ACL

The Austin City Limits Music Festival, or ACL, is a three day music festival put on in Zilker Park, just outside of downtown Austin. The festival started in 2002 and has been held every year since. This was the first year that the festival was held in October. I had not heard of the festival until this year. Deborah, one of Courtney's college roommates who still lives in Austin, expressed an interest in going to this year's ACL. Courtney and Mike decided to go and invited Jen and I. We purchased our tickets and made our hotel reservations. Jen and I only had tickets to Saturday and Sunday while the others had the three day passes. Previously I shared our Thursday and Friday adventures  along with pictures from the event. What follows is a recap of our Saturday and Sunday in Austin.

We met everyone over at Deborah and James' house a little before noon. James took their two kids to the Natural Bridge Caverns and we decided to have lunch at Texadelphia. After ordering our food, I tried to pay with my debit card, only to find out that I did not have it with me. The last time I remembered using it was the night before at Perry's Steakhouse. I called the steakhouse and spoke with a manager. He stated that it had not been found, but he took my information and would let me know if it showed up. I immediately checked my account through the iPhone and the card had not been used. That was a good sign that the card was lost, and not stolen. After eating great cheese-steaks at Texadelphia, we left and went back to the hotel to see if the card was in my jeans from the night before. We searched the room and did not find the card. I decided to wait a little while to cancel the card in the hope that it would show up at Perry's. We went back to Deborah's house and watched some college football.  

Quick side note, the Georgia vs LSU game had a crazy finish that was heavily influenced by the referees. A Georgia wide receiver made a great play and scored the go ahead touchdown in the final minute of the game. He then did what just about anyone would do in that situation, he jumped up and down with his teammates in celebration. The referees threw a flag and penalized the Bulldogs 15 yards on the ensuing kickoff. That meant that they had to kick from their 15 yard line. LSU returned the kick to Georgia's 45 yard line. Then two plays later they were in the end zone celebrating their go ahead touchdown, and another flag was thrown for the same thing. At least they were consistent. It is crazy to expect these athletes to just put the ball down and run to the sideline. I want to see them celebrate. I do not want to watch a robot. I want to see their personalities come out. 

Back to ACL. Due to the weather, we contemplated not going on Saturday. We decided that we had enough rain ponchos and other foul weather gear and headed out. Mike stayed behind because he was not feeling well. To avoid taking a shuttle, Deborah found a parking space via Craig's List. It seems that people that live close to Zilker Park will rent out their driveways to festival goers. We paid $20 a day to park in a driveway. Then we walked to the festival. I would guess it was about 2 miles from the driveway to the festival entrance. We got our daily exercise out of the way. As soon as we walked in the gates, it started to rain. Raincoats and ponchos were put on and we started slogging through the mud to the main stage area which was on the opposite side of the park. The Dave Matthew's Band came on at 8 and put on a good show. It actually stopped raining for the show which was nice. We stayed for most of the show. After packing up our chairs and picking up everything else that we brought, we trekked back to the car. Our shoes and lower legs were covered in mud and we cleaned up as best we could before getting into the Infiniti. 

Sunday went much like Saturday. We ate at Waterloo Icehouse and watched the early NFL games. By 4, it had stopped raining, and we drove back to our rented driveway. After the hike to the festival entrance we were met with worse conditions than the day before. The  mud was horrendous. Every step was an adventure. If you were not slipping, you were worried that your shoe was going to get sucked off of your foot as you tried to pick it up. I was amazed that none of us fell that day. We found a good spot on some semi-grass-mostly-mud and set up camp. Mike and I left the girls and found the TV tent. They were showing the Cowboys vs Broncos game. That was fun except for the outcome of the game. After the game, we texted the girls and got their food order. We quickly picked up BBQ sandwiches and then stood in live for 45 minutes at Children of the Kettle Corn. There we purchased a large bag of the best kettle corn popcorn that you will ever have. I said it was like giving crack to children as I was eating it. It was hard to put the bag down, but I managed. While in line, Mike was treated to a squirrel completely covered in mud running around in the lines. Only at ACL.  

Pearl Jam came on at 8 and put on a great show. They sounded great and played a good mix of old and new songs. This was my first time to see them live and they lived up to the hype. After the show and the journey with thousands of others out of the park and across the Town Lake Bridge, we again tried to clean up a little before getting back in the car. Back at Deborah's house, we took out the hose and sprayed down our mud covered shoes. Jen and I brought them back to our house to attempt to save them with the washing machine. 

We made it back home safely Monday morning. Thank you to Jim and Cathy for watching the kids. Thank you to Rob and Pam for taking care of Austin on Thursday and Sunday. The Perry's Steakhouse manager did call and they found the debit card. I had already cancelled it, but at least I knew what happened to the card. 

The picture was taken from the footbridge on the way back to the car on Sunday.