I went to all three days of the first and second Austin City Limits Music Festival here in Austin (uh, except that the first year was only 2 days). So, I considered myself an old hand at the logistics of getting to, around, and out of this giant music festival.

(Here’s my journal entry from last year’s festival)

But it took me until nearly the end of the first day of the third year to really figure out how to do the ACL Festival. This isn’t a typical concert where you can just show up, watch some music, buy a couple of beers, stroll back to your car, and head on home. No, getting the most out of the ACL Fest requires logistical planning of a higher order.

As you can see in the picture below, the crowds were huge. The crowd at this one stage? Same thing at the other 7 stages. An estimated 75k were in attendance on each of the three days. It just felt and looked like more.

Getting to the Festival

Do not plan on driving up to the festival gates. Do not plan on taking the shuttle bus with the other 225K people who are also planning on taking the shuttle bus.

I figured out the first year that the easiest way to get to the festival was to park my car at a friend’s house about .5 mile away (in Rollingwood), unload my bike, and ride right up to the front gate. Total time to park, unload, and lock my bike up at the entrance? About 8 minutes. If you can, ride your bike. Even if you have to drive to within a mile or two of the park, and then ride from there. But ride your bike.

How to Do the ACL Festival

The following list details what turned out to be the perfect plan that optimized my enjoyment of the ACL Festival this year. Your mileage and preferences will vary.

• Take off work on Friday, and get to the festival no later than 1:00. The bigger acts might play later at night, but Friday afternoon is the least crowded time of the entire festival. Which means that there are fewer kids crowding the stages, so you can sit back, relax, and enjoy some of the outstanding—if not slightly more obscure—musicians that play on Friday afternoon. I remember in 2003, getting there early on a Friday afternoon, and setting my chair up with an unobstructed view (read: no idiotic, unaware, and self-entitled teens crowding my space) about 75’ from the front of the stage to watch Liz Phair.
• Come alone–I’m there to listen to and enjoy the music. Not to socialize. There are way too many bands that I want to see, and the more people you have in your group, the more likely you are to have to miss out on one of your favorite bands to go watch something else with your buddies. Besides, moving through the immense crowds is much easier when you’re moving solo.

Having arrived early, I was able to watch Trish Murphy from about 10′ from the front of the stage:

• I rode my bike, parked in Rollingwood
• Bring a small back pack with your two allowed bottles of water, a camera, cell-phone, sunscreen, sunglasses, a big-brimmed hat, a towel, and some swim wear. If you’re a guy, the shorts you’re wearing to the festival should double as swim wear.
• Go swimming. The temperature in central Texas in mid-September is hot. This year, in the mid-to-upper 90s. One of the truly great swimming holes in all of central Texas (Barton Springs) is about a 2-minute walk from the front gates of the festival. But it seems that NOBODY knew this. Around 5:00 p.m., I strolled over to the springs, and submerged my sweaty, hot body into the year-round 68 degree clear water (oh, bring Tevas or some other type of sandal that you can wear into the water…Barton Springs is not a barefoot-friendly swimming hole). I was surprised by how few people were swimming…considering how brutally hot it was. Use the cold water to wash away the dirt and grime and sweat from the mid-afternoon heat. Get your body temperature back in check, relax, and then head back to the festival as the sun and the temperature begin to drop.
• Leave before the end of the last act. Trust me, especially on your bike, you will not want to negotiate the mass exodus.
• Repeat on Saturday and Sunday.

The highlight of this year’s festival was watching the Blind Boys of Alabama and then Patty Griffin perform back-to-back on the same stage on Friday afternoon.



By the time I got over to where Bruce Robison was playing, I ended up just standing at the back of the crowd…about 150 yards from the stage.