Virgins do it better

My personal apologies are owed to swashbuckling tycoon Richard Branson and his Virgin outfit (and maybe to Bjork as well). On Saturday at around 1pm a text message from a friend suggested an impromptu afternoon trip to the beach was in order as the day was perfect and unkind and cruel people everywhere have been talking aloud about summer being over and we wanted to show them it isn’t. We knew it was Virgin Festival weekend and imagined that the line to the island ferry would be as chaotic and frustrating as it was during Wakestock last month. My two friends decided to take a water taxi from Harbourfront, but I arrived later and thought I would see how the lineup was. When I rode down Queens Quay I saw the line stretched around the Westin, and I cursed Branson, Bjork and indie rock in general as I rode by.

Yet as with Wakestock, it’s a good idea to scout ahead and I found the Virgin Fest attendees were in a specific line for security that led directly to the Centre Island ferry, and to the left there were wickets for folks going to Hanlans or Wards. It was the quickest and most efficient ticket-buying and ferry-hopping ever. Kudos to the organizers for giving me a pleasant comeuppance and throwing an event that got everybody where they wanted to be with minimal aggravation. It seemed like a model balance between throwing a special event and keeping “regular life” disruptions to a minimum. While my personal desire to attend day-long open-air music festivals waned not long after attending Woodstock ’94 and a couple of early Lollapoloozas, Virgin Fest would appear to be an ideal annual visitor, and I won’t be deleting Bjork from my iTunes as I said I would at Bay and Queens Quay yesterday.

Pictures above were taken at around 7pm on my way back when there lines were gone and only a trickle of late-comers were heading to Centre Island.