Extra picture entry for the week (there are a bunch of pictures this time)
Okay so these pictures are from last summer when we went to two DCI shows. One was in Charlotte that we've gone to a few times. We made the trip to Bloomington, IN for the DCI World Championships. We made a stop at the Cumberland Gap National Park on our way there.
Curtis likes to tailgate, a lot, even if we’re tailgating by ourselves. :-P This time we had some tagalongs, my friends Jeannelle and Dianna came with us.
This is Pioneer and they are from Milwaukee, WI and their show was Celtic Dreams or something like that, it was nothing spectacular.
These are the Crossmen from San Antonio, TX. Their show was Planet X but I can’t really remember anything cool about it.
The Glassmen from Toledo, OH. Their show was pretty cute except that they let a lot of balloons go (we saw their show four times because they made it to the finals and I just kept getting more mad at them for letting balloons go). But other than that it was pretty cool, at one point the drum line was playing the drums with those squeaky hammer things (there will be a picture later). And their drums were candy-painted (they changed color with the light)
The Boston Crusaders are from Boston, MA. They did Neo-Cosmos, another space themed show. Again, I don’t remember anything that stands out about their show.
The stadium is right outside of downtown so there’s a cool view from the end of it.
The Blue Knights are from Denver, CO and their show was Knight Reign. They had pretty flags.
The Blue Devils are from Concord, CA and their show was Constantly Risking Absurdity. It was weird, that’s for sure, but it was really interesting. They used these long sticks as props that I had never seen before. They made a stick person with them on the ground near the end of their show.
At one point, the whole color guard squeezed into one square. They were at the top of the pack for a while.
The Cavaliers did a Samurai show and they are from Rosemont, Illinois. There was lots of fighting and people dying. They are one of two all-male corps.
Carolina Crown, who hosted the show, is from Fort Mill, SC and they did a show called Finis, which was up of a bunch of famous ending pieces.
So now this is the trip we took in August. This is Pilot Mountain somewhere in NC on our way there.
Cumberland Gap State Park
So we stayed overnight near Cumberland and explored the park in the morning. The main part of the park is in KY but you have to cross over to TN to see the cave. Once you enter the cave, you are in VA. There are three main things to do/see there, mountain overlooks and hiking, a cave, and a old settlement. The park ranger asked a little kid what three states we were in and to help the kid figure it out the mom said, “What state do we live in?” (I forget the answer) “What state is the Walmart in?” (I forget the answer to that too, and the last question).
This is the entrance to the cave:
There were no lights inside the cave so you had to have flashlights.
Fallen rocks
This is a “Weather Station” in the middle of the cave where they measure various things.
A bat!
This is called “Cleopatra’s Bathtub”
This is called cave coral
Speedy Gonzales was here and he left his hat.
Another bat!
This is called the Column of Hercules
This is the caveosaurus
This is “The Gap,” the old highway used to run through here but it was really dangerous. So they built a tunnel through a mountain and now they are trying to restore the forest to this area.
Pretty flowers outside the visitor’s center
Curtis is a bear!
This the Hensley Settlement, it’s a historic area from the 1800s or the 1900s, Curtis and I can’t remember. We had to take a van ride up this crazy gravel road to get there.
This cabin burned down because some stupid hunters decided to build a fire in a non-working fire place. Apparently there’s some law about historic restorations and you’re not allowed to rebuild a structure unless there’s a certain percentage of it intact, too much of it burned so they couldn’t rebuild it.
This is a chicken coop.
Back to the visitor’s center…This is one of my favorite pictures that I’ve taken.
At one of the overlooks, these are the Finger Lakes.
I’m in Kentucky taking Curtis’ picture while he’s in Virginia. They have repainted this line because you used to be able to take a picture looking down with one foot in Kentucky and one foot in Virginia, and you could see the state names. They moved the state names too far apart so you can’t get them both in the same picture.
So now Curtis is in Virginia taking my picture in Kentucky.
This is the town of Cumberland Gap, TN.
This was a weird fountain Indiana University.
More tailgating…basically there were a couple of breaks between the different competitions. We were staying Indianapolis, so it didn’t make sense to drive all the way back. So we just packed a lunch for each day and hung out under some trees.
This is The Academy from Phoenix, AZ, we can’t remember what their show was about
The Troopers are from Casper, WY and their show had something to do with trains. They made a train at one point.
Spirit is from Jacksonville, AL, and we can’t remember what they did either.
The Colts are from Dubuque, IA, and they did something about Day/Night.
