Thank You Bruins!

On behalf of our UCLA/ND Planning Committee, and the entire Chicago Bruin family, we'd like to thank you ALL for making this past weekend one to remember. We enjoyed being your host and showcasing the best that Chicago has to offer.

We had fun sharing laughs at Second City, taking in the beauty of our city on the river cruise, doing an 8-clap at Joe's Bee Bop Cafe, and the bus ride to/from Notre Dame. We were thrilled that our UCLA Scarves were a BIG HIT! For those of you who were unable to buy one, or would like to buy more, they will continue to be available exclusively on our web-site at http://www.chicagobruins.com/ . They make great gifts for the holidays.

An e-mail asking for your feedback, stories, and photos will be sent out within a few days to all that participated in our events. We hope you will share with us what made your visit to Chicago and Notre Dame special....

Despite the loss....there is always next year when the re-match takes place at the ROSE BOWL!

SOLD OUT !!!

Our two pre-game ticketed events, Second City on Thursday night, and the Boat Cruise on Friday afternoon, are SOLD OUT!!! Confimation e-mails with details on the events have been sent out. As a courtesy to all your fellow Bruins, please arrive on time and ready to have fun. See you there....

Bus Option... involving Domers

Victory Liquors, a new ND bar at 2610 N. Halsted in Lincoln Park, charters 3 buses to South Bend for every home game.

Victory Liquors Information

If you were not able to get a seat on the Chicago Bruins bus, we present another bus option. For $65, your bus fare includes a bloody mary bar, bagels, beer and a tailgate upon arrival to South Bend. Oh, yeah, and a bunch of hard core ND fans. They have 25 seats left. If you are interested, please email Mike at info@dillongp.com or call his cell at (773) 255 7864. Their buses will depart between 7-730am on Saturday.

Shirts and scarves are in the mail!

All shirts (with the exception of XXLs) and scarves are in the mail! Check your mailbox as they should be arriving within the next day or two. Don't forget to bring your scarf because it's COLD out here!! XXL shirts will either be picked up in Chicago or mailed separately. GO BRUINS!

GOT SCARF?

It's sad but true. It was snowing in downtown Chicago this morning! The freakisly cold, abnormal and record-breaking temps were not isolated to the upper great lakes...

Now for the good news. We will be up towards the 60s by this weekend. And, if you didn't purchase a scarf, we will have them on sale at our Pregame Party (and our check-in for buses if we don't sell out on Friday). A box of these handsome numbers was recently purchased by the Spirit Squad. Look for our table at Joe's Bebop Cafe.

Bruin Bash/Tailgates

Just confirmed again. No Bruin Bash tickets are available, Fan Travel is sold out. If you purchased your tickets through the school, they are included in your package. Our club is not organizing a tailgate. We have our hands full with our buses and other weekend activities. One guy in our group recommended finding others at Bruinville.com if you wish to organize one on your own. Sorry we can't manage that on top of everything else.

Second City and Boat Tour

We will send a note to folks who will be attending either event. However, no physical tickets will be mailed. Folks who will be attending the Second City event are asked to arrive at the theater by 715pm where tickets will be handed out. Please look for the blue and yellow balloons. Since our boat will not open to the public, we are keeping a list of names for everyone who purchased a seat. We look forward to seeing you at these events that will showcase our great city.

MP Parking

Some of our bus passengers will be staying with friends and family outside of downtown. If you are driving to Millennium Park (most of us will be cabbing it), the link below has information on parking:

http://millenniumpark.org/generalinformation/directions_parking.html

I just called the lot. The garage is open 24 hours, and fare for 14 hours (I was told) would be $16. That is outraegously cheap for downtown Chicago parking!

Bus Confirmations

Bus confirmations have been emailed. If you purchased a bus seat, please make sure you received the confirmation email w/ check-in instructions--and that it didn't get stuck in a spam or junk mail folder. NO bus exchanges or refunds will be given at this point. Feel free to email ucla_chicago@yahoo.com if you did not receive a confirmation for your purchase. We look forward to seeing you in Chicago and getting you to South Bend.

Merchandise Update!

The majority of remaining shirts and all scarves purchased to date will be mailed next Wednesday. We would have liked to have mailed everything out earlier, and we apologize that vendor delays have not permitted us to do so! And now for the bad news... there are additional delays with XXL. A member of our planning committee will send a note to all the folks who purchased this size. If you will not be riding our chartered bus to South Bend, we will unfortunately have to eat the cost of sending these overnight to ensure you have them for the game. The JanSport shirts are great quality. But we certainly did not anticipate a series of delays like this. Thank you for your purchase and your continued patience.

Millennium Park bus departure

For those who purchased a bus seat, we will send official confirmation emails by the end of next week with check-in information and details. PLEASE NOTE: OUR BUSES ARE DEPARTING FROM MILLENNIUM PARK!

http://millenniumpark.org/

If you had already planned on checking out this beautiful urban park, you are in luck. Millennium Park is conveniently located near the Loop off of Michigan Avenue. Navy Pier was unfortunately difficult to work with. And despite UCLA bringing them business, they said the cost would be $10,000 for us to stage check-in there. That's a bit steep for a club with no financial support. We think Millennium Park is a better location-and more appealing visually. We apologize if you have to greatly alter your game day arrangements because of this. Stay tuned for more details.

