Beautiful Day and Beautiful Arena in Virginia Beach

The RVA Solo event in Richmond, VA was the catalyst to my making another trip this past weekend, however this really just gave me an additional reason to do what I probably would have done anyway. Truthfully, I was planning to make a trip to this region regardless so that I could visit two LQ locations in reasonably close proximity to each other. So I used this tournament as a great excuse and first drove down to Virginia Beach and then decided to tag my way back up to Richmond for the events later that night. What a beautiful day for a drive down to the beach!

My first stop as I made my way into southeast Virginia was to Laser Quest Virginia Beach, a location that is only a couple of blocks away from the site of the former Photon Virginia Beach. I know that because as soon as I walked into LQVB one of the staffers noticed my hat and commented on it with a nod of respect to the old school laser tag system. The other employees didn’t seem to recognize it, but I always think it’s cool to encounter someone who does. He thought a business called Surge was located at the old Photon site and I was tempted to try to find it, but figured my time was better spent playing the laser tag right in front of me, so since I got there just in time for a game I put on my pack.

I’m told this LQ was previously an Ultrazone arena which made it particularly distinctive in a few ways. When I entered and headed to my left I found myself walking around and through a pyramid structure and my first thought was that it felt like something you’d find in Zone even before I learned that my assessment was correct. There were several other really unique elements to this arena including a tall cylindrical (or maybe octagonal) orange structure in the middle. I found a ramp to get me up into it…and then another…and another. The ramps kept going up higher and higher and I followed them into a separate alcove at the top of the highest tower in the arena. The way these areas are attached is quite interesting and the structures were very cool to explore. It was not they typical three tower layout that I see most often. This arena was something special for sure!

There were a couple of guys getting WAY into it and I wondered if they might be competing with me later that night. Time would tell, but for now I was pleased with the outcome of this game and had a beautiful day in Virginia Beach ahead of me, so it was time to move on with one more LQ checked off my list!