cangialosi? As things are, we’ll have to wait until 2018’s Cup in Russia when FOX takes over the US broadcasts to get an American voice on the play-by-play mike. If plans hold, Gus Johnson will serve in that role four years from now.

Last Thursday night, we went up to Kodak, TN to see the Tennessee Smokies play the Chattanooga Lookouts on opening night of the Southern League season’s second half. This is high quality pro baseball at the Double-A level. The Cubs have loaded the Smokies club with lots of future major leaguers since affiliating with TN in 2007. Unfortunately, future Cub slugging star Kris Bryant had just been promoted out of Tennessee a day before the game we attended. Still, we got to see 25-year-old Korean right-hander Dae-Eun Rhee who has a mid-90’s fastball and could see a Cubbie call-up in September.

The best player on the field was Chattanooga second baseman Darnell Sweeney who led the game off with a home run and made a couple eye-popping defensive plays. Sweeney (pictured above) was a 13th round pick by the Dodgers out of the University of Central Florida in 2012 and reminds me a bit of a young Alfonso Soriano.

The other talent that drew attention at this game was the voice of Smokies radio play-by-play man Mick Gillispie. We left after eight and a half and heard Gillispie’s call of the winning Smokies run bottom nine on the car radio. I’ve since listened to the free internet stream of a couple Smokies radio broadcasts and I really enjoy the pace and composure used by Gillispie as he describes the game. If the Cubs look to replace Pat Hughes at some point after they make the switch to WBBM-AM next season, they need look no further than Gillispie. He clearly has a handle on how to deliver a vivid description of what’s before him and only elevates the volume when absolutely necessary.

My flights to reach Knoxville and back didn’t go as planned but both the inbound and outbound journeys were each completed in long single days.

One general observation about air travel: I’m seeing an alarming decline in the baseline cleanliness standard for both aircraft interiors and airport gate waiting areas used by the carrier I work for. Even at hub properties which fall under daily scrutiny by those setting and enforcing these crucial standards, I’m shocked at the indifference over infrastructure that is trashed and unkempt. I believe there is a direct correlation between one’s overall impression of the flying experience and the cleanliness of their surroundings on the airplane and at the gate. Sure, there are other factors, but a clean plane and gate is crucial. I’ve traveled a lot domestically over the last 20 years thanks to the benefit attached to my job and never can I remember seeing the kind of filthy conditions I’ve come across in the last year or so.

California Chrome’s Saturday evening attempt to became the first horse since 1978 to win thoroughbred racing’s Triple Crown failed at Belmont Park before a juiced-up crowd that filled the old race track plant in Elmont, NY.

The gorgeous sun-drenched afternoon at Belmont had a delirious vibe as the audience swelled beyond the track’s ability to meet patrons’ basic needs – whether it be beer, food, bathrooms or escalators used to navigate the three main levels on the grandstand side. It didn’t matter to most, though, because you come to expect organizational lapses at this event in exchange for the prospect of witnessing history.

You know how the race played out. Seasoned broken-down horseplayers expected Chrome to get leg-weary in the race’s final stage. In fact, he did. At least, however, he gave the illusion coming out of the final turn that he had a shot – which gave the massive crowd a chance to create the most beautiful roar in all of sports. The corresponding bouncing of the concrete below our feet on the third floor of the grandstand added to the tingle you get in your limbs before the place hushed down and people streamed to the exits with losing bet slips placed on the 4-5 favorite.

This was the 13th shot at history since Affirmed captured the crown in ‘78. Each time the drought is prolonged, the anticipation grows.

Chrome owner Steve Coburn’s bitter reaction to his colt’s loss is unfortunate. The improbable breeding success story he helped nurture is now earmarked in the history books with a sour grapes cry of foul that most racing fans disagree with. The Triple Crown is elusive for a reason. The rules for participation in the three Crown events are clear-cut. New shooters (like Belmont winner Tonalist) can enter either or both the Preakness and Belmont if they meet necessary qualifications without regard for their presence in Louisville on the first Saturday in May. Coburn’s assertion that the current and longstanding Crown process is unfair could have been (and has been) debated without him sounding like the down-on-his-luck bettor who laments the outcome of a fairly-contested event. The graciousness displayed by the many other owners and trainers who won the first two legs of the Crown only to get knocked off in the Belmont shows Coburn to be derelict and isolated in his understanding and appreciation of the sport. He had such a magical ride and used his final chapter in the spotlight to spew vitriol. I thought the emotion displayed by Coburn in the immediate aftermath on NBC would dissipate with a night’s sleep but he was still riled up Sunday morning.  He bizarrely used the kid-in-a-wheelchair metaphor which only added to his likely legacy as a crybaby.

