The trip to Seattle, p2

Started the day at a coffee shop in J's neighborhood called Soho.
Cute local place that started the day off right for me.

Reason #1: Radiohead on the Pandora every third or fourth song
Reason #2: Free wifi
Reason #3: Great coffee and egg, cheese and tomato english muffin

Everybody in the place seemed friendly and talkative, but not overly so. I'm wondering if it's the way people are here or if it's just that I seem more open and friendly to people since I'm on vacation and a bunch of my social walls get broken down when I'm traveling.
It could be because of the goofy grin on my face since I'm still in shock about being in Seattle.

I double check directions and leave Soho around 11, texting some people I'm supposed to meet up with.

I am completely unprepared for the total effing gorgeousness that I will see on the way from Seattle to The Gorge.
Water, sky, bridges, rocks, trees, flowers, snow-capped mountains, streams, farms, rolling hills.
EVERYTHING is so clear and beautiful. I'm taking tons of pictures and trying to drive at the same time. (I know, BAD BAD)
But I can't help it. I have never seen anything like this. I start to get a headache from changing focus so much. I can't stop looking around! I want to soak it all in. I am seeing the source of countless stock photography shots that I've used in marketing materials. And there really is no photoshop needed. These colors and textures....wow, speechless.

Once I get to the site, the traffic is pretty sparse since it's late in the day. I drive into the day parking lot, without having to pay? Ok, cool.

I get out of my car and it's pretty hot by this time so I grab my sunscreen and my bag and head off to find a ticket. I hear other people all around asking for tickets too, so I'm thinking this might not be as easy as I thought.
I walk up to the front gate, expecting to see people with stacks of tickets like at every other festival I've been to...but no. These scalpers are slick. They have signs saying THEY need tickets. It takes me a while to spot them because they look like people that are actually trying to attend the festival.

While I'm waiting around up front, I meet Tasha, a graphic designer from Portland who's there with her boyfriend, also trying to buy tickets.
A scalper offers to sell us his ticket for 175. Holy crap. No way.
Another one later in the day offers his for 150. At some point I hear 120. What the hell?
I'd rather just drive back to the river and hang out in nature...or chill at the gate for a bit and hear some of the bands for free.
I finally tell myself I'm okay with paying 100. So I tell some of the scalpers that, and they laugh at me and say that's what they paid. They have a system down and I'm finally figuring this out. They are shuttling each other back and forth from the entrance to parking down to the entrance for the show. I actually see a scalper buy a ticket from a girl for 100...he was agressive so I couldn't ask her first...and then in 10 seconds resell it to another person for 120. And he knew I'd been trying to actually get into the festival for about 2 hours at this point.

I started to get a little more aggressive and actually ask the people passing me if they have extra tickets. A girl walks by and says she might...but wait and she'd let me know. I figured she was just being polite.
She comes back from will call and doesn't have them, but she tells me good luck.

About 30 minutes later, I decide to give it one last try back out at the entrance to parking so I walk the half mile back up there and start asking people on the way. No luck. I walk down the row of cars arriving asking if people have extras they want to sell. It's humiliating doing this, but most people are pretty nice.

About the 5th car back, there are 4 girls in an SUV. And one of them is the girl I talked to before. She tells me they're going BACK up to will call to get their tickets and that if it's successful, I can get it. Awesome!
They ask me if I'd like to ride with them back up to the gate. Holy crap yes.

They are super friendly and offer me some goldfish and ask me how my day has gone. I tell them I'm about to just wander by the river instead of pay a fucking scalper 175 for a ticket. I'm hot and tired. And sad that people are so selfish and can keep actual fans of the music from attending a show just so they can make more money.

We get back to will call and hop out. One of the girls offers me a PBR. We get to talking about where we're from. The driver tells me she lived back east for a while. And works in the record industry. And knows people in DC and a girl in Richmond....who might be dating my friend?!?!? Such a small world.

Ticket girl gets back with 2 comps and I offer to buy one for 80 (the last ticket sales prices were 79) but am fully prepared to pay 100. The scalpers are following her and yelling in her ear that they'll pay 100 and 120 for her tickets. Driver girl and ticket girl look at each other. And driver girl says, "I really want this girl to have this ticket." So I think, sweet! At least I'll get first dibs at buying it.

But then they say, "yeah, thanks, but we'd like you to HAVE this ticket. We'll sell the other one to the scalper guy."

Holy.

Fucking.

Shit.

These girls have made my day. And have turned out to be some amazing people. Even before they gave me the ticket, they were taking care of me. But with the ticket. Whoa. I tell them how thankful I am and how much I appreciate what they've done. I'm still in shock, actually. Such kindness when they could've just made money.

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So I get to see:

Animal Collective (for a few songs)
Sun Kil Moon (in passing)
Ra Ra Riot (awesome)
Mos Def (crappy start, but strong finish)
Bon Iver (words can't describe)
Kings of Leon (also awesome)

And the Bon Iver show was worth it alone.

I head back to Seattle at 11:30 and drive around the city with bad directions from 2:30 to around 4:00.
But finally find my friend. He's hanging out with some peeps, celebrating a birthday.
And we make a 4am grocery run.
Yeah, they have 24-hour grocery stores here.

Get back to the friend's house and I crash on the floor as they make food.
It's the best sleep I've had in a while and Justin Vernon sings to me again in my dream.