Article: Ten things you should and shouldn't do at a festival this summer
If you're going to a festival this summer, you may need to know some of the do's and don'ts at a festival. The Student Room has put together a list of 10 things that you should and shouldn't do at a festival. Here they are: http://www.thestudentroom.co.uk/content.php?r=17049-Ten-things-you-should-and-shouldn-t-do-at-a-festival-this-summer
If you have anything to add, how about commenting below!
If you have anything to add, how about commenting below!
(edited 8 years ago)
Scroll to see replies
Original post by OU Student
I was told not to put a padlock on my tent - it implies you've got something valuable in there.
Good advice.
I wouldn't take anything valuable with me to a festival
This was painful to read - comma splicing galore. And the wrong 'there'.
Dreadfully messy and horrendously white indie. Underground nightclub or warehouse rave everytime.
Original post by OU Student
I was told not to put a padlock on my tent - it implies you've got something valuable in there.
This is excellent advice. If someone wants to get into your tent then a tiny padlock isnt going to do bugger all, they'll just slash the side of it with a knife.
Also; Keep all valuables hidden even when you are in the tent at night. Ideally put them at the bottom of your sleeping bag. Thieves do sometimes go into tents at night and shine a torch in your eyes to rob you while youre disorientated.
Original post by Reue
This is excellent advice. If someone wants to get into your tent then a tiny padlock isnt going to do bugger all, they'll just slash the side of it with a knife.
Also; Keep all valuables hidden even when you are in the tent at night. Ideally put them at the bottom of your sleeping bag. Thieves do sometimes go into tents at night and shine a torch in your eyes to rob you while youre disorientated.
Also; Keep all valuables hidden even when you are in the tent at night. Ideally put them at the bottom of your sleeping bag. Thieves do sometimes go into tents at night and shine a torch in your eyes to rob you while youre disorientated.
Why don't people wear night blind folds then? They can no longer blind you!
Or wear sunglasses.
Oh, DO enjoy. Well, ****.
Q&As from glasto 2008. I'm not going this year (no tickets 
first I've missed since 2003).
A few questions from a Glasto virgin:
1. When should I arrive?
2. Is the Pyramid Stage worth the bother? Looking over the lists, there's only a few that I want to see at all. Is the Pyramid Stage worth it, considering its size
3. What do you do for food and drink? Is it really expensive?
4. What's the easiest way to get there on public transport from Birmingham?
5. Any particular stages to recommend?
6. How easy is it to muscle your way to the front/muscle your way out for a piss/muscle your way back in?
7. How dirty is it?
8. What essentials do I need to bring? Survival tips?
9. Is there a lot of drugs going around? Is it easy to avoid?
10. Do you meet lots of new people?
11. What are the demographics like? I'll be going with a load of teenagers, but I've heard from some sources that it's full of families, 50 year-olds etc... This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I'm just interested
12. How easy is it to lose/find people again?
13. Will I have fun leaving my group and seeing a couple of bands on my own?
14. How do you know when/where bands are on? Is it easy to flit from stage to stage, seeing the bands of your choice, or do you end up sitting through a lot of crap?
15. Do you sleep/eat much?
16. Are there loads of nutters running around setting things on fire?
17. Is there much crime? Will I probably lose my new phone?
18. Any clothing tips? How to deal with **** weather?
19. Is it prohibitively huge, or does it get easy to find your way around eventually?
20. What time do the acts start/stop? does much happen on the Wed/Thurs?
21. Anything else I need to know
1. As early as possible - preferably wednesday morning but if it's a choice between wednesday night and thursday morning arrive on wednesday night (BUT BRING TORCHES) unless the weather forecast is atrocious. My first glasto we arrived on thursday evening, we hadn't practiced putting our tent up so failled to get it up properly, got it semi-erect and the bugger blew down. We spent the weekend sleeping in the car (which has it's own charms but makes things pretty hard work).
