Saturday, 9:30 a.m. - Last night we retreated to the relative peace and quiet of our Whistler compound, or as some people call it, the hotel room.
The exit strategy for festival-goers is a complete gong show. As the site shut down, thousands of campers headed for their tiny 10x10 foot patches of real estate, while thousands more headed for the parking lot, which is a few kilometers away. Add alcohol and drugs into the mix and you've got yourself a good old fashioned shit show. People scrambled to get onto shuttles, stragglers stumbled down the highway in the dark, and police and volunteers continued to struggle with the traffic.
Bottom line - it took us an hour and a half to get from the festival site to Whistler, 30 kms away.
"It's so stupid," said our hotel concierge, who spent the day reveling at the festival. "Pemberton is a town of 4,000, it's not setup for this kind of thing. This will never happen again."
Word is, though, Live Nation organizer and part-time Pemberton resident Shane Bourbonnais already has next year's date set.
Speaking of dates, I have one with the Flaming Lips later. Should be a good one.
For now, though, a strong cup of coffee is in order before we head back up to ground zero...
