My Nightmare At The Epicenter Festival (Never Again)

WHAT WAS THAT...

I can honestly say...in all my vacations I've had in my life, I don't recall a 'bad' vacation. This really was...a bad vacation. I'm someone who tries to find the good things. We met some of our friends on the way down....in Kentucky. That was awesome. But the festival was a nightmare.

WHAT HAPPENED

Friday....We arrived in North Carolina in the early afternoon. We went to the hotel. The staff was awesome...the room was awesome. The ease of getting our wristbands, and VIP passes...all incredible.

The boys showered and we got in the car about 6:16 pm and headed to the event, hoping to see some of the headliners in the evening. Unfortunately, we sat 1.2 miles away from the event in event traffic until 10:15 pm. We were still NO closer to getting in. We just turned around and got back to the hotel about 11:30 pm.

SATURDAY: NEW PLAN

Saturday, we decided we would get to the event before it even opened. No traffic at 9 am.  I dropped the boys off at the event. I went back to the hotel to make a plan with Tanner to go to a movie. We went to the movie at 5:45pm. At 5:46pm I get a panic text from my sons that they were being kicked out of the festival due to safety concerns because of a tornado WARNING!  None of the VIP people had a campground or vehicle to go back to. They just kicked all of the VIPS out of the event and let them fend for themselves against the elements. I left Tanner at the theater and proceeded to get stuck in another traffic jam trying to reach my stranded kids. I eventually abandoned my vehicle at a standstill in traffic and walked up to the event to find my children. I walked back to my vehicle. No worries. No one moved an inch in the time that I was gone.

I found a hole in the orange road cones and turned around, and after several detours found a roundabout way back to the hotel; because I Didn't follow the rules. I left to pick up the boys at 5:50 and had them back at the hotel at 8.

I drove back to the movie theater to watch the last 40 minutes of the movie. EXCEPT: The movie just shut off.  All the theaters went down. They rebooted everything and 10 minutes later, our movie came back on...and guess what...it went down again 30 seconds later. They turned the lights on and ironically...we didn't get to see the end to END GAMES. LOL.

We proceeded to eat our sorrows away, and watch episodes of Game Of Thrones until 3 am.

SUNDAY

Sunday fun day...We were watching online. Same story day 3 of Epicenter. Traffic nightmares. My kids decided that it wasn't worth the 4 hour wait at the end of the night, to be stuck in traffic and then have to road trip it back to Minnesota for another 22 hours straight. We just slept and ate on Sunday.

HIGHLIGHTS OF THE TRIP

The good parts of this trip?

•  Driving all the way there and back was awesome. Just a couple traffic delays.
•  The best part was visiting with friends in Kentucky on our way to North Carolina.
•  I have to say...the hotel we stayed in was awesome, and the staff was great.
•  We enjoyed the great fun staff and food at Waffle House. Kind and funny locals, and great food.
• Eating at COOK OUT...a local southerny milk shake and burger joint that reminds me of the past. AWESOME food.

TO TOP IT OFF

Once we drove 22 hours straight back from North Carolina to St. Cloud, Minnesota, Drew realized his wallet was missing. That was the straw that broke the camels back. We called the bank and reported his bank card lost. We started to head to the Licensing center to get a new license and luckily, he found his wallet after 2 hours of cancelling everything in it. OMG!

I don't want to talk about it anymore. Next time we go on a trip, it will not involve a music festival. End of story.  I have no pictures except one of Drew and Mason sunburnt beyond recognition. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.