2. The Pyramid stage is in a natural amphitheatre - it's a very nice stage (for a biggun). However it's **** if you're wanting to get near the front - I was at the front for REM in 03 but that involved me getting there in time to watch Suede, david Grey (?) and another band first - and even then I was only near enough to pass my bag over to security to keep hold of behind the fence and to *just about* be near enough to touch the fence (and being a muppet I kept allowing shorter people in front of me ). It's LOVELY during the day or from the back - during the day it's got a really nice laid back atmosphere - there's usually grass to sit on (even when it's muddy) if you go back abit. I usually eat my breakfast in front of the pyramid if it's not belting it down.
3. The food is AMAZING. I don't take any cooking equipment or food I just take cash. It's not overly expensive (it's certainly a lot cheaper than NEC/stadium food). The prices are regulated by glastonbury - in 2014 it was restricted to £7.50 for a meat main meal, £6 for a vegetarian main meal and £1.50 for soft drinks. It's very easy to find cheaper prices than this (and of course remember that a main meal varies from "a burger" at the greasy burger vans to "a full serving of potatoes and meat from le grande bouffe" to "massive portoins of vege curry, rice, dhaal and naan bread" from the green fields) in fact the hare krishna's will feed you for free of you end up skint (they're usually near to the orange phone tent). Bearing in mind that I go for 5 1/2 days and I stuff my face almost constantly (they kept tempting me with sponge cake and/or nachos last year) I spend in total around £150 on food and drink - that's just under £25 a day or £7.50 per meal (drinks do add to the price quite a lot).
If you're looking to save money on food then bring a decent water bottle and refill it from the taps, bring something to have for breakfast so you aren't tempted by the gorgeous food everywhere and set yourself a budget per day and stick to it (it'd be quite easy to get by on £15 a day for food if you just ate when you're hungry and didn't buy soft drinks)
4. I have no idea. The nearest train station is castle cary and there are free shuttle buses to and from there - in 2007 on the monday there was an ENORMOUS problem with the buses which has supposedly been sorted out but meant that most people were waiting for 3hrs or so to get on a bus to the station which was pretty miserable.
5. Acoustic stage is lovely - usually a really nice atmosphere, very relaxed and worth the walk up to it in a muddy year.
The Glade is nice if you fancy a bit of a dance.
The west holts stage is great - it's actually the 3rd biggest stage and home to Brothers Pear Cider stall but it hosts acts who're a bit less well known than the John peel tent so it gets ignored by the NME. There's also the avalon stage in the next field (plus avalon cafe) if you fancy a change.
The Leftworld tent is FANTASTIC - very good if it's a bit wet because it's all inside and home to billy bragg and tony benn (no more
)as well as music, comedy and a whole bunch of other stuff. Billy bragg roundup most afternoons is well worth a visit to see someone new.
If you're at a loose end on Sunday early evening then Speakers Corner is worth looking into - every year Michael Eavis (who runs the show) does a Q&A session in there around 6pm ish. Last year and the year before he was followed by tony benn (this is in a tiny tent with a max of about 40 people in it
I always gravitate towards the Caberet tent - swear the comedy mainly happens and it's great
Stages I hate:
Other stage (just nasty)
John Peel (hate the stage)
6. Depends entirely on the stage/act - it's not that hard to push through but most people who absolutely want to get the to front for a particular act get there VERY early (see my above story re: REM headlining the pyramid).
7. Depends on the weather this year it will be scorching and dry and wonderful - to ensure this happens you must bring some wellies
8. Wet wipes, a blanket for the evenings to wrap up in while still out, wellies, if it's forecast to be even slightly wet then either bring a folding chair or buy one (they were for sale last year for £10) after you arrive - not sitting down anywhere for 4/5/6 days is hard work...most important SMILE
9. Yes there is a LOT of weed about. However it's not in a negative way - my mum last year went from being very anti-drugs pre festival to saying she was quite sad that she'd never had an opportunity to try it out when she was younger. If you head for the stone circle you'll hear people selling EVERYTHING (apart from acid - apparently it's almost impossible to source onsite) but even there there's no pressure. I don't think my cousin really noticed the drugs at all when she went - it's very much treated as a background understated part of the festival -noone shoves it in your face but if you look for it you'll see it everywhere.
10. Yes if you put in the effort, smile, say hello and most people will be happy to have a chat with you - Glastonbury is how the world should be in in this respect.
