Glastonbury, the verdict

Ok so it has taken me a long time to get round to writing about Glastonbury. In fairness I have probably only just recovered from the 'glasto jet lag'.

So here we go. If you read my blog below I expect you would have guessed that a part of me had wanted to dislike Glastonbury. There is something about wanting to hate something after its been overhyped so when I was rudely awakened in the wee small hours of a rainy June morning I must admit I was grumpily muttering obscenities to myself and wondering whether it was all going to be worth the hassle.

We arrived in the car park at 6am the gates to the actual festival do not open until 8 I believe, the car journey onto the site itself was pleasantly pain free so by this point my mood had lifted slightly.

At about 6.15am I unfolded a camping chair and cracked open a can of strongbow (don't judge me please, neither for being an alcoholic nor being one that drinks strongbow, Im at a festival, rules are different :)

Unfortunately this was the low point really, as little did I know at this point that I was going to queue for no less than 4 hours in the rain, to get into the site itself. 4 hours is upsetting on its own but when you are carrying a rucksack with what feels like a ton of breeze blocks inside and attempting to drag a sack truck through the muddiest mud that Somerset can offer its certainly not something that will fill your heart with joy!

still smiling! :)

Finally we did get in and find a space to pitch our tent in an already heaving campsite (on a wednesday morning, bearing in mind the festival does not technically start until Friday).

The first thing I realised that this is a festival in its own league of festivals. The vastness of it is the aspect that strikes you first I think. The size of one of the fields is probably the size of the entire Reading festival arena. It seems to always take an hour to walk between stages, due to both the distance and the volume of people. It is therefore advisable to set off early if there is something specific you want to see!

The best advice I had before I left was, don't expect to be able to plan what bands you will watch, you will have a better experience if you let the festival take you where it wants to. The festival itself is like a small town. There are a variety of bars where you can actually sit on sofas and there is live music. Even if you were to simply sit in one of these for a day and miss the main headliners you would still have an awesome experience.

Also unlike your standard festival there are things to see and do almost as soon as the campsite opens. Usually if you were to arrive on a wednesday am you would be largely confined to your tent until the Friday when the arena opens and the festival officially kicks off. Here however there are bars playing music open from Wednesday eve so effectively you are getting two extra days of entertainment for your ticket price. Glastonbury suddenly was seeming better value for money.

My one issue is perhaps that I would like to see less of the likes of coldplay and U2 and more bands that are more to my taste. I very much enjoyed flogging molly but I would liked to have seen some more of the heavier bands. This is where Reading and Lowlands win for me. However it cannot be said that Glastonbury does not have an extremely diverse range of music so maybe I was in the wrong place at the wrong time I don't know.

If you are a dance/drum and bass/dubstep fan you will however been in your element as there is an entire arena, containing about 5 separate stages all devoted to such music which will keep you busy to the small hours.

In addition to the bars and stages there are the healing and greenpeace fields where you can see all sorts of weird and wonderful things. Perhaps try some dandelion vodka (but only if you have a strong gag reflex if you want my advice). There are also the circus and children's fields putting on an array of entertainment and street theatre until late.

Why not get your face painted especially if you have a friend who is afraid of people dressed up as cats.

Christina, doing her bit to make mullins feel uncomfortable!

Finally if you have the energy after a day of walking miles in the mud (so many miles I actually managed to lose weight!) you shouldn't go home without visiting Glastonbury's late night areas. Shangri-la, arcadia and the unfair ground.

We discovered these on our last night and I wish that we had found them a few nights earlier as they are something else. Nightclubs with buses crashed through the front and all sorts of crazy things

Sadly by this point I was a broken woman and managed only to wander round in awe for a bit before crying off to my tent!

In conclusion I have to concede that Glasto is the most impressive festival I have ever been to. I also heard that Reading was in the region of £190 to attend this year. When you consider that Glastonbury is not only 2 extra days long its probably 5 times the size of Reading - value for money wise its really a no brainer. Sorry Reading...its not you...its me.

In my heart Lowlands will always be my true love festival wise, I prefer its more intimate feel the fact its so offbeat and I've seen a more diverse range of music here without doing a half marathon between stages.

However would I go to Glastonbury again given the chance? Whilst I was so desperate to hate it. Your damn right I would, In a heartbeat.

