Cal-Expo was a great venue. One of the best shows I went to was one of the Cal shows in '86. We were able to walk right up and get a spot on the grass about 15' in front of Jerry. They opened with One More Saturday Night and I think it was the first and only time they ever did that. Apparently they had a power problem the night before(Saturday Night), right at the end of the show, and couldn't do the encore. So they basically opened Sunday's show with Saturday's planned encore.

Another great Venue was Alpine Valley up in Wisconsin. It was in the middle of these corn fields out in the middle of nowhere. Some farmer would clear out some land and let all the Dead Heads camp there. For 3 days it would be this Dead Head village with thousands of happy trippin people. The show I saw there in '87 was probably the best I ever went to. The China Cat>Rider was smokin and later they pulled out All Along The Watchtower, only the second time it had ever been played. Nobody really knew what it was at first, not expecting the Dead to be playing Hendrix(well Dylan, but they did it Hendrix style) but when people figured it out everyone went nuts.

Here's a link to a downloadable version of that Alpine Valley Show. It's an audience recording but tip top quality for an aud. Definitely worth the down load Internet Archive: Details: Grateful Dead Live at Alpine Valley Music Theatre on 1987-06-26