11. It's very mixed - if you hang around the john peel area it's full of teenagers, the road along the back of the pyramid stage is always full of old (ish) people (40s or so - they nab the camping spots and stay there all weekend), the bars near the pyramid stage are the main place where you find lager louts (so I always avoid). The east holts area (caberet, circus tent/field and theatre) and avalon/green fields are the main place where there are kids and the green fields houses the old hippies. It's still quite a young festival but the timing often means there aren't that many students (it clashes with exams most year so A level/uni students aren't as common as at reading on august bank holiday).
12. Very easy to lose people, very difficult to find them again unless you actually arrange a sensible meeting point (there's a main meeting point near Williams green/tony benn tower) - meeting people at stages is just not worth trying.
13. yes yes YES do it - if there's an afternoon/evening when something is on that you want to see then go and do it.
14. The program that you get on arrival has the full listings in it. I usually use that, plus the clashfinder (once it's finalised) to put together a rough schedule of when my MUST SEE acts are on. Don't expect to be able to leave one stage and get to another in time for the next act - leave yourself about an acts length of time to get between stages - more if it's muddy. I've sat through a lot of bands that I've never heard of but I wouldn't call any of them crap.
15. Personally yes and yes - but then I'm a lazy greedy pig . I try to stay up to see the sunrise at the stone circle one night but apart from that I usually crash by about 1/2am at the latest (). If it's sunny then sleeping in a tent during the day is awful so I'm usually up and about by 8/9am (but I'll sometimes have a nap in the afternoon - either back in my tent or at one of the stages). See food comments above - I personally have 4 meals a day while I'm at glasto
16. No, not at all. There are nutters but they're pretty much the harmless confused nutters that people will make sure to put a blanket over when they've passed out.
17. Yes there's crime but not much. The festival has a population larger than bath - and a much lower crime rate. If you're worried about your phone then there are FREE property lock ups run by charities (also a source of free loo roll) that you can leave stuff in. You're most likely to lose your phone due to losing it than to crime.
18. Layers, lots of layers. Bring wellies and waterproof trousers (not sexy but if it's nasty then they're worth it). With waterproof trousers I only take 1 pair of jeans [plus the ones I wear to travel] (waterproofs keep the mud off them). A decent waterproof jacket is worthwhile (though lots of people take ponchos?) too. I take my wellies, trainers and crocs and wear the wellies to travel in. Bring plenty of socks because wet socks are nasty. And bring a woolly hat for sleeping in (it gets very cold at night). If you bring this all it will be blazing sunshine and you'll be wearing t shirts and shorts all weekend ;yes;.
19. I was completely overwhelmed in 97 - had no idea. In 2003 I had my bearings by thursday and since then I've always found it quite easy to navigate. However my mum was USELESS at navigating. On arrival go to an info point in the markets and get a copy of the A3 full map - it's really detailed and much nicer than the one in the program. Mark your campsite on it so that you can find it again after a million other tents have sprung up blocking your way.
20. The Park, the dance tents and lost vagueness (or whatever has replaced it) go on until 3/4am. The main stages shut down at midnight ish. There's a party at the stone circle until dawn at 4/5am and for a few hours after that. There are a few things that are on on thursday officially, even more things on unofficially. Wednesday is usually a pretty quite evening/day (but the stone circle will always be busy unless it's pissing it down and cold).
21. I can't think of anything right now but watch this space.....
]I thought of another - most important of all - tip
Avoid the portaloos - the long drops might take a bit of getting used to but they don't smell so bad and at least the drop is long (while the turdis's suffer from "heaping" which can make clearance an issue if you don't want to squat on the seat)
The compost loos are AMAZING.
first I've missed since 2003). A few questions from a Glasto virgin:
1. When should I arrive?
2. Is the Pyramid Stage worth the bother? Looking over the lists, there's only a few that I want to see at all. Is the Pyramid Stage worth it, considering its size
3. What do you do for food and drink? Is it really expensive?
4. What's the easiest way to get there on public transport from Birmingham?
5. Any particular stages to recommend?
6. How easy is it to muscle your way to the front/muscle your way out for a piss/muscle your way back in?
7. How dirty is it?
8. What essentials do I need to bring? Survival tips?
9. Is there a lot of drugs going around? Is it easy to avoid?
10. Do you meet lots of new people?
11. What are the demographics like? I'll be going with a load of teenagers, but I've heard from some sources that it's full of families, 50 year-olds etc... This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I'm just interested
12. How easy is it to lose/find people again?
13. Will I have fun leaving my group and seeing a couple of bands on my own?
14. How do you know when/where bands are on? Is it easy to flit from stage to stage, seeing the bands of your choice, or do you end up sitting through a lot of crap?