The Crossmen again and this is Bones, their “mascot.”
Here’s a picture of the Glassmen playing the candy-coated drums with squeaky hammers.
Phantom Regiment is from Rockford, IL and their show was Spartacus. They won and I bought a shirt and random people ask me about that shirt every time I wear it. It was badass, there were herald trumpets, slaves, fighting, and the last minute “death” of a drum major.
These are all the open class finals (there is both open class and world class, just two levels of competition)
The Marine Drum and Bugle Corps did an exhibition.
The Madison Scouts are from Madison, WI and their show was La Noche de la Iguana (which was actually the first play of this season at the Triad Stage). They are the other all-male corps.
It sounded cool when they were banging on these things:
The Blue Stars are from Lacrosse, WI and they did a show called Le Tour all about the Tour de France. It was really cool, lots of fun things with bicycle wheels and there was a race at the end.
The Bluecoats are from Canton, OH and they did a show called The Knockout all about boxing. This one was pretty cool too, I like shows that have “stories” to follow instead of just dancing around to music or whatever.
Santa Clara Vangard is from Santa Clara, CA and is one of Curtis’ favorite corps (it’s a tie with Carolina Crown). They did a show called 3hree and it had various plays on and allusions to the number three both in music and drill (thanks to Curtis for the description).
The color guard had a really cool costume change in the middle of the show and I really want to see it in slow motion. They were all wearing brown and then all of a sudden they were wearing blue.
They always make a V out of their cymbals at the end of their shows
And Carolina Crown again.
They had a cool flag change where they just shook the flags and the outer layer came off.
There is one corps we saw that there are no pictures of. The Cadets are from Allentown, PA and they are weird and I don’t like them. So I didn’t take any pictures of them. Whenever their show came on I was like, “Oh, time to do some puzzles and not pay attention.”
All the World Class corps
The view from our hotel at night.
Our super comfy bed
Indianapolis at night
These we affectionately called the “Warp Rings”
The Capitol Building
So this BLT cost us $23. We got back real late one night and were starving. The only place still open was Steak and Shake but it was packed because everyone else was going there. So we ordered room service. It was delicious and we split it in two and it was just enough to tide us over until the morning.
Our view from the hotel in the day time
Warning: Fire may chase you down the stairs
We got distracted on our way home on our way to see Carrie in Lexington. We stopped at some fossil beds near Louisville.
Look an exit 0!
Louisville, KY
Curtis likes to tailgate, a lot, even if we’re tailgating by ourselves. :-P This time we had some tagalongs, my friends Jeannelle and Dianna came with us.
This is Pioneer and they are from Milwaukee, WI and their show was Celtic Dreams or something like that, it was nothing spectacular.
These are the Crossmen from San Antonio, TX. Their show was Planet X but I can’t really remember anything cool about it.
The Glassmen from Toledo, OH. Their show was pretty cute except that they let a lot of balloons go (we saw their show four times because they made it to the finals and I just kept getting more mad at them for letting balloons go). But other than that it was pretty cool, at one point the drum line was playing the drums with those squeaky hammer things (there will be a picture later). And their drums were candy-painted (they changed color with the light)
The Boston Crusaders are from Boston, MA. They did Neo-Cosmos, another space themed show. Again, I don’t remember anything that stands out about their show.
The stadium is right outside of downtown so there’s a cool view from the end of it.
The Blue Knights are from Denver, CO and their show was Knight Reign. They had pretty flags.
The Blue Devils are from Concord, CA and their show was Constantly Risking Absurdity. It was weird, that’s for sure, but it was really interesting. They used these long sticks as props that I had never seen before. They made a stick person with them on the ground near the end of their show.
At one point, the whole color guard squeezed into one square. They were at the top of the pack for a while.
The Cavaliers did a Samurai show and they are from Rosemont, Illinois. There was lots of fighting and people dying. They are one of two all-male corps.
Carolina Crown, who hosted the show, is from Fort Mill, SC and they did a show called Finis, which was up of a bunch of famous ending pieces.
So now this is the trip we took in August. This is Pilot Mountain somewhere in NC on our way there.
Cumberland Gap State Park
So we stayed overnight near Cumberland and explored the park in the morning. The main part of the park is in KY but you have to cross over to TN to see the cave. Once you enter the cave, you are in VA. There are three main things to do/see there, mountain overlooks and hiking, a cave, and a old settlement. The park ranger asked a little kid what three states we were in and to help the kid figure it out the mom said, “What state do we live in?” (I forget the answer) “What state is the Walmart in?” (I forget the answer to that too, and the last question).
