This weekend I rode my bike to North Ave Beach, where several friends were playing in a volleyball tournament. Several friends and several thousand other young/active people--the beach was completely full of teenagers, 20-somethings, and families playing volleyball, swimming, and lounging on the sand.
As Chicago's most popular beach (by observation only, no scientific research to prove this), North Ave is usually crowded, especially on the weekends, and especially when Nelly is scheduled to perform after the summer's largest volleyball tournament. Sadly, we didn't stick around to see him (not that we had tickets or anything, but I'm sure people on the beach could still hear). After 4-5 hours of sun/sand/water/people watching, we were tired and hungry and in need of some shade.
We cleaned up and hydrated at the Gold Coast/Naw, then continued "Beach Day" up north, at Roscoe Village Burgerfest. I had heard that this annual neighborhood fest topped the Taste of Chicago in quality and we prefer to check out more local/neighborhoody things anyways. We ate burgers from Mrs. Murphy's and Sons Irish Bistro (not the best I've had, but they were grilled out on a street, not in a kitchen, so I'm willing to forgive).
As the hot summer day cooled into evening, a wonderful thing happened on the east event stage: the trippin billies, the Dave Matthews Tribute Band, started sound check. I was so excited to hear live Dave music two weekends in a row. While Brit, Diego, and Barrett walked around the fest and checked out Sister Hazel on the other stage, I worked my way to the front of the crowd to sing along to the nearly identical (but still unique) covers of some of my favorite songs.
Sunburnt and sticky, we we returned to the Naw as Burgerfest ended to reapply aloe and make plans to stay in the shade all day Sunday--one mustn't overdo Beach Day if one hopes to be dark, not lobster red.
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