US Open: Day 2

For the second day of my visit to the US Open this year, I took a gamble and grabbed seats to Arthur Ashe Stadium. Katie agreed to come along with me for the day, and she did well with a day of tennis, as a non-sports fan!

When we got there we took in the sights from the walk into the Flushing Meadow complex from the South Gate, before checking out some play on the bigger Court 17, as we kept our eye on the scores on the big stadium. Once the first match looked like wrapping up, we made our way into the infamous bowl of seating, to catch Andy Roddick.

During the warm-up I climbed to the top of the Promenade section so I could take in the full view - you can see Manhattan from those seats! It must look amazing at night!

The A-Rod, who later that week announced his retirement and that this would be his last tournament, played young American Rhyne Williams, and won in comfortable 3 sets.

With the end of this match, we took a much needed shade break within the South Plaza area, before managing to time our shift perfectly to score front row seats in the shade for Marcos Baghdatis' game.

Struggling to a set all, Katie and I then left this court, had some silly and fun photos taken with the Fan Wall, before scoring seats at the mini-grandstand at Court 13.

Aussie Bernard Tomic started his US Open out here by dropping the first set, and then clawing his way back to a 4-set win well into the evening and under the lights of night. As we cheered him on, we could not help but be captivated by the sight of Pat Rafter courtside. Getting a photo with him at the end of the match may well have been the highlight of my trip away! Ha!

I loved the excitement of being at the event that I have watched from home for so many years, and be able to soak it all in across these two days, while comparing the ways and differences to the other 3 Grand Slams.