❤️ What's happening this weekend in the 757

Good morning, 757!

The wind got a vote this year, and it voted first.

Neptune Festival was supposed to take the Boardwalk tomorrow. Instead, sustained winds at the Oceanfront pushed the artist and vendor load-in from Thursday to Friday, so the festival suspended all of Friday's Boardwalk programming. Poseidon's Playground is closed Friday. The sandsculpting tent is closed Friday. The Boardwalk itself is closed to festival activity Friday. Everything opens Saturday morning, and Saturday and Sunday run exactly as planned, 8K race, Grand Parade, Dock Dogs, Touch-A-Truck, all of it. Check their page before you drive down, because this one moved once already.

New here? The decoder. Hampton Roads is split by water into two halves. The Southside is Norfolk, Virginia Beach, Chesapeake, Portsmouth, and Suffolk. The Peninsula is Hampton, Newport News, Yorktown, and Williamsburg. The HRBT is the Hampton Roads Bridge-Tunnel, which is how I-64 crosses between them. It is free. So is the 664 bridge-tunnel further west. The two that actually charge you a toll are the Downtown and Midtown tunnels between Norfolk and Portsmouth. So when this newsletter says something on the Peninsula is free, it means free, not free-plus-a-toll.

Now, back to the weekend. None of that wind trouble touches the Peninsula, where things start on schedule. The Phoebus Jazz Festival opens Friday night at The American Theatre in Hampton and runs two nights, and the Williamsburg Pancake Festival takes all three days.

One thing does survive Friday night, and it is not small. The Farm Aid Family Reunion concerts at 31st Street Park go ahead, free, 6 to 11 p.m. That is the warm-up for the actual headline of this weekend: Farm Aid itself is at the Veterans United Home Loans Amphitheater on Saturday. Willie Nelson, Neil Young, John Mellencamp, and Dave Matthews, in Virginia Beach, on one bill. Farm Aid has been staging this benefit since 1985, and this year it lands at our amphitheater.

So Saturday is going to be a day, on both sides of the water. Neptune reopening the whole Boardwalk, Farm Aid at the amphitheater, ODU hosting James Madison at 6, and the second night of the Phoebus Jazz Festival in Hampton. If you are driving to the Oceanfront Saturday, assume the worst and leave accordingly. And if you are not, understand that the Peninsula is running its own weekend this week, not a consolation prize: two nights of jazz in Phoebus, a pancake eating championship in Merchants Square, BugFest in Yorktown, and free soccer in Williamsburg on Sunday.

Four ways to use this issue. If you have small kids and you are on the Southside, the cheapest good Saturday in the region is Poseidon's Playground at 17th Street Park: every activity free, 10 a.m. to 9:30 p.m., with Zootopia 2 on a screen in the park that night, and you never need a festival ticket to use any of it. If you have one free morning and want the kids to learn something, BugFest in Yorktown is free, indoors, 10 to 2, straight up 64 with no toll from either side of the water. If you want one thing nobody else in your group chat has heard of, it is Vitreous Theater at the Chrysler's glass studio Saturday night, which is exactly as strange as it sounds. And if you work Saturdays like a lot of this region does, here is a weekend that costs you nothing: Friday night at the Farm Aid Family Reunion in 31st Street Park, free, no ticket, real acts. Then Sunday, take your pick of the Taste of Virginia Fest at Mount Trashmore with free parking, or free conference soccer at Albert-Daly Field in Williamsburg. Not one of those three asks you for a dollar at the gate.

One new thing in this issue: some listings carry an easy to do solo note. That is us saying you can walk into that one by yourself and nobody will look at you funny. Tell us if it is useful and we will keep it.

A few more worth the calendar:

Let's get to it.

Josh

🔱 Neptune Festival Boardwalk Weekend opens Saturday, September 26 and runs through Sunday, September 27 at the Virginia Beach Oceanfront. Friday is suspended after high winds delayed vendor load-in. Saturday runs 10 a.m. to 11 p.m., Sunday 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., with the Grand Parade heading up Atlantic Avenue from 16th Street at 11:30 Saturday morning. The Boardwalk, the parade, the concerts at 24th and 31st Street Parks, and Poseidon's Playground at 17th Street are all free, and the family fun zone runs 10 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Saturday with Zootopia 2 on a screen in the park that night, then 10 to 4 Sunday. Two things are not free: the sandsculpting tent at 7th Street is $7, free for children under 12 with an adult, and parking is real money. The Pacific Avenue garages at 9th, 25th, and 31st cap at $10 for the day, street meters run $2 an hour, so the garage is the move.

🎷 Phoebus Jazz Festival runs Friday, September 25 and Saturday, September 26 at 7:30 p.m. at The American Theatre, 125 East Mellen Street in Hampton. Friday brings Latin Jazz Conspiracy, the Ada Rovatti Quartet, and Lori Williams. Saturday brings the Billy Williams Quartet, pianist Justin Kauflin, and saxophonist Eric Marienthal. Tickets are $25 for one night or $40 for both, parking is free, and the theatre sits in the middle of Phoebus’s walkable restaurant block. Come early and eat first: The Baker’s Wife is on the corner at Mellen and Mallory, Fuller’s Raw Bar is four doors down, and Stuft on North Mallory runs to 2 a.m. if you want somewhere to land after the second set.

