Pimlico Race Course
After some pre-concert checking at the Virgin Festival website we determined that the easiest way to get to the site was to take the subway to the Rogers station and then catch the shuttle bus. Neither of us had taken the Baltimore subway before so did not know any of the stops. We went online and picked the first station with free car parking which happened to be Mondawmin. Following the directions we went through many seedy areas of town and ended up at the Mondawmin Mall. We parked the car and walked to the metro stop. G was a little uneasy about leaving his car there, but trying to find a different metro stop would have taken us quite a while.
So we took the subway two stops and got off at Rogers Ave. and took the shuttle bus. Once we arrived at Pimlico we could hear Fountains of Wayne playing in the background. Following the hoards we entered and walked over the horse race track before ended up in the center. There were two huge main stages, a few smaller ones, tents galore, lots of port-a-pottys, food vendors, and other booths. We consulted the lineup and planned our strategy. Luckily all the acts we wanted to catch were at the North Stage. We meandered over that way, checking out the booths along the way, and walked at close as we could to the stage. We then laid out our blanket and sat down with everyone else.
The first band we watched was Cheap Trick. Although they have grown quite old, they were still a lot of fun to watch. They played some newer songs along with some oldies such as "Surrender" and "I Want You To Want Me". I do love the 80s.
G then went a grabbed me a slice of pizza and a sausage sandwich for himself. We enjoyed it during the lull before the next artist.
Amy Winehouse then performed. I must say we were not impressed. She sang with no emotion, kinda like she did not want to be there. She also looked very skinny and was missing a tooth. Would not recommend her at all. Then Incubus came on. I enjoyed them, although G was not very impressed. As the crowd was get more rowdy we had to pick up our blanket.
We then started to move forward in the crowd. Once Incubus was complete and people started leaving we made a solid push and ended up right at the rail. Want to preplan to be front row for the final acts even though the heat was more stifling without any breeze. (Found out the heat index was over 100).
We then watch Ben Harper and the Innocent Criminals. They were okay. G liked them more than I did. I felt he was just trying too hard and way too political.
The hoards of people there was insane. G picked me up and I could not see the end of the crowd. It was so cool.
Then it was time for the Beastie Boys. Boy did they rock. They were so much fun to watch and they played many for over an hour. They played "Criminal", "Heart Attack Man", "Sure Shot", "Intergalactic" and Georg's favorite "Sabotage" as the encore. The crowd surfers were fun to watch, although many of the spectators were not drinking enough and had to be pulled out with heat stroke.
Finally, the Police came on. Wow talk about amazing and front row. Sting is so skinny. They played so many of their songs including "Roxanne", "King of Pain", and "Message in a Bottle". The hoards of people there was insane. G picked me up again and I could not see the end of the crowd. It was so cool.
We then walked out with the hoards to catch the shuttle buses. Once there we waited and waited to get on a bus. There was a lot of shoving and pushing. And there were not enough buses. Finally we caught one and made it back to the subway station where we waited for our train. We then head back to the car, which was safe and it was great that G had parked underneath a light. Just felt a little safer. We then drove home making one quick stop at Taco Bell for food and WaWa to use the restroom.
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