15. Do you sleep/eat much?
16. Are there loads of nutters running around setting things on fire?
17. Is there much crime? Will I probably lose my new phone?
18. Any clothing tips? How to deal with **** weather?
19. Is it prohibitively huge, or does it get easy to find your way around eventually?
20. What time do the acts start/stop? does much happen on the Wed/Thurs?
21. Anything else I need to know
1. As early as possible - preferably wednesday morning but if it's a choice between wednesday night and thursday morning arrive on wednesday night (BUT BRING TORCHES) unless the weather forecast is atrocious. My first glasto we arrived on thursday evening, we hadn't practiced putting our tent up so failled to get it up properly, got it semi-erect and the bugger blew down. We spent the weekend sleeping in the car (which has it's own charms but makes things pretty hard work).
2. The Pyramid stage is in a natural amphitheatre - it's a very nice stage (for a biggun). However it's **** if you're wanting to get near the front - I was at the front for REM in 03 but that involved me getting there in time to watch Suede, david Grey (?) and another band first - and even then I was only near enough to pass my bag over to security to keep hold of behind the fence and to *just about* be near enough to touch the fence (and being a muppet I kept allowing shorter people in front of me ). It's LOVELY during the day or from the back - during the day it's got a really nice laid back atmosphere - there's usually grass to sit on (even when it's muddy) if you go back abit. I usually eat my breakfast in front of the pyramid if it's not belting it down.
3. The food is AMAZING. I don't take any cooking equipment or food I just take cash. It's not overly expensive (it's certainly a lot cheaper than NEC/stadium food). The prices are regulated by glastonbury - in 2014 it was restricted to £7.50 for a meat main meal, £6 for a vegetarian main meal and £1.50 for soft drinks. It's very easy to find cheaper prices than this (and of course remember that a main meal varies from "a burger" at the greasy burger vans to "a full serving of potatoes and meat from le grande bouffe" to "massive portoins of vege curry, rice, dhaal and naan bread" from the green fields) in fact the hare krishna's will feed you for free of you end up skint (they're usually near to the orange phone tent). Bearing in mind that I go for 5 1/2 days and I stuff my face almost constantly (they kept tempting me with sponge cake and/or nachos last year) I spend in total around £150 on food and drink - that's just under £25 a day or £7.50 per meal (drinks do add to the price quite a lot).
If you're looking to save money on food then bring a decent water bottle and refill it from the taps, bring something to have for breakfast so you aren't tempted by the gorgeous food everywhere and set yourself a budget per day and stick to it (it'd be quite easy to get by on £15 a day for food if you just ate when you're hungry and didn't buy soft drinks)
4. I have no idea. The nearest train station is castle cary and there are free shuttle buses to and from there - in 2007 on the monday there was an ENORMOUS problem with the buses which has supposedly been sorted out but meant that most people were waiting for 3hrs or so to get on a bus to the station which was pretty miserable.
5. Acoustic stage is lovely - usually a really nice atmosphere, very relaxed and worth the walk up to it in a muddy year.
The Glade is nice if you fancy a bit of a dance.
The west holts stage is great - it's actually the 3rd biggest stage and home to Brothers Pear Cider stall but it hosts acts who're a bit less well known than the John peel tent so it gets ignored by the NME. There's also the avalon stage in the next field (plus avalon cafe) if you fancy a change.
The Leftworld tent is FANTASTIC - very good if it's a bit wet because it's all inside and home to billy bragg and tony benn (no more
)as well as music, comedy and a whole bunch of other stuff. Billy bragg roundup most afternoons is well worth a visit to see someone new. If you're at a loose end on Sunday early evening then Speakers Corner is worth looking into - every year Michael Eavis (who runs the show