Festival Season is in full swing, with both small and huge Festivals taking place all over the UK. If you’re heading to your first festival this Summer, or even if you’re a seasoned pro, have a look at our top tips for getting the most out of the weekend and coming safely out the other end...
Packing
Don’t go for the cheapest tent you can find – whilst these are often lighter and easier to assemble, you’ll be much warmer, drier and overall comfier in a mid-range model. A good rule of thumb is to buy a ‘size up’ (i.e. a 2-man tent if you’re alone, a 4-man tent for 3 people, etc) to make sure you’ve got enough room inside the tent.
English Festivals can be a bit of a mine field in terms of weather, so packing a small amount of clothes for almost all conditions is usually the best idea. A pair of shorts and t shirts for the sun, and some thick leggings or jeans and a hoodie for evenings and if the weather cools down. Whilst pack-a-macs can be the ugliest things on the planet, they’re also useful for keeping you dry and for sitting on, so make sure to keep one with you throughout the festival.
Most festivals have showers, so if you fancy braving the queues you can be fresh and clean every day. But you might as well embrace the full on festival experience and let yourself get a bit grubby for once – baby wipes, hand sanitizer and dry shampoo are all you really need.
A good rule of thumb for festivalgoers is ‘if you can’t bear to lose it, leave it at home.’ Opt for a few disposable cameras and a cheap £10 burner phone and leave the smartphone and DSLR at home where they will both be much less likely to be stolen. Good old-fashioned film photos will probably look trendier on your social media feed anyway.
Planning
Eating 3 basic meals every day at a festival will probably cost you around £30 daily, and that’s not factoring in alcohol or the purchase of any cool merchandise you might see. Before you go to the festival, it’s a good idea to decide whether you’re going to take food with you (energy bars, pot noodles, cereal, crisps, alcohol etc) or you’re going to buy everything once you’re there, and budget accordingly.
Lots of people drive to festivals, which is a great idea if you have a larger party but even if there’s only a couple of you, you can always play good Samaritan and give a stranger a lift – check social media for people looking to hitch a ride to the campground (they might even pay you back with beer).
If you’re a pedestrian and can’t get a lift, most bus and train stations around the festival location will be running shuttle bus services to and from the grounds, but these sometimes have to be pre-booked so make sure to plan ahead and reserve your seat.
On Arrival
After queuing for entrance wristbands and getting your bags checked, you’re going to have to find somewhere to camp. Hopefully you’re early to the party and have plenty of space to choose from, but be mindful of a few rules of thumb:
There’s going to be plenty of space near the toilets to camp, and there’s a very stinky reason for this. Don’t be tempted to pitch there; by day 2 you’re going to regret it.
If there’s a chance of rain (and let’s face it, we’re in the UK so there undoubtedly will be), avoid camping at the bottom of a hill or slope as the water will naturally run down to your tent.
Patches of grass near paths and walkways will get much boggier than those further afield, and the same goes for campsites close to the main stages. These areas are high trafficked, so if you’re planning on getting a half decent night’s sleep it’s best to avoid them at all costs.
Affix something to your tent that you’ll be able to recognize at night when you’re wandering through the sea of tents. Once everyone’s pitched up and there’s less light, every tent is going to look the same and you don’t want to accidentally trespass into someone else’s. You can buy pretty flags online, or make your own, or even attach some kind of stuffed toy to a stick to help you identify your own tent(s).
It’s always good to be nice to your camp neighbours – you might actually make friends with them, or at the very least you’ll have one less person who might want to trash your tent when you’re not there.
Enjoying Yourself
The festival itself is (hopefully) going to be the highlight of your year, and the main thing is to have fun and make memories. You’ll have less fun with alcohol poisoning and/or dehydration, so make sure you’re drinking as much water as you can and keep the beers to a minimum. You’ll probably be having such a good time that you’ll forget to eat, but make sure you have a couple of substantial meals each day (including some veggies if you can) to soak up all that alcohol and nourish your body.
We can all hope that the weekend of the festival will be full of glorious sunshine, but it will probably rain, so make sure to change out of wet/muddy clothes before you go to sleep. In the miraculous event that the sun shines, make sure to wear a hat and sun cream – heatstroke and sunburn are real killjoys and might ruin your experience.
Keep your ID, bank cards, cash and phone on your person at all times. A secure backpack or bum bag will give you freedom to dance whilst keeping your valuables safe and looks the part – or you can go all out and get one of those neck wallets to wear under your top. Sure, they’re nerdy, but they do the job.
Leaving
Festival grounds are a nightmare for discarded tents and general rubbish, which isn’t helping the environment. When leaving the festival, whilst it might be tempting to just abandon that annoying tent (it’s going to take ages to disassemble and you can just buy a new one next year, right?), make sure to take it and everything else with you. Some sites have tent recycling services if your tent is still usable, so you don’t have to take it all the way home if you don’t want to.
As awful as it sounds, getting up early to leave the campsite is usually the best idea – there will be far less people trying to get out and therefore next to no traffic on the way home. A good plan is to pack as much up as you can the night before to save time in the morning.
