Dryers filled with T-shirts kept running by stage hands during each performance.

Thanking Troy and his wife Lynn for letting us stay the night in their beautiful home Judy and I hightailed it out of Oakland early the next morning. Not having been to the bay area in over ten years I wasn't sure how long it would actually take us to travel North East to West Sacramento. We needed to check in to reserved hotel rooms already waiting for us there. Along the way we stopped to pick up some last minute travel supplies. At about 11:30 a.m. we arrived at a Best Western hotel with desk clerks kind enough to allow us to check in to our rooms earlier than expected at no extra charge. Yippie! Coincidentally - there's not much to see or do when it comes to sight seeing in West Sacramento. After settling in we ventured out onto a main street in our nifty new rental car (a white Pontiac grand am for those of you taking notes) and found a place to have lunch - Chinese! My fortune cookie read - "Your dearest wish will come true" - looking back on that moment as I sit here now I am amazed at how incredibly accurate that statement would come to pass in the near future - more on that later. Further down the road we developed our first batch of concert pics at a one-hour photo stop inside a Walgreens drug store.

While waiting for our film to develop we got a call on Judy's cell phone from Warren (whom we met the day before - you ARE reading these pages in order right? - just checking). Not only was he able to score a ticket for the night, he was also able to stay in a third room we reserved (back at the Best Western). The third room was conveniently made available when our ticket agent who had originally planned on joining us at the last minute found lodging closer to the AutoWest. As luck would have it everything worked out for the best. Later that day Warren hitched a ride with us to the arena about an hour and a half before Rush would hit the stage.

We had a great time at the AutoWest Pavilion - all things considered. Getting there was a bit nerve racking for the three of us. It appeared I had seriously miscalculated the distance in miles from the place we rented our rooms to the location of the pavilion way out in the middle of (cow country) nowhere. I had pieced together the travel itinerary we were using with the aid of Yahoo Mapquest and as a result we arrived at AutoWest within a half hour to showtime. Damn that Mapquest!

The map we followed to the AutoWest Pavilion.

To make matters worse - the electrical power at the venue was down due to a fire which threatened a nearby power plant forcing it to cut off it's power supply (to check for possible system damage caused by the heat of the dangerously close flame no doubt). Fortunately the fire nearby had been put out earlier that day without further incident. I would learn later from a concession stand operator working the dimly lit arena that the stage had been running on backup generators for a good part of the day.

The AutoWest show was delayed fifteen minutes and no power outages plagued the performance.

We sat fifth row that night and by luck our ticket agent Jeff (also a major Rush fan) was able to scuttle Judy up to third row with him. It was a good thing too since a couple of sasquatchian fellows purchased tickets directly in front of us. Isn't that always the case? Damn! There should be some sort of height requirement at concerts. If you're short and reading this I bet you'd agree eh? As it is, I stand six feet even and I still had to strain to look over their woolly shoulders. Oh well. Hmmm... Wanna' hear something cool? Don't tell anyone but later that night - when no one was looking - I found my way to the third row too. ;)

Highlights at this event included meeting my internet Rush buddy Tom (ROCINANTE70) face to face for the first time. Poor guy was suffering from a case of strep throat that week but even that wouldn't keep him from attending the show. It was good to see him there. Rush played loose and relaxed. They appeared to be truly enjoying themselves. Neil even went so far as to mouth the word "Moooo!" to the audience. I'm still trying to figure that one out. Hmmm... I've never seen him smile as much as I have on this tour. I was smiling back. :)

Ghost Rider was performed that night!

Standing in line for refreshments during intermission my eyes were drawn to Earth's neighboring satelite high in the night sky. The Moon shown down with a brilliant intensity. It wasn't completely full but it was nevertheless a gorgeous sight to behold. Losing track of time and waiting for people ahead of me to make up their minds on what they wanted to eat and drink I missed the beginning of One Little Victory - the opening song of the second act. I even spilled beer on myself in my hurry to get back to my seat! Figures. Don't get me wrong however - I managed to have a terrific time in any event.

The ride back to our hotel that night is a part of our adventure I'd just as soon forget.

Traveling southbound on a stretch of road designated Highway 70 (the 70 would eventually turn into Highway 99 which in turn became the I-5) we kept our eyes peeled for a lane that would lead us back to the I-80. If that wasn't confusing enough, the road system ahead would prove to be one right out of the Twilight Zone! Leaving the schizophrenic highway behind I managed to backtrack our way to the eastbound I-80 from the southbound I-5. About an hour later, we exited the I-80 (more than once) to seek out directions from what would turn out to be half asleep and outright clueless locals working twenty-four hour convenient stores off the highway. We were halfway back to Oakland by the time we figured out where we were. Referring to local area maps (an ever growing collection I amassed along our travels) we were shocked to discover the I-80 splits off into multiple directions across Sacramento! What a mess this must be to travelers new to the area - especially for us Rush fan types! We had been traveling in the wrong direction and didn't even know it. We ended up approximately thirty-five miles away from where we wanted to be. I likened ourselves to Harry and Lloyd (characters in the Dumb and Dumber movie) and had a good laugh about it later in the shower that morning. We didn't return to our hotel rooms 'til clear past 2:00 a.m. We were beat.

The next day Warren left at the crack of dawn without so much as a word. He needed to catch an early flight so we didn't hold it against him (we would run into him once again on our travels at the Los Angeles, Staples Center event - but I'm getting ahead of myself).