Labor Dave Weekend

When my parents dropped off my kids today my Dad said, "You didn't post enough photos to Instagram this weekend."

I laughed out loud. My parents love Instagram. They love seeing what we are all up to via that platform.

But yes, he was right, I didn't post very many photos from our adventure this past weekend to see Dave Matthews again at The Gorge.

No reason other than it was just nice to be there without looking through the lens of my camera. All my photos here are from my iPhone and most are from the road. The drive over there is awesome and an event in and of itself.

With views like these I think you probably get what I mean.

We stayed in Terrace camping again. Gotta love that green grass. This was taken late Thursday afternoon as it was starting to fill up.

We keep trying to get our food packing and planning "just right." We like a mix of eating at our campsite and eating from vendors both in the venue itself and in general camping. We still ended up with too much food returning home in the cooler but we were closer than last year.

Those almonds are insane in case you have never had them before. And olives, yes, always for me.

It really is a simply breathtaking view.

We went with reserved seats again this year - section 203 on Friday night and then Saturday and Sunday in section 103. Those 103 seats ended up being fantastic - right behind the pit.

Last year I bought a trucker hat. This year I bought this one - which proved to be perfect as the temperatures were significantly cooler than in past years.

When we go to The Gorge we go to see three nights of Dave Matthews (he sings different songs every night). This year his openers were Gregory Alan Isakov (loved him - similar to Ray LaMontagne) and Edward Sharpe And The Magnetic Zeros. We saw Edward Sharpe here a few years ago for Sasquatch so it was cool to watch him again as his band has evolved - they did a lot more "jamming" and a lot less of playing straight off their albums. Aaron loved it and I loved just watching Alex (the lead guy) basically orchestrate the whole thing.

People always ask why I'd want to go see Dave three nights in a row. Because it's rad, that's why. I'm sure for me it has a lot to do with Aaron and his passion for the music, but one of the big things I've learned over the last couple years of coming to these shows is an appreciation for the musicality of the performance. I love watching how all the members of the band communicate with each other and I love it when they play my favorites (Stay Or Leave, Loving Wings, Crush). There's always a pretty fun guessing game going on trying to anticipate what the next song will be and the next one after that. It's just fun.

PHOTOS I DIDN'T TAKE

• Sitting under a sun shade reading Rising Strong on Sunday while Aaron played his guitar. I interrupted him multiple times to read parts and passages out loud.

• The craziness of the wind on Saturday afternoon and evening - tents so close to falling down, etc. I was so glad I brought my big coat. It was definitely fall vs. summer over there this past weekend.

• Stopping at Burgerville on the way there and the way back. If you've ever been there you know why.

• More of Dave/the concert. You can't take DSLR cameras into the venue so it's all iPhone which are okay, but not awesome. And also I was just having fun dancing and singing. But I do have a fantasy of being a music photographer.

Check out past posts about seeing Dave here: 2014