we went to virginia one weekend in the fall.

Only a week after the Texan adventures in Austin, Jules and I went to Richmond, Virginia for the music festival United Blood. Friday morning started before the sun even came up, we had to wake up at 5am to make it to La Guardia airport in time for our 9am flight. Not many people must want to go to Richmond early on a Friday because our plane was one of those tiny two-engine contraptions that only seat about 20 people. I’m pretty sure I spent the majority of the flight thinking I was never going to touch firm ground again!

We're hereeeeeeee

After a short flight we made it to Richmond and we were greeted by the prospect of no phone reception and no Starbucks. Instead, all there was Caribou Coffee, where they apparently don’t know what a Soy Chai Latte is. Oh well, the lady got it right on the third try.

Apart from those little interuptions, we got to our hotel nice and easy thanks to a very helpful cabbie, who took us on the scenic route through downtown Richmond and past all the pretty buildings and the Edgar Allan Poe Museum. The best surprise of the day though occurred when we got to our hotel room and discovered it was a suite, not a normal room! I swear the bathroom in the suite was bigger than my bedroom in Brooklyn, – having a living room, a huge bathroom and a huge bedroom was a bit of a luxury, even if it was only for the weekend.

Welcome to our living room

The hotel suite bigger than my apartment in Brooklyn..

The view from out our window

After we got settled into our room and unpacked we went for a walk to a local cafe and saw some of the sights along the way. Richmond is a really old city so there’s lots of super old buildings with pretty architecture, it gives off a feeling of ‘Old America’. We stopped at two thrift stores as well and I got a cute blue and aqua long sleeved mini dress as well as a 1960’s floral dress for less than $30 altogether.

I felt a bit like Little Red Riding Hood, but with a blue coat instead

We learnt the hard way that cabs are really unreliable in Richmond if you’re not getting picked up from the airport (we spent an hour waiting in the cold drizzle for a cab we’d called but never came) but finally made it to the venue Alley Katz for the first day of United Blood. The line-up for the show was pretty much amazing:

Friday (Doors at 3PM)
Alpha and Omega
Backtrack
Cruel Hand
Death Threat
Donnybrook
Dryspell
Mother of Mercy
Paint it Black
Title Fight
True Colors
War Hungry
Swamp Thing

Saturday (Doors at 1PM)
Blacklisted
Bracewar
Cold World
Concrete Reality
Fire & Ice
Foundation
Free Spirit
Harms Way
Madball
Maximum Penalty
Mind Eraser
Naysayer
Rival Mob
Steel Nation
Wasted Time

One of the early bands on Friday

More music.

The view from above

Cruel Hand

This was right before the DJ dropped Miley Cyrus and we lost it!

The next morning we got up early and went for breakfast at a cute little cafe that had lots of yummy vegan food. I think if I’d had enough money I would have ordered one of everything on the menu!

The yummy 821 Cafe

Jules' vegan chili burrito

My avocado and veggie burger

On the walk back to the Alley Katz for the second day of the festival we passed more pretty buildings and houses that looked like they were out of a scene in a movie.

This house was so perfect it even had a porch swing!

If you look closely, you can see the cobblestone road

Obviously Cam didn't get the memo that sunglasses inside isn't cool..

Resting our feet

Oh and the Virginia State Capitol Building was right across the street from our hotel as well. I swear its a mini version of the White House, for a state like Virginia it’s a pretty nice place for your governor to live.

The Virginia State Capitol, it totally looks like a mini White House

Goodbye Virginia

floating somewhere in the stratosphere

Since I left for Texas a few weeks ago I know I’ve neglected my blog. Things have just been super crazy and I’ve been super busy, – running on little sleep, working long hours and going out for even longer hours still. In the next few days I’m posting everything that has happened between March 17th and now, here is just the first bite – written while I was on the plane to Austin, Tx.

17th March – Somewhere high above Earth, in between Georgia and Texas

Texas is the lone-star state, and right now, flying a few miles above it in the pitch black sky, I feel like the world has been inverted, – the clusters of lights scattered below me look like stars and the endless black of the sky above me could be the ground for all I know. The outside scenery aside, the SXSW adventure has already started and I haven’t even planted a foot on Texan soil yet.

waiting for our plane to leave

waiting, pt. 2

bye bye New York (or this could be New Jersey!)

the compulsory 'sky and aeroplane wing' shot

The flight Mayan and I took from JFK to Atlanta, Georgia was fun, – intermittent sleep combined with episodes of 30 Rock and The Office. When we deplaned in Atlanta we made friends with some other people on our flight who were also Austin-bound. The airport was typical nondescript airport fare, aside from the fact that most of the fast food restaurants served southern food and the airport bar we waited in had a smoking section indoors. Obviously they do things differently in the South.

happy St. Paddy's Day!!

down the hatch!

look how green mine is!

To celebrate St. Patrick’s Day (we’re all a little bit Irish on March 17th), Mayan and I did one of the Heinkein Bar’s festive shots – mine had a combination of vodka, apple schnapps and triple sec, while Mayan’s had vodka, pineapple and some other equally green ingredients in it.

the yummiest three-coloured tortilla chips EVER

We’re now halfway into our flight to Austin and all there is to do is play the waiting game; the snack cart has already made the rounds, I’ve got my Ipod (actually a borrowed Iriver thanks to the person who stole my bag back in December) playing in my ears and am switching between writing and reading (Up In the Air – it seemed appropriate). There’s some turbulence and as much as I don’t mind the unplanned high altitude roller-coaster ride, I will be happy when I arrive in the home state of such notables as George W. Bush and Hilary Duff.