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I'm not going to lie, I know that Glastonbury is a massively popular festival and tickets are like gold dust, but I was apprehensive about camping on a farm for 4 days with the high likelihood of rain and mud. I don't really like mud. So with that positive outlook we got on our bus from London to Glastonbury farm for 4 days of camping, music and madness.
The bus trip involved an unexpected view of Stonehenge as we drove past..... Like a really good view.... So TICK. The bus trip also involved an unexpected expulsion of stomach contents into a plastic bag after a large night out at gordons wine bar the night before. Luckily it was just prior to a food stop and I nervously, nibbled on some Burger King chicken nuggets which seemed to settle things down. We arrived at the farm (without further incident) and right on cue, the heavens opened and for the next 12 hours it rained steadily. I wasn't the best company as we sloshed and slid everywhere through the instantaneous mud, but my 6 pound primark green wellies with bows on them held up. I wet wiped everything before getting into our snug two man tent and hoping that the next day called for sunshine.
Before I continue I need to talk about our tent area. Its called tangerine fields and it involved them setting up your tent for you before you arrive, port a loos only for the people in the campsite, a pamper parlour with hair dryers and hair straighteners and the holy grail of hot showers. It was worth every cent we paid, especially as we found out, for the port a loos. As a very non-extreme human being, this luxury really made me happy.
We woke up the next day to sun and in my case a much sunnier disposition. We met with our group of peeps and had a we had a wander around the village of glastonbury festival. The place is pretty amazing, 150,000 people for 3 days of music, food stalls, 24 hour supermarkets, cabaret, a circus, children's area, bars and clubs, a myriad of music stages and much to our New Zealand delight a green peace cafe with Allpress coffee (this place turned into our daily coffee and debrief, it was beautiful). After soothing our souls with good coffee we decided our Glastonbury music experience should commence. The day started with us dabbling in a bit of The Hives before venturing to listen to an All girl, American rock band called Haim which had all the boys drooling. Myself and Jo (the only other girl) got our pop on to Rita Ora and I awkwardly head nodded along to alt-j (these guys are great, but honestly there is no dancing to their music). As the sun went down we got our happy on as we watched Foals on the Other Stage. After me protesting I didn't know any of their music it turns out I knew every song and much enthusiastic dancing and sitting on peoples shoulders ensued. Sitting on someone's shoulders at Glastonbury defies belief as for one, I can actually see the stage and performers for once, but as you turn your back to the stage and look over the heaving mass of the crowd you realise just how massive this festival is, and you get pretty excited. After the amazing experience of Foals our wee group split up due to different musical preferences and Dan and I literally skipped to the main Pyramid Stage (well I skipped, Dan I'm sure sauntered manly or something) to see the Arctic Monkeys. This was something I was looking forward to and they didn't disappoint. I bet that I looked good on the dance floor (grass) as Dan and I got our dancing shoes on (I apologise for that but I couldn't help myself). Their encore was great with the crowd signing happy birthday to Alex Turner's mum who was in the crowd (how cute!). First day at Glastonbury exceeded expectations and my bad mood was a mere distant memory as we trudged home to our wee tent.
Day two started with, you guessed it, Allpress coffee and to my delight a bacon buttie!! Happiness is really quite simple. The second day was a bit less intense music wise as the only thing that was on my to do list was to watch the Rolling Stones who were Saturday nights headliner. I was simply happy to tag along behind other more musically educated people and take in the sunshine and great sounds. The Stones were on at 9.30pm on the main stage, so we thought we would go early and get a good spot. Unfortunately, pretty much every other person at Glastonbury had the same idea but their early was much earlier than ours and we ended up far enough away that Mick Jagger looked about the size of my pinky finger. It did not distract at all from the show and it was a show. They played all their classic hits and the crowd did get their satisfaction (sorry I did it again). The finale involved fireworks and a giant, robotic bird coming to life the top of the stage. Not sure what the point of it was but it was spectacular. According to reports 100,000 people packed in to watch these icons in leather pants do their thing and they killed it.
A vicious rumour had been doing the rounds of the tents that Daft Punk would be playing a DJ set at 2am so thousands of gullible people (yes include us in this) stampeded to where they were rumoured to be playing. Where they were rumoured to be playing was in fact a giant robotic spider (seeing a theme here?) that had fire shooting from its legs and the DJ booth was in the body of the spider, glastonbury doesn't do things by halves. The rumour turned out to be just that, but hard to be disappointed when fat boy slim and chase and status fill in. As I have a finite amount of time I can listen to this music I pulled the nana card after about an hour and tottered back to my tent. NB: no rain today, none.
Day three started (much later) with Allpress coffee (we are creatures of habit) but to my disappointment I couldn't find my bacon buttie stand. We had to settle for a wood fired pizza, tough life. By day three the port a loos and other human waste troughs had started to emit a terrible stench so you had to be strategic and not stand down wind. If you were unfortunate enough to have to use one you just held your breathe, closed your eyes and dry retched it out, followed by hand sanitizering your hands and arms up to your shoulders. As we walked around glastonbury on this last day, Jo and I couldn't help but marvel at the way some girls looked like they just stepped out of a hair salon, whereas we looked at our reflections in windows and shuddered. Honestly don't know how they did it. Music in our last day started with the Swedish sister duo of First Aid Kit, they were amazing a definite album purchase and another round of boy drooling commenced. The surprise of glastonbury was up next on the main stage..... Kenny Rogers. We went as we wanted a good spot for Vampire Weekend who was on after and ended up having the time of our lives! I lead the group in a spot of line dancing and Jo and I composed an amazing dance to the iconic 'The Gambler' (it basically was made up of literal moves to the chorus words, but it was spectacular none the less). Kenny knew what the crowd wanted and his encore was a repeat of 'the gambler' and 'island in the sun'. Who knew Kenny was such an entertainer! Vampire Weekend were stunning and were followed by the big finale of Mumford and Sons. I am biased as I love the banjo playing, British folk rock band, but they really came to the party. Just a surreal experience. The final song was a cover of The Beatles "with a little help from my friends" and all the bands who played on main stage that day were involved, you should youtube it, it was glorious.
At the end our little group looked at one another and decided that was a perfect way to end our Glastonbury experience. We got a final beer and found a nice piece of grass and sat in a circle and reminisced over our favourite Glastonbury moments. Then we all said goodnight and that was that.
Nothing I can write can adequately describe the unique experience that is Glastonbury Festival of Music and Contemporary Arts, but if you ever find yourself a golden ticket then get along and have the time of your life.
NB: As I write this we are all suffering from post-glastonbury depression.
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