Archive Sunday #71
Added 2024-10-20 16:00:17 +0000 UTCThe next day after the Hollywood Bowl show with Death Cab, we caught a flight to Porto with a couple hour layover in Paris. The Paris airport is beautiful, but kinda uncomfortable when you have to spend an extended amount of time there. I remember we couldn't find a spot to sit anywhere in our connection terminal, so we eventually gave up and settled on the floor. The terminal had this impressive glass ceiling, but in the summer heat it kinda turned the place into a greenhouse. Needless to say we were sweating pretty bad, and the next flight to Porto couldn't come soon enough haha.
Luckily we had the next day off to adjust to the new time zone. It was also Emily's birthday, so we all walked out towards the river district to explore in the beautiful sunny weather. I remember we ran into a bunch of kids by the tall bridge there that were taking donations for their fearless friends taking turns jumping the 30 or so feet into the water. Our sound guy John figured he'd skip the middle men and decided to make the jump himself. The kids seemed surprised by the adult joining in, but when he made the plunge everyone cheered haha.
We grabbed some food pretty close to the river and sampled the local Super Bock beer made nearby. Then we wandered a few miles or so mostly just to prevent anyone from falling asleep too early from the jet lag. I remember being enamored by the beautiful tiles on the outside of the old buildings. Once we made it halfway back we stopped at a tiny gelato shop to grab something sweet. It turned out to be a really nice day.
The next day we took a van out to Praia Fluvial do Taboão out in the hilly countryside in the north near Spain to play Paredes de Coura. It seemed pretty far from any major town or cities, so I'm sure most be attending camped out for the weekend. I remember walking around this pristine river with an arch bridge on our way to the stage. After we set up we went to a nearby school to grab some catering, and I remember it seeming surprisingly nice for such and isolated area. After that we watched a bit of Alvvays and Khruangbin before getting ready. We were super excited because it was one of those few opportunities we got to play an evening set at a big festival. There was this huge hill that sloped down towards the stage, and it made the view from the stage utterly awesome as we could see the faces of the crowd for as far as we could see. I remember closing the set with Beach Life and the crowd went so crazy that I wished we had an encore haha. But pretty soon after we finished we had to grab a shuttle back to the city, so unfortunately we couldn't catch much of New Order's set.
The next day we took a flight to Cardiff to make our way towards Brecon Beacons National Park in Wales. My brother who was living in Cambridge at the time, met us at the airport to drive us around through the countryside because we never quite trust ourselves driving on the left haha. It turned out to be for the best because there were a bunch of narrow country roads along the way with the occasional slow tractor we got stuck behind. I also remember finding a pretty cheap Nord drum around the area on ebay shortly before we arrived, so my brother was nice enough to bring that with him too haha.
Wales was super charming with these flat-topped mountains overlooking the lush countryside. We got to the Green Man festival in the afternoon, so we didn't have too much time to explore. But from what we did see, it seemed to kinda have a Glastonbury-like vibe with a focus on community and sustainability. I remember Will decided to throw in a cover of Stevie Wonder's Superstition but kinda more of the version Jeff Beck did into the set. It was a fun night, plus we got to catch some of The Comet is Coming right after us who put on a great show.
The next morning we all caught a flight to Amsterdam to head back home. Emily and I decided earlier to use the opportunity to spend another week or so in Europe, so we said our goodbyes there at the airport as the rest of the group headed back to Seattle. From there we explored The Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, and Denmark by taking trains and staying at hostels and air bnbs by the town centers. It was a ton of fun, and made me realize how much we miss by mostly visiting these places on tour on a pretty strict schedule. It's pretty rare that we get the chance to book a short tour like this with only a few shows, so I'm super thankful we got to take this trip together!
