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Four-day musical and cultural extravaganza held at Easter each year, on the outskirts of Canberra. If you love Womad, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival or anything similar, you'll love the atmosphere at 'the National'; by the end of the weekend you won't want to go home. Except to sleep. And think about coming back again next year. Not only is it a multicoloured musical and dance fest (and inspired craft fair) the whole site becomes a large village for interstate festival goers to live in for the weekend (drive-up b.y.o. accommodation on site). Motels are close by for those who love their creature comforts, and shops if you need milk for your 'billy tea'. If you need some time out from festivalling, a walk round the nearby leafy inner suburbs on a sunny autumn afternoon is peaceful and provides stunning views of lovingly kept neighborhood gardens. Oh yes, as with any music festival, if you are staying on site - don't forget to take good ear plugs with you! The music keeps going as long as people are awake enough to play it ...
www.folkfestival.asn.au/
Google map: tinyurl.com/lb4b26
It's free! OK, it's only one day so no camping as such but you'll be struggling to find such a mixture of attendees from hardcore hippies to grans and granchildren, plus a fine selection of music.
Midsummer Common, Cambridge, 6th June 2009 www.strawberry-fair.org.uk
Get your self an old telescopic fishing pole and attach "individually made" flag / cuddly toy / inflatable banana... Anything that takes your fancy and parade yourself round the festival in the knowledge that your friends will always find you. Can also be stuck outside your tent to draw back your friends after hours of dancing / trudging (in mud) and general festival antics.
Also check out the Oxford Cowley Rd Festival. A day of great music, authentic food from a huge number of places, arts and crafts and loads more... Check it out - Sunday 6th July!
www.glastonburyfestivals.co.uk/
www.cowleyroadcarnival.co.uk/
If it's going to be a long hot festival summer, then try putting these sheets over your tent. They reflect the sunlight away, keeping you cooler!
A beautiful, quirky boutique party, where anything goes as long as it glitters!
DO: Take sparkles, dressing up materials and all your eccentricity.
DON'T: Take the programme too literally - while the bands are all just about on time, some of the 'Action Camps' (tents full of various wonderful weirdness) don't open when they say they will, or even exist!
They'll only tell you when you get tickets.
If you’re looking for a Festival without the mud and with all the best bands then why not go to Belgium? Travel is easier and just as quick as getting to most of the UK festivals. Book the Eurostar (it only cost me £70 last year) and you can relax until you get into Brussels. The rest of the travel is free with your festival ticket. So no worries about your carbon footprint!
It seems all the decent bands split between the UK festivals meet up in Belgium for one big event. Rock Werchter has won the ILMC Arthur Award for the four times in the last five years demonstrating that things are much more organized and as a bonus there is better chance of avoiding the rain.
Give it a go and you will be going back year after year.
Werchter, Belgium
The best kept secret for the last two years, a lovely friendly house music festival tucked away on a beautiful site in Devon, with hot showers on tap and loos with flowers in them that smell as sweet on the sunday as they did on friday! Great house music from local DJs and musicians in the South West such as Kinky Movement, DIY, Magic Hanstand, Duvet Vous? and Fruity Antics plus many more, plus 360 degree projection madness from the Igloo fellas (who graced last year's Glastonbury). So friendly you'll wonder why you ever went to a big festival:
www.greenfieldsweekender.co.uk/
Braunton, Devon www.greenfieldsweekender.co.uk/
Tel: 07724355561
Email: greenfieldsweekender@live.com
Fabulous foreign shindig held in September, the African springtime. Imagine the Burning Man meets Afrika in the desert reaches and surrounding mountains of the Tankwa Karoo, South Africa. A lightning moment of environmentally alert creativity manifested in a myriad of art forms. Join in the fun or just take the opportunity to camp out under a million stars and become bewitched by the passing show.
Festivals in London have been cropping up more frequently in recent years. Mostly they're one-dayers, like the O2 shows; or events that run in a series of venues on back to back days, like the Stag and Dagger festival or the Camden Crawl. In a sense these aren't really festivals, more a string of back to back gigs in a typically uptight London gig going atmosphere.
The upside of London festivals is how little it will cost you to get about if you're in and about London. That benefit is massively outweighed by watered down, over-priced festival beer.
My favourite London festival is set away from the centre of town, near Hainault Forest. It's a two-dayer, with super-early bird tickets coming in at £35 (and sadly sold out) and early bird tickets going for £45. The line up this year is pretty solid. A Certain Ratio and The Slits playing amid a veritable horde of young talent, and the vibe of the festival is much more laid back than you get in the centre of town. Being out somewhere green and connecting with nature overnight does tend to chill people out, comparing favourably to being stuck in a grimy, too familiar city setting, wondering if you'll get in to see the band that everyone wants to see in a venue that's probably much too small for the entire festival crowd to squeeze into. Some of last years Concrete and Glass patrons were heard to remark that that was all they saw when trying to get in to TV on the Radio at Koko last year.
Also, while Offset still falls into the weak, expensive beer trap, you can drink as much as you like of what you can bring in to the camping area of the site, which is well served for water and toilets too. If last year's experience is a guide, the campsite isn't a Reading/Leeds style warzone either.
It's on over the 5th and 6th September, near the temperate end of the scorching festival season. In my opinion, it's a cheaper, better alternative to the major festivals. Give it a look.
