Bluesfest - Rush

Had a good time at Bluesfest this year.

Alexis and I went to two nights this year.  We had reserved seats for Rush and then the general admission ticket for the night "LP" was playing.

After seeing Rush in Hamilton only two nights before I was worried that I wouldn't enjoy this show as much.  My previous Bluesfest experience had not always been positive because of the festival crowds and focus.  I hoped that buying the reserved seats would fix this.  Good news, it did.

I ordered the tickets as soon as then went on stage and was lucky and got front row.  Now front row at Bluesfest is way off to the side and still a ways back from the stage.  Still very good seats.

I had just taken the morning train back from Toronto as had a few hours to rest and relax before the show.  We headed down to the site hoping to get a good place to park.  No luck.  Finally in frustration I decided to just "Drive West" until we found a transitway stop with some street parking.   I found a sidestreet near Tunney's that had lots of parking and a quick walk to the Transitway.   A short bus ride and we were on site.
I figured we could always take a car back to the show if the bus was too crowded.

We arrived at the festival and lined up to get a beer.  I then found out that Rush would be playing a shorter "festival show"... Hmm I wonder what that meant?

We decided to go see what our seats were like.  When you enter the reserved section they are very nice to you.  They explain all the services available and give you a special wristband so you don't have to show your ticket again to enter.  We then walked to our seats. There were only 4 seats in the first row and the other two people were already there.

With time to kill we went to the smaller main stage and watched "The Specials" for a while.

At about 15 minutes before Rush was scheduled we went back to our seats.  I recognized a few of my friends in the reserved section and chatted it up.  Before the show I asked Alexis if she wanted anything to drink, so I went to buy some water.  The lineup was only about 7 deep and there were 3 servers.   I was out in no time.

The show started and we both had a great time enjoying the music.

The show was great.  They played about 21 songs with no intermission vs 28 songs and an intermission in Hamilton.  Still a great night.

We left the venue and joined the sea of humanity walking up Booth Street.   I was looking for cabs but couldn't see any.  We walked to the transitway and empty buses were lined up accepting passengers.  Since we were only going 2 stops it didn't matter which bus we got on.  We just walked on the next filling bus and in a few minutes we were on our way.  Much easier than parking near the site.