Bus Passenger List Finalized

Sadly, our group cannot accommodate the overwhelming demand for seats. We have just finalized the passenger list for all of our chartered buses, and we are not taking any additional names from the wait list. We are sorry to turn away any Bruins. We recommend renting a car and making the 2-hour drive.

Alternatively, United Limo (http://www.coachusa.com/tristateunitedlimo/) operates a bus service from both Chicago Airports (O'Hare and Midway) with daily service to South Bend. We are unsure if they have seats available for the 21st, but it's worth looking into.

T-shirt Delays....

Unfortunately, JanSport ran out of one of the sizes. What does this mean? Only half of our first order will come in soon. The rest of the shirts (this will cover all remaning orders) will not delivered to us until 10/9 or so. Our club will pick up the cost of postage and mail them out in time for game day. We apologize for the delays, but this is beyond our control. We have ordered additional shirts to be sold ND weekend.

Our Seats are in...

Sections 114-119, confirmed with school this a.m. Good luck to the folks who are trying to find tickets on their own close to the UCLA section.

Architectural Tour - ALL UCLA Boat!

There are several companies that operate tours along the river, but the ones done by the Chicago Architectural Foundation are the best with their extremely knowledgeable docents. We forgot to mention on our site that this is an all UCLA tour, Bruins only!

TWO-sided scarf

A couple of people were confused about our scarf... There is only ONE style that has a different design on each side. Pretty neat, right? Many folks who are not coming out to ND are buying them, so don't delay. Purchase one for yourself and one as a gift today.

We are LIVE!

I am pleased to announce that the chicagobruins.com site is live. Thank you again for your patience. We are still tweaking domain redirection w/ chicagobruins.org, but we are open for business. We look forward to seeing you in Chicago...

The buses and events have been organized by dedicated volunteers to host the many fans who are not a part of Fan Travel. The club receives no financial support from the university. Please support us by picking up a scarf and/or T-shirt with your bus fare.

GO BRUINS! From your ND planning committee

Where are our seats?

Well...

your guess is as good as ours. Not even the mighty Athletic Department knows where we're sitting! We won't know until we get our hot little hands on the actual tickets late summer. The only thing for certain - we know we're in the end zone.

We'll post updates as we get them, but you'll probably have your tickets by then!

Notre Dame Weekend FAQ

ND Weekend: FAQ and Site ETA

Hi everyone! We have been overwhelmed by the response from our board postings. We hope to have our website up by the end of next week. Since we are all busy volunteers, we are trying to respond back to everyone who has emailed us. To help answer all the questions, we would like to address the most commonly asked questions about the UCLA-ND weekend. We thank you for your continued patience, as we want to do the best job possible.

Why isn’t your website up?

There are several reasons for the website delay. The task was overwhelming for the assigned parties, and we started late in the game. We could slap something up fast, but we want an attractive site for several reasons. An attractive, professional site will help us attract in-kind donors, advertisement dollars and monetary donations. These are all things we desperately need, as out-of-state clubs do not receive financial support from campus. The folks who are building the site are professional art directors and web designers who also want to do it right.

Does the club know how to get tickets?

The club only received a small allotment of tickets, and we do not have any more available. In the event one of our members cannot use his or her tickets, we have a wait list for Chicago members. Here are sites we know of (not affiliated with either school or the club) that are selling tickets online:

StubHub
TonysTickets
GreatSeats
TheTicketProfessionals

You may also want to check Craigslist and Ebay.

Can you recommend a hotel?

Unfortunately, the weekend of the game falls on the same one as the Chicago Marathon, and many of the area hotels will be sold out. We don’t have any special connections or “hookups” for hotels. All of our planned events will be downtown, but we are hearing the rates are high. We urge everyone to make plans now! We recommend checking out hotwire.com or priceline.com, as they generally have lower rates than other Internet search engines.

What events do you have planned?

Right now, we are looking at a variety of fun and exciting events for the weekend. These include:
- a night at the legendary Second City improv comedy club on Thursday night
- the famous Chicago River Architecture Cruise on Friday afternoon
- a rocking Pregame Party at Joe’s BeBop Café on Navy Pier on Friday night
(just like Damon’s in Birmingham, only better)
- and a Postgame Gathering downtown after the game.

Will you be arranging transportation to South Bend?

The club is indeed organizing roundtrip luxury motorcoach transportation due to the high demand. The estimated departure time will be 8 am from Navy Pier. Exact details and bus assignments will be coming soon.

How much will it cost?

We are negotiating with several bus companies. The seats (with champagne continental breakfast and snacks on the return) will not exceed $50, but we will not know the exact amount until a contract is signed.

How long is the drive?

By car, it is a 90-minute drive to South Bend from downtown Chicago. We are estimating 2 hours due to potential construction delays and traffic.

Do I need to rent a car in Chicago?

No! You are certainly welcome to, of course, but Chicago is a very easy town to get around without a car. The Chicago Transit Authority is one of the best public transit systems in the world, and can easily get you from O’Hare or Midway to downtown with minimal hassle. Cabs are available at all hours of the day and night. Plus, parking at downtown hotels can cost up to $35-40 per night. Combine all that with the Chicago Bruins bus transportation to the game - why bother with a car rental?

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Thank you for your continued patience as we finalize details and launch our site. Please contact us at ucla_chicago@yahoo.com if you have an ND question that requires an immediate response. The ND Planning Committee is looking forward to hosting you. Have a great weekend!