I love tour. I love driving impossibly long distances with incredible friends to find inspiring music and an insane party. I love Limestone, Maine, too. I went there for the Great Went in 1997 with Meredith and Sam and for the Lemonwheel in 1998 with Beth and Jordan. Now Phish announced their first post-hiatus festival, simply titled It. This time around D. Marcus Arm hooked the RV (a la Big Cypress), and we were able to travel the 633 miles from NYC to It in style. (The photo above is of the colorful It message board.) Meredith reprised her Limestone appearance with her friend Christina. Beth joined my side, naturally. Gabe and Marcus brought the party. Dina, our newfound East Village compadre, popped in the RV with her coworker Anita. And Jordan, en route from Tahoe to Siberia, had a weekend layover until his flight to Moscow. (Thanks for hooking the Kahns again, Phish!) Marcus took the first shift over the Whitestone Bridge and up through Connecticut in the pouring rain and the rush-hour traffic. Beth took us through Massachusetts and southern Maine. At around 11:55 p.m., we pulled off the highway for a last attempt for dinner. With Maine's stores closing down, we caught the folks at Friendly's as they were locking the door.

At left, Dina, Meredith, and Bethy pose inside the Portland Friendly's restaurant. Portland marked the halfway point of the trip from New York. We still had 315 miles to go, but I've never seen a happier crew. Below, Gabe gets cozy in the back of the RV with three lovely ladies: Bethy, Christina, and Meredith. We all took shifts napping, except for me. Only once we hit show traffic was I able to take some rest.

With a failed stereo system in the RV, we listened to the local radio stations. Somewhere in Maine, in the middle of the night, I heard the original version of Lynyrd Skynrd's classic Curtis Lowe for the first time. "Play me a song, Curtis Lowe," our whole RV crew sang. Though Phish never busted out the old school rarity like I had been calling for since 2000, we did get the treat on the ride up, and I relished every note as our truck rumbled slowly north up the I-95. Beth and Gabe point the way to Limestone, after spending about 24 hours in the RV. It was a hard, long drive in a 30-foot truck. Even after 8 hours of traffic to go the last 25 miles, we were ecstatic to be there.

By the time we got to the entrance to the festival, the rain had cleared--but the ground was still soaked. We parked our RV in the lot and had only a few precious hours to decompress from the drive before the show was to begin. Beth used some of that time to review her school notebook; it was Saturday afternoon, and she had a midterm in her graduate school history class on Monday. Gabe and I used that time to explore our surroundings.

Our RV home was at the very end of the large parking lot, at the edge of the public area of the decommissioned air force base. Not more than 50 yards from our spot lay 100s of heavily armored military vehicles, their empty guns aiming nowhere in particular. It was an amusing contrast to see 60,000 Phishheads camped in their RVs and tents with the aging machines of destruction within a Frisbee's throw away. There's something inherently ironic about a Phish show on a military base.

For the third trip to Limestone, Phish made the most of their surroundings. The water tower was given a face-lift--or, more specifically, a pair of glasses and a funny nose. And Phish used the abandoned control tower for a surprise fourth set of space ambiance, beginning at 2 a.m. Check out the photographs of the Tower set at page bottom, courtesy Tie-Dye Jeremy.

The afternoon set on Saturday was a blast. The first of three sets lasted nearly two hours and featured groovy versions of Ya Mar, a gorgeous Reba, and a fan-requested Meatstick. Vultures brought me back to the Great Went, the first Phish festival at Limestone. That was the first time I had heard Vultures, with Meredith. And now, six years later, it was coming full circle.

Meredith and Marcus show the mood that we were all feeling below. I ran into a high school buddy, Jesse Lubinsky. He was married, bearded, and had become a New York City math teacher. At right, Jesse evaluates his 40th show while Anita, Mer, Marcus, and Beth dance away in front. His comment on the fan's request of Meatstick was hilarious: "It's like having the chance to have any meal, and choosing White Castle."

Did I mention that it was muddy? Well, it was. Some parts of the field were worse than others. Unfortunately, we didn't discover the high, dry ground until Sunday's show.

After the sun set, the exhaustion set in. We couldn't rest between sets because the grounds were so muddy. I had lost Jordan before the show, so we were apart for the Brother bust-out (another festival reference). The ambient jam in the Waves rocked me to sleep, and I was physically unable to photograph the tower set. Thank again to Jeremy for providing the great photos of the boys atop the old air tower. I wonder if the military ever envisioned an event like this.