This time last year I was at Glastonbury (although it was a Wednesday). I have been lucky enough to experience the Glastonbury three times in a row from 2015-17. And while this may not grant me Glastonbury Veteran status I think it allows me to bestow on you tricks, tips and advice on what to expect and how to survive this festival of festivals. Even for regular festival goers “Glasto” can be a daunting prospect for your first time. So, if you battled through the pain of hammering the refresh button into a ticket position for the first time, these next few points may come in handy.
1. As soon as you are in, you are in. Unlike Reading or Leeds which has a checkpoint of alcohol Nazis to get through into the camping site and then another group of cider fascists to get to the stages, Glastonbury just has the one gate right at the start. No need to hide hipflasks down wellies or in various cavities. You can walk around with that warm can of Strongbow Dark Fruits to your hearts content.
2. Hygiene – Yes, it is a festival and yes, if you look hard enough and are dedicated enough there are showers but you need to find the festival fresh balance. Finding and having a festival shower is a time-consuming endeavour, time that could be better spent listening to bands and groups you have never heard of or exploring the different zones, of which there are many. But no one wants to be pressed up against a minger in the John Peel tent. To keep you fresh and everyone around you happy, take plenty of wet wipes or baby wipes for a wet wipe “shower”. There are water stations around the various camping areas with taps you could also use to wash but don’t be that person who decides to do it during the morning rush hour before the music starts. Other than the usual items from your wash kit, other items worthy of note are dry shampoo and sudocrem.
3. Use the flags. Glastonbury is famous for its flags. If your go to Glasto several years on the trot you may recognise several flags from previous years. You will also see some that will make you believe that the owners are the most creatively funny people in existence. Many flags you will see will be year specific, based on the acts that are performing that year. Chances are at some point during the festival you will separate form your group for an act only to try and find them later on. You will never find them. To better you chances, as a group choose a side of the stage and a rough geographical location on that side for you to meet back up. You can then use any of the flags currently in that area as more accurate marker for the group to find you or you them. Then as a reunited force you can curse all the other flags in front of you blocking the view of the stage.
4. You won’t be able to see all the acts you want to see or all the different fields and zones. And you won’t be able to see the ones you missed the following year because it will all be different. Accept it and embrace that you will be having your own completely different experience to everyone else.
5. Glastonbury is a “Contemporary Arts Festival”, not a music festival. Many people are there almost exclusively for the music but there is so much more going on! There is the Circus Area, the Green Fields (charity work and educational stuff going on there), the Crafting Field (where you can learn woodwork, metalwork, and leatherwork etc), The Temple, The Unfairground, Block 9, The Park, The Stone Circle and The Healing Fields (where you can get massages, reflexology and “cellular negative memory removal”). Do yourself a favour, turn up on the Wednesday and use Thursday to explore before heading to William’s Green for some music
6. Be adventurous with food. Three years attending Glastonbury, seventeen days of living in a field in Somerset, roughly 42 meals and I never ate at the same place twice. There is a ridiculous amount of variation and choice it would be such a waste not to push the boat out.
7. Wellies. This should go unsaid. It’s a summer festival in England so if I am yet to make myself clear on the matter, wellies, take them. And make sure they fit and are as comfortable as you will be doing a lot of walking!
8. Toilets. As festival toilets go they are generally not too bad, although you may be the unlucky person to come across the one where everything missed. You have your bog standard (get it!) long drops along with compost toilets, all of which are cleaned regularly by the dedicated Hygiene Team. This lot deserve medals. Queuing protocol for them is fairly standard. You either line up directly in front of the one you want to use if they are on the outside of the block or in a single line for the next available one in the central stalls. If possible, use one that has just been used by a female. It will probably be left in a better condition. Each block with have hand sanitiser pumps or taps with them but it is not unknown for them to be empty so bring your own. Finally, always have an emergency length of loo roll on your person. You never know when you may deviate from your usual rhythms. I had to abandon a show and run straight past an Idris Elba DJ set because no one I was with had any.
9. Sex. No idea about this one, ask someone else.
10. Drugs. A full day of standing up doesn’t do my back much good so its paracetamol and ibuprofen for me. Others at the festival could suggest and maybe even provide something else.
11. Rock ‘n’ Roll. Yes please, and lots of it.
12. Its busy as hell! Imagine the London tubes at rush hour then add a few more thousand people and you will have an idea.
I asked friends what they would suggest or recommend to people going for the first time at Glastonbury. The most useless was about Pokemon Go so it got ignored, others were more useful. Look at the line-up, listen to the unknown artists and plan who you are going to see before you get there. Accept you won’t be clean, eat or drink well while you are there so don’t worry about the diet. From a girl I got don’t bother with a she-wee, take shorts and tights, not jeans or leggings (there is a difference between leggings and tights apparently). Take ear plugs, string to fix things or tie you sleeping bag up with if you lose the bag in the mud, a fan (electric or old school manual, dealers choice with that one), electrolytes or caffeine sachets and a small day bag you don’t mind possibly writing off.
The most common thing I got was be to be “open minded”, to explore as much as you can and try new things. The Tepee field hosts naked yoga on Thursdays so I shall see you there.