🥞 Williamsburg Pancake Festival runs Friday, September 25 through Sunday, September 27 in and around Merchants Square, Williamsburg. Friday is the pancakes and pajamas dinner, Saturday is the World Pancake Eating Championship at 12:30 p.m., and Sunday sends you around town to local breakfast spots running pancake specials. Free to attend, and yes, that is a real championship. Saturday timing worth knowing: the Williamsburg Farmers Market runs 8 a.m. to noon in the same block and the food and craft vendors open at 11, so park once at 10 and you will be standing in the right spot when the eating starts.

🍽️ Ghent Restaurant Week runs Friday, September 25 through Sunday, October 4 across fourteen restaurants in Ghent, Norfolk. Doumar's, Baker's Crust, The Green Onion, Public House, TASTE, Zinnia Cafe, and more. Ten days is long enough that you can skip the Saturday scrum and go on a Tuesday like a person who plans ahead. Each restaurant sets its own pricing, so check the menu for your spot before you commit.

The one piece of Neptune that survived the wind, and it is free. Chris Pierce, Kyshona, and Rissi Palmer's Color Me Country takeover, with farmer interviews between the sets and Red Crook-ed Sky dancing to open it.

The Virginia Symphony pairs the most familiar thing in the repertoire with the Virginia premiere of Glass's Symphony No. 15. Simone Porter on violin, Davóne Tines on bass-baritone, Eric Jacobsen conducting.

Her Netflix hour, Take Me With You, is the one somebody already sent you a clip from. She has been selling out rooms and adding dates, and the Attucks is a small enough house that you will actually see her face.

Lake Ballard under a nearly full moon, with a guide who will tell you what wakes up after dark. You book ahead, and kids 3 to 17 have to be booked with an adult.

Willie Nelson, Neil Young and The Chrome Hearts, John Mellencamp, Dave Matthews with Tim Reynolds, Margo Price, Nathaniel Rateliff, Turnpike Troubadours, Sierra Ferrell, and a dozen more. Gates at noon and music until 11. Eleven hours is not a concert, it is a shift.

Portsmouth's free one this week. Local beekeepers Lacy Shirey and Bill Gregory open a live observation hive, there is local honey to taste, and everybody builds a little bee house to take home. All ages, and it is free, but you do have to register.

The Royal Rivalry, at home, under the lights. JMU has been the wall ODU keeps running into, which is exactly why Ballard will be loud.

The inaugural one, billed as Chapter One. Authors, booksellers, and the state's literary community under one roof for the day, free to get in and free to park. Then R.L. Stine takes the stage in the evening for a moderated conversation and audience questions, ticketed separately.

The reason this one works is who runs it. York County Mosquito Control puts it on with the library and Parks and Rec, so the people answering your kid's questions actually know the answers. Booths from local organizations, crafts, and pinned specimens to look at. Billed as all ages, no registration, and it is indoors if the wind is still doing this.

The strangest thing on this list, and the best argument for going out alone. Light and sound pushed through glass as a live performance, with Ross Walter and VCU musicians, inside the Chrysler's glass studio.

Wings, cold beer, and live music on the Harbour View taproom's lawn for most of the day. Free to walk in, and the kind of thing you show up to at 2 and leave at 6.

Freedom Park closes at sunset every other night of the year. For the full moon it keeps Multiuse Trail 3 open, a one-mile paved out and back through Colby Swamp, self-guided, no registration, nobody herding you along.

Soul food, Caribbean, Indian, Mexican, Asian, and a real vegan showing, from regional chefs and food trucks rather than the same four festival vendors. Free to walk in, and parking at Trashmore is free too.

Suffolk Pride's festival, out on the water at Bennett's Creek. Live entertainment, local vendors, and community resources, in a city that did not have this ten years ago. Free.

Nine acres of grass, animal rescues and vendors, food trucks, and wiener dog races at 1. Bring the ball launcher.

Military Appreciation Day at Albert-Daly Field, which in this region is less a promotion than a demographic. Women's soccer, conference play, Sunday afternoon, and it does not cost anything.

🌳 Barraud Park reopens Saturday after a $4.5 million renovation, at a Norfolk park that has been in the neighborhood since 1928 and once had Arthur Ashe practicing on its courts.

⛽ Suffolk got the region's first Sheetz this week, the chain's 861st store, and it opened on Holland Road by handing $2,500 each to Special Olympics Virginia and the Foodbank.

🏈 Norfolk State beat Hampton in the Battle of the Bay for Michael Vick's first win over a Division I opponent, with Jason Wonodi returning two punts for touchdowns.

⚓ The Virginia Peninsula Chamber honored five service members this week, one from each branch, out of the roughly 23,000 active-duty members stationed on the Peninsula.

🏥 Hampton University opened WellNest this week, an integrated pharmacy, mental health, and primary care center across two campus buildings, built over two-plus years of work with the legislature to address what its pharmacy dean calls a pharmacy desert in Hampton.

Thank you for reading The 757 Current!

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— Josh