~Winter Jam ~

WOW - We just had the most amazing day!   We left our campground around 11am and headed into Tampa for the day.  It was really pretty - right on the river with beautiful views of the downtown area.

This is the Tampa Bay Times Forum where the concert was held and also where the Tampa Bay Lighting play their home games.

We parked our van not far from the arena and went for a lovely walk down the river.  It was such a hot day.

When we first walked past the arena there were already people lining up - it was 1pm!!!  The concert was due to start at 6pm !!!   WOW!   We asked and the lady said "You should start lining up around 2.30p and you should get in" .....what???   Oh well.... this should be fun eh??

HAD to take a hockey photo - not "our" team.....but still fun to see.

The lady directed us around the corner to where the line had ended and that is where we "sat", "stood", "paced" for many hours while waiting!!  Not joking.....it was over 32 degrees and VERY humid too.

They had a live band that kept us entertained.

At about 4pm we decided to see how it looked near the entrance and to our horror there were now thousands of people crowded into the main area - NO more lines!!! Oh dear.....we asked the "lady" and she said....."We've lost control of it" - so.......after a bit of thought we picked ourselves up and marched to the main area and found a new spot.

Then around 4.30pm they decided to start letting a few hundred people in at a time - the pre-concert started at 5pm.  Everyone was very anxious about making it in..........

but.............WE DID !!!!   And....we ended up with great seats with a view straight ahead of the stage.  There were 20 000 people there (a full house) and another 4000 people outside that didn't make it inside the arena.

The concert was SO great, but also VERY loud!!   It started with "Capital Kings"............

then "OBB".............

"Jason Castro"............

"Royal Tailor"...............

"Newsong".................

"Jamie Grace"..............

Toby Mac joined her for "Hold me"....................too cool!!!

"Sidewalk Prophets".......................

They had a HUGE disco ball with lights, they had fire, they had smoke...............it was all so incredible and such an experience for us all................

They had a wonderful speaker - Nick Hall who gave a great message.

Then came "Red" - oh my goodness...............it was SOOOO loud..................

This is Travis and Scott "enjoying" this part of the concert !!!! :)   :)

This is Austin Greene who shared about his World Vision experience - amazing.

Then came Matthew West....................

and finally.................Toby Mac !!!

The concert lasted for  5 hours and we had such a fun time with MANY laughs and stories that we will share later!!!!

The girls LOVED the concert and each bought a souvenir t-shirt!!