Whether you are exceptionally late or unfeasibly early when you arrive at the festival, never panic pitch your tent. However tired you are, and however much gear you have, avoid the temptation to pitch your tent near one of the the walkways or near one of the stages. If you do and the weather turns to s**t it'll be like camping in a first world war trench. And if the weather is good you'll be living in a dust storm for the weekend with the march of the living dead keeping you awake all night as they tramp right past your front door. Keep your spirits up and keep walking. There are always spaces in the more distant camping fields however full it seems when you arrive. An extra 10-15 minutes trek is worth it to get a great camping spot that you can enjoy for the entire festival and where you can relax when you want a break from the partying. Have a great time.
You know those cool backpacks that cyclists and serious walkers/runners wear on their backs to have on tap refreshment during activity? They are just as effective with any drink you choose. Avoid the queues at the drinks tents and fill the 'water bag' with your chosen vice. We found that mixed summer fruits with a bottle of Pimms and lots of lemonade did a splendid job of refershing throughout the long hot days at the Big Chill. And we did it very responsibly!
Any good outdoors activity shop (and probably at some bad ones too!)
The Perks:
It's free
Roads are closed in the city to make way for over six large outdoor stages dotted on and around the city centre roads.
My favourite tip - take your own beer.
There's all music, not just the Beatles. I was very excited about the Brit pop acts but some of us headed for northern soul dancing fun while my 'down south friends' enjoyed the Beatles/Merseybeat tours.
Watching a Brazilian Beatles cover band. Bands come from all over the world and their performances are superb.
Were you an original mod/rocker? The live bands could have been plucked right from the 1960's, they make the effort to dress the part and banter with the audience as though we're just hearing 'Do wah Diddy' or 'Needles and Pins' for the first time
If you're booked up for Creamfields the same weekend then you can carry on your festival fun on the Sunday as the Matthew Street festival is over Sunday and Bank Holiday Monday (and its only a 30min train ride away.)
If you're not into cover tribute bands then visit the fringe festival that runs at the same time and watch all new signed and unsigned bands
My Personal favourite bars can all be googled:
Korova; I enjoy the bands Hot Club de Paris and Elle S'apelle and they are playing here this year. Check their myspace.
Heebie Jeebies: Dance to Northern Soul all night.
JR's Bar and Grill: right by Central and Lime Street Station for excellent grill food with various heavy and light options. Plus they have live music.
Make your own bunting or flags to mark out your tent amongst the others. Buy some and the chances are others will have too - this leaves you open to flayling into the wrong tent after a hard days festivalling having confidently 'identified' it as yours. Make your own and no-one will have the same! Personally i'm aiming for flamingo and poodle bunting this year.
It is a well established fact that when visiting festivals in the UK one should always take wellies "just in case" it rains. It took a visit to the first Malmesbury Womad, however to teach me the following: never leave your wellies outside the tent for the magic of Womad enables them to walk away. I imagine it's the music that draws them, as they tend to take other items, such as stools, with them this is not to be encouraged. Thus keep your wellies in your sight and always inside your tent.
A second tip: dont try to dance in 18 inches of mud especially if your wellies have strayed. You never know what's down there and it may not be very savory. Instead, use it to gently soothe your skin and choose more sublime music to chillout to.
An umbrella at a festival can be handy for rainy days (and nights) but can also double up as a parasol. Being in the sun all day is lovely but there comes a point when you can not take any more, and some festivals have more shade than others.
Any festival, Glastonbury Festival
Fancy dress is a winner every time at a festival, UK or abroad and there are so many reasons why.
1. If there are a group of you, you'll stand out (you may get a pic or two in the press or get on telly!)
2. It's also easier to find each other.
3. You don't need to worry about what to pack clothes-wise! A couple of spare pairs of pants and socks and you're good to go - no fashion dilemmas!
4. You can easily add to or take away from a fancy dress outfit if you're creative! So you can adapt it whatever the weather, rain or shine!
5. Wellies can be painted and decorated to fit any costume, so you'll be fine at the UK festivals!
It's a win win situation. Go on get dressed up! Oh and a sensible tip - take a stapler becaue it mends all fancy dress mishaps!
Recently went to Glastonbury after a 20 year gap! This time with three children, top items to take; waterproof trousers and head torches. Water proof trousers as you can sit anywhere and not worry if the ground is wet, dry or in our case especially muddy. Head torches are great when you need the loo in the middle of the night, have you tried balancing a conventional torch, loo roll and pulling trousers up in the dark at the same time, whilst hoping no one opens the less than secure door? Headtorches are the way!
Paint your tent in heavy duty supreme glow in the dark/ day-glo paint so you'll never miss your alien spaceship (tent)! and if theres any paint left paint yourself (not eyes or teeth) and become a space man/woman.
in a bottle or a tube or a tin.
The beach at Fegina is dominated by the famous concrete statue of the Giant, built beside the terrace of a local villa. Representing Neptune, the god of the sea, and despite today having no arms, trident and a leg, this massive sculpture is nonetheless impressive! Monterosso al Mare is the most western town of the Cinque Terre. The village is protected by hills covered with vineyard and olive groves and has beautiful beaches, steep rugged cliffs and crystalline waters.
The main train station is La Spezia. Here you need to take a regional train that stops in every Cinque Terra town.
Glastonbury festival has something for everyone. Particular favourites of mine are the tiny tea tent because you can relax in a yurt or on wooden hand crafted furniture while drinking any kind of tea or chai under the sun. Also Henry's Beard cafe in the Green fields has yummy vegetarian curry which is hearty and warm making it a great choice when cold and wet.
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