See you in 2013 Mr Eavis :)

The journey so far

Melissa, sums up this picture

So, Im about to embark upon my 10th festival, the epic that is Glastonbury. It will be my first time at glasto and I'm unsure whether I am excited or not.

When I was 16 I was absolutely desperate to go, but my mother, who is a worrier forbade me. In any event, I had nobody to go with. It was not until I was 18 and met Rob that I got my first go on a festival at Reading 2001.

Reading 01 will probably always be the festival I look back at with the most fondness. Probably because it was my first, and also because it was awesome. This picture isn't isnt 01, I think it was probably Reading 2003...I cant find my 01 pics, but Im sure they are similar :)

Times felt simpler then, it was ok to hug anyone you wanted, join a hoedown for no good reason and there was a van that sold as many hats as you wanted for £1. What more could you want :)

We had a few years following at Reading with some epic musical performances, Marylin Mansun on stilts, Green Day's burning set and an accoustic set from Staind (because of technical difficulties) all spring to mind. But there were so many more...

Someone told me that they hated Reading festival as it was like going to a festival in a car park, looking back, it was a bit...but that didn't stop it being the best weekend of the summer :)

In 2006 my best friend (selfishly :) ) chose August bank holiday weekend to get married and so Reading and I had to 'go on a break'. We haven't been back since :(

2006 we headed North to Download festival. I remember three things about Download. 1) There was an actual riot, 2) it was dusty 3) Someone set fire to the toilets when I was in them. Aside from the fact Download felt a little like a war zone, It was messy and we had fun...see I look happy...and tanned...tanned no doubt because of the dust!

After Download, clearly we had a taste for change and it was decided not to go back to Reading the following year so on it was to Rockness. Poles apart from the anger of Download. Rockness on the banks of Loch Ness was a much prettier festival. Well pretty apart from winning the award for the worst festival portaloos I have ever experienced ( Evidenced by the fact I saw a girl open the door of one and be so disgusted that she threw up on sight of what was inside...grim) Fortunately we had paid an extra few quid for 'VIP' tickets, which did not get you much extra other than flushing toilets & a rhubarb vodka bar but in the circumstances it was money well spent! Here I learned that the Scottish can drink an impressive amount of beer constantly for days. Heights of hardcore I will only ever aspire to. Im told that weekend I saw Kelis turn up in a helicopter, the chemical brothers and daft punk. In all honesty I mainly remember meeting a man called Lauren...

not sure which one Lauren was... :)

In 2009 we did camp bestival, which I have written about in a previous blog. In essence its a family festival which is great if you have kids, but not my usual choice. I wont bore you with that again anyway and I'll move on.

In 2008 we got confident and decided to venture abroad for our festival fun. Lowlands in the Netherlands is a brilliant, well organised festival, the weather even held out for us and again in 2010 when we popped back. I don't speak dutch but but festivals are supposed to be mad so the fact that everybody is speaking another language just adds to the charm. In any event, when drunk everyone understands each other fine :) Setting aside my love of the 'Reading' years Lowlands is probably the best festival I have attended.

One of the best 'last night' parties Ive been to. Kees Van Hondt's DJ set on the final night is a mad mix of people dancing with bits of tree or random inflatables. I don't know why, as I say, I don't speak dutch. I'm not actually sure if the dutch know either.. All I know, is that it is sheer brilliance! :)

So after the fabulousness of Lowlands I'm unsure if I have spoiled myself for the festival that I was so desperate to go to when I was a young un. The cleanliness of the Netherlands is to be swapped with what is almost guaranteed to be a mud bath. Im excited, Im scared and to be honest for £200 Im expecting great things. So come on Glastonbury...show me what you've got....

Toto I don't think we are in kansas anymore

Hey, Long time no post I know.

Have been busy being jet set which has been amazing. Decided to take a trip down under to the merry old land of Oz.

I arrived in Sydney with no expectations really, normally I spend weeks and weeks obsessively reading up on my chosen holiday destinations but for some reason Australia has never really excited me. I kind of always assumed it was mostly like England but with nicer weather and full of people who were obsessed with bbq food. Oh and I think someone said something about jellyfish.