This is the entrance to the cave:
There were no lights inside the cave so you had to have flashlights.
Fallen rocks
This is a “Weather Station” in the middle of the cave where they measure various things.
A bat!
This is called “Cleopatra’s Bathtub”
This is called cave coral
Speedy Gonzales was here and he left his hat.
Another bat!
This is called the Column of Hercules
This is the caveosaurus
This is “The Gap,” the old highway used to run through here but it was really dangerous. So they built a tunnel through a mountain and now they are trying to restore the forest to this area.
Pretty flowers outside the visitor’s center
Curtis is a bear!
This the Hensley Settlement, it’s a historic area from the 1800s or the 1900s, Curtis and I can’t remember. We had to take a van ride up this crazy gravel road to get there.
This cabin burned down because some stupid hunters decided to build a fire in a non-working fire place. Apparently there’s some law about historic restorations and you’re not allowed to rebuild a structure unless there’s a certain percentage of it intact, too much of it burned so they couldn’t rebuild it.
This is a chicken coop.
Back to the visitor’s center…This is one of my favorite pictures that I’ve taken.
At one of the overlooks, these are the Finger Lakes.
I’m in Kentucky taking Curtis’ picture while he’s in Virginia. They have repainted this line because you used to be able to take a picture looking down with one foot in Kentucky and one foot in Virginia, and you could see the state names. They moved the state names too far apart so you can’t get them both in the same picture.
So now Curtis is in Virginia taking my picture in Kentucky.
This is the town of Cumberland Gap, TN.
This was a weird fountain Indiana University.
More tailgating…basically there were a couple of breaks between the different competitions. We were staying Indianapolis, so it didn’t make sense to drive all the way back. So we just packed a lunch for each day and hung out under some trees.
This is The Academy from Phoenix, AZ, we can’t remember what their show was about
The Troopers are from Casper, WY and their show had something to do with trains. They made a train at one point.
Spirit is from Jacksonville, AL, and we can’t remember what they did either.
The Colts are from Dubuque, IA, and they did something about Day/Night.
The Crossmen again and this is Bones, their “mascot.”
Here’s a picture of the Glassmen playing the candy-coated drums with squeaky hammers.
Phantom Regiment is from Rockford, IL and their show was Spartacus. They won and I bought a shirt and random people ask me about that shirt every time I wear it. It was badass, there were herald trumpets, slaves, fighting, and the last minute “death” of a drum major.
These are all the open class finals (there is both open class and world class, just two levels of competition)
The Marine Drum and Bugle Corps did an exhibition.
The Madison Scouts are from Madison, WI and their show was La Noche de la Iguana (which was actually the first play of this season at the Triad Stage). They are the other all-male corps.
It sounded cool when they were banging on these things:
The Blue Stars are from Lacrosse, WI and they did a show called Le Tour all about the Tour de France. It was really cool, lots of fun things with bicycle wheels and there was a race at the end.
The Bluecoats are from Canton, OH and they did a show called The Knockout all about boxing. This one was pretty cool too, I like shows that have “stories” to follow instead of just dancing around to music or whatever.
Santa Clara Vangard is from Santa Clara, CA and is one of Curtis’ favorite corps (it’s a tie with Carolina Crown). They did a show called 3hree and it had various plays on and allusions to the number three both in music and drill (thanks to Curtis for the description).
The color guard had a really cool costume change in the middle of the show and I really want to see it in slow motion. They were all wearing brown and then all of a sudden they were wearing blue.
They always make a V out of their cymbals at the end of their shows
And Carolina Crown again.
They had a cool flag change where they just shook the flags and the outer layer came off.
There is one corps we saw that there are no pictures of. The Cadets are from Allentown, PA and they are weird and I don’t like them. So I didn’t take any pictures of them. Whenever their show came on I was like, “Oh, time to do some puzzles and not pay attention.”
All the World Class corps
The view from our hotel at night.
Our super comfy bed
Indianapolis at night
These we affectionately called the “Warp Rings”
The Capitol Building
So this BLT cost us $23. We got back real late one night and were starving. The only place still open was Steak and Shake but it was packed because everyone else was going there. So we ordered room service. It was delicious and we split it in two and it was just enough to tide us over until the morning.
Our view from the hotel in the day time
Warning: Fire may chase you down the stairs
We got distracted on our way home on our way to see Carrie in Lexington. We stopped at some fossil beds near Louisville.
Look an exit 0!
Louisville, KY