When Bob Costas opened the post-Belmont trophy presentation by asking the owner of Tonalist for reaction to Coburn’s salvo, veteran racing fans in the live audience cringed at the awkwardness of it all.

Coburn’s irrational public anger mirrored that of many fans who found components of the event’s logistics to be frustratingly inept. The worst of it came as people tried to exit the facility. The Long Island Rail Road estimates that more than one-third of the 102,199 in attendance took the train. Those 35-thousand or so who used the rails arrived over a period of about five hours. Problem is, there was no such incremental nature to the flow of those returning home. Thousands flooded the concrete walkway used to funnel riders to the two tracks where departing trains were deployed. Friends of TSR on the walkway describe a scene of panic when word circulated about concerns about the integrity of structure.

Knowing full well the train chaos would play out as it did based on previous experience, my game plan was to use the Q110 bus which got me out of previous madhouses in good order over the years. What foiled that approach this year was the elevated walkway freak-out and ensuing effort by law enforcement to channel train riders into the bus stop lines. At about 900 PM, there was a complete free-for-all in this fenced-in area adjacent to the train tracks. There was no apparent fairness to how people gained access to the buses. It was an every man for himself kinda thing. I witnessed several episodes of extreme disrespect of law enforcement by people desperate to get on a bus or train. One well-dressed guy who sounded like he was from the south got in the face of a Nassau County police officer and carried on and on about Bill de Blasio. “Where’s Bill de Blasio? How did he fuck this up so bad?” The problem with the rant was that de Blasio is the mayor of New York City and a majority of the law enforcement deployed at this event were a combination of Nassau County and LIRR police along with NYRA Peace Officers.

Some of those who saw no immediate chance of leaving via transit started heading for Hempstead Avenue in the hopes of flagging down a taxi. It seemed like a futile endeavor but me and Perl did it anyway. We walked and walked. All the way up to Jamaica Avenue – and then all way the down into the 170’s before Perl finally flagged down a gypsy cab that was already occupied. We stuffed in and the guy took us the final 15 blocks or so to the E train stop at Parsons and Archer.

The bottom line on the transit issues is that people who take the train can’t expect to leave all at once. The single track linkage and associated power limits between Belmont and the main line back to the city constrict swift movement of trains in a big way.

I think greater deployment of buses is the way to go but that would require a shift in mentality for many track visitors who simply rule out that option. Hempstead Avenue over to Jamaica Avenue was devoid of traffic starting just a couple blocks west of the track. You could operate hundreds of buses out of a protected lane on Hempstead in front of the track and steer people over there via a well-fortified path manned by the same police officers unfairly subjected to derision last night. Buses could make the short trip to either the E or F subway lines which both have massive capacity that would swallow up riders in no time.

To me, the larger logistical problem was the track’s inability to serve food and drink as the day wore on. Almost everything was gone about 90 minutes before the feature. I waited in one line only to be told that there was no beer. Hot dogs could be had at that stand only if you didn’t mind it without the bun. The few stands left with cold beer an hour before Chrome’s run had lines a mile long.

The picture above shows what for many was the last known oasis for keeping the buzz alive. A trailer parked on the main level of the grandstand side unloaded cases of Coors Light in sixteen-ounce metal bottles. Fans desperate to wet their whistle were buying them at room temperature for ten bucks per as fast as the army of vendors could carry them away from the truck.

Earlier in the day, the excellent new handicapping and past performance outlet TimeformUS set up a booth on the second floor of the clubhouse to welcome fans who are just starting to discover their product. The respected new public face of TFUS Mike Beer manned the booth after analyzing the day’s card on the in-house NYRA TV program Talking Horses.

Perhaps the finest moment of this Belmont Day came just before Palace Malice won the Met Mile in eye-popping fashion. I met up with lots of old friends who have gathered for horse races over the last two decades. We shared sips of fine bourbon in Belmont’s glorious paddock and reveled in the good fortune of being together.