What an awesome festival. Kudos to the City of Vancouver for throwing such an amazing free party, and thanks to all the volunteers (especially the energetic folks at the bike valet) who made it happen. On Saturday night we saw the mayor, Gregor Robertson, helping out in the bike valet. Thanks Gregor, you rock!

Emily and I spent most of our weekend in Stanley Park, enjoying the perfect weather and listening to awesome local bands. Most we’ve seen before, but Dan Mangan, the New Pornographers, Mother Mother, and Spirit of the West always put on a good show. My musical discoveries of the weekend were the Belle Game (an up-and-coming young band who have some catchy tunes) and Barney Bentall (and old-timer who can still rock).

Fun coincidence: Winnipeg Folk Festival was also last weekend (and attracted over 60,000 attendees this year). It started in 1974 as a free festival to celebrate Winnipeg’s 100th birthday, but became an annual paid event because it was so popular. If I didn’t think it would destroy the Vancouver Folk Festival, I’d suggest Summer Live become a regular event too. Stanley Park was an amazing venue – the only downsides where the difficulty getting people in and out, and the bottleneck between the two stages.

I was a little peeved that we were almost trampled by douchebags chasing the giant light-up beachballs during Dan Mangan’s set last night, but otherwise had a great weekend.