Lucky Town

Tuesday, February 7, 2023 Entry #33

Hollywood, Florida, the site of the fourth concert of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band’s new tour, is in south Florida, very close to Fort Lauderdale, so I knew it would be a quick drive from my Miami Beach home base and it was.

My in-laws live in the area, and we often see the gigantic guitar looming off Interstate 95 on our drives from the airport to their home and back. I had always thought that it was just a cool looking sculpture in front of a Hard Rock sponsored arena, but upon entrance I came to discover actually that the guitar is one of the HOTELS in this high end casino-entertainment venue-shopping mall-resort. A guitar shaped hotel? Seemed appropriate for my final show on this Springsteen fueled road trip! Here it is up close:

Because of the proximity, I was able to arrive at the venue quite early in the morning, and I rushed to find the arena which was kind of in the middle of a huge room filled with slot machines. I found the nice people (inevitably Europeans) who were doing the fan check-ins for the GA Pit, and, they marked my hand with my number for the eventual line, I looked, and I was #17! I felt like I had won the jackpot though I didn’t play a single game of chance all the many hours I spent at this casino. Barring an Orlando-like debacle, I should be in good shape, position-wise. The line organizers said everyone on the list needed to report back at 2pm, but until then, I was on my own.

Excited, I wandered around the compound, inside and out. There were some fun Springsteen exhibits with cool memorabilia set up throughout the resort. Each of my post-getting my number/pre-line up experiences had a different “vibe,” and the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino’s was definitely the most luxurious and sensory filled.

After a delicious lunch, #17 (that’s me) checked in and the wait began. In Hollywood, they distributed the wristbands at the beginning of the line-up, so my array of 4 prized GA pit entry arm wear was now complete.

Once again, I met great people, including this family of superfans:

And this youngster and his father. The kid would eventually spoiler alert) receive a harmonica from the Boss himself:

6 hours later, our tickets were scanned and we were on the move in!

Day 10