Oregon Dixieland Jazz Festival

Tonight was so awful that I think I'll write about last weekend instead. I'll wait until the morning and hopeful things will look better or at least be easier to photograph.

So...Saturday was the Oregon Dixieland Jazz Festival in Seaside. Mindy from Stumptown Dance organized a group of Swing Dancers to attend together. Several of us met around 8am at the PPAA to carpool. I rode with Rosey, Mindy and Neil (an out of towner from Ohio). We passed the ride pretty easily talking the whole way. A minor disappointment since I had planned to read but it was probably more fun. We got there in time to hear the first band start to play, however it takes forever to get twenty or so dancers who drove in various arrangements gathered and organized.

At first we stuck to the convention center which had two rooms set-up for bands including dance floors. It was really easy to hop back and forth between the two rooms based on what the bands were playing. We had at a cafe that offered seafood options after walking down to the beach and back up. Since Saturday was the day of the Earthquake in Chile, there were not one but two News Vans in Seaside to cover the potential tsunami. So we were able to poke fun at them a bit amongst ourselves.

After Lunch we hopped between the convention center and the Elks. The floor wasn't as good at the Elks but they were better prepared with a box of dance wax. We heard some really great bands in the afternoon and the evening. Some of my favorites were: Titan Hot Seven, Blue Street Jazz, and High Sierra, in no particular order. We had pizza for dinner on our way back to the convention center for the last set of the night with Titan Hot Seven. During the last set there was some shuffling of the driving arrangements to make sure that none of the dancers had to drive home alone. On the way back, Kyle joined Rosey and I, while Mindy and Neil rode with other dancers. We had a fun time driving back too...

It was a long day with about 12 hours of dancing. It was completely exhausting but it was so much fun and I hope that i am able to go next year!