In fact, so disorganised I was I didnt actually realise we needed a visa until the day of travel...doh! fortunately you can get them fairly easily online!

In truth, its not like England at all really. Its bloody massive for a start. England is the size of a tiny ant. I think going somewhere so big does make you feel tiny and insignificant on the scale of things.

Anyway...It all started well, sunshine, pizza, jugs of tooheys new and chilling in the big city. After 2 days we headed up to cairns. Id heard great things about cairns so I was actually a bit excited by this point to be going there.

And when we got there I was not disappointed. Beautiful day, and it looked gorgeous.

We arrived at our hostel where we were greeted by a typical chirpy aussie who checked us in

'hey guys, yep got you a room on the top floor tonight, but we are going to try to move everyone downstairs tomorrow'

'ok...(we look confused about the moving rooms situation)

'you don't know what Im talking about do you? didnt anyone tell you'

Now Im on my holidays I don't read the news papers and again at this point I was regretting not researching prior to travel.

With that, chirpy Aussie man, (still smiling) slaps a newspaper on the counter. On the front page was a picture of a large storm system...underneath, the headline read: 'The monster'

G U L P

'Yeah, so we are actually recommending everyone tries to leave cairns. There is a flight out to the gold coast tomorrow'

Rob and I look at each other, and just start laughing. Coming from a country where a light snowfall can shut an airport, neither of us have any experience of weather that is really any more extreme than a light drizzle.

Ah well says Rob 'its only a bit of wind'...'lets go for a beer'

Anyway...a few hours pass and we are not laughing so much any more. People are starting to look nervous. Severe Tropical Cyclone Yasi is upgraded to a category 5 storm system. We book a flight out. They close the airport. The storm is so large there is no point driving anywhere as there is not time to get out of its way. All there is to do, is sit back and take it.

6am Im up, not sleeping well due to jet lag and nightmares involving flying cows like in the film twister. When I log on to the news page on the internet the headlines read like the apocalypse. Nothing like media hype for when you need reassurance. The big news now is the potential storm surge, south of the centre of the cyclone the tidal surge is expected to reach 6 metres. The low lying areas are being evacuated. The army has flown everyone in Cairns hospital to Brisbane. One article actually uses the word tsunami.

Now I've never had to cope with any sort of disaster and I always thought I was someone that wasn't phased by much, but at this point, I'm ashamed to admit I cried like an 8 year old girl. No longer was I annoyed that some bad weather might ruin my holiday, this looked way worse.

We go to the supermarket to stock up on batteries, canned food etc. Its 7.30am and its very windy. The cyclone isn't even due to cross the coast until 11pm. Supermarket is obviously shut, we meet an american couple from our hostel on our way back.

'Is the supermarket closed' the guy says

'yeah' I reply

'all day?'

'yep there is a sign in the window'

'is it because of the cyclone?'

Now...if someone was to give an award for dumb questions that would be up there. No its closed because they have run out of eggs. I mean...seriously!!

The hostel makes the decision to ship us all out to an evacuation centre. The hostel is a wooden structure, and they are not sure how it will hold out.

The evacuation centre - the mall

It was an interesting night to say the least. 24 hours at close quarters with 3,000 other people. I still wish that the old guy sleeping near me wore some socks...seriously 24 hours with someones crusty feet in your face...no fun!

The red cross arrive and are brilliant. Ration packs are handed out and they update us hourly which as there is no TV is needed to stop everyone going nuts.

ration time!

The last red cross announcement is at 10pm then the power goes out 'cyclone yasi is a serious threat to life and property' yeah...thanks

I think I actually managed to fall asleep after then, fear is tiring. A baby was born in our evacuation centre there is a lot of howling an banging (from the cyclone, though I imagine the pregnant lady contributed) and after what seems like hours it goes quiet.

When we finally get let out, I initially think it has been some cruel joke to make me sleep in a mall as cairns is largely intact.

So in a nutshell (as I have to finish this now as rob wants feeding) it was only a bit of wind for us. Unfortunately some were less lucky and the winds did some serious damage to small communities on the coast. No fatalities fortunately but obviously for those who were effected its no joke.

Its days like that, that put life into perspective, and remind you to check whether its cyclone season before you take a holiday :)

thats all for now

Dawn category 5 crusader :) x