My whole woodstock 94 experience was fantastic. My sister and brother scored tickets in exchange for working in this dude's booth set up outside the venue. People laughed at the dude cuz he was selling wool sweaters at a summer festival, but he cleaned up when temps dropped down to the 30's overnight. He sold outta sweaters that weekend!!!
I dropped the balls on signing up to work for a ticket. I decided to go anyway and take my chances. We also heard tales of ticket checks at toll booths and police dogs and whatnot. We ended up being parked in the Black Lot about 10 miles away from the site. That was the first lucky thing that happened. Some folks were parked and shuttled in from near Albany. We later found out that the "black lot" was a last minute created lot that was on no map or diagram. Cops were stationed at the entrance of the lot and we were told we must wait for a shuttle......but no shuttle came. Again and again we tried to get past the cops but each time our escape was usurped. Each time we went to storm the gate, our group got larger and larger. Finally we went again, ready to hive those cops hell only to find that they had abandoned their post. It was dark and late and off we went, carrying/dragging all our stuff. We got about 3 miles, at least 10 shuttles pasted us when we came across a cop on the side if the road. We asked him how far we had to go and he told us 8 miles. We were so disillusioned because we saw the lights and heard Collective Soul playing. As we talked to the cop about the elusive "black lot" another shuttle was coming down the road. The cop flagged the bus to a stop and told the driver to let us on. The driver argued with the cops, saying under no circumstances was he to let us on. Then the cop said, "let them on or I will place you under arrest.". That was all it took, we were on!!
I was freaking out. My brother and sister were all set, tickets in hand. What was going to happen to me??? How was I going to get through the gates, the search, get into the camp ground?? How? Get on an employee shuttle, that's how!!! The shuttle pulled us right in to the staffing area. By this time it was like 3am. When we got off the bus we were told to set up our tents in this gravel lot.
we woke up the next morning to a little tent city around us. My sister and I decided to start the morning with a bowl of, uh, salad when someone started unzipping our tent door. It was a cop....SHIT!!! I immediately apologized as a knee-jerk reaction. The cop could care less. He told us we couldn't camp there cuz it was a bus loop. Then he proceded to tell us to go up the road, make a right and that there was a hole in the fence and we could camp up on the hill. Wow!! Thanks officer
There were mud people before the rain fell. Not me. I was glad to NOT be covered in mud by the end of the show. When the rain did come, we were all set up on our little hill.
The locals were phenomenal. I was fed, people let me use their bathrooms and gave us tips all weekend.
The music was great. Saturday I opted to stick to the South Stage. I saw
The Cranberries
Youssou N'Dour
The Band featuring Hot Tuna, Bruce Hornsby, Roger McGuinn, Rob Wasserman, and Bob Weir
Primus featuring Jerry Cantrell
Salt n Pepa closed out the South stage for the night. Midway through their set I trekked over to the North stage and caught most of NIN, metallica and most of aerosmith.
Sunday was north stage day. it was a truly awesome day!!
Like I said earlier, primus stole the show for me. During My Name Is Mud, Les Claypool informed the mud-slingers, "You know, when you throw things on stage, it's a sign of small and insignificant genitalia."
The mud-slinging came to an immediate halt.
We even lucked out leaving. Being the the black lot was a last minute addition, no one knew exactly where it was. One of the locals drove the 3 of us around looking for it and only took $20 from us.
Magical weekend. Writing this story put the hugest grin on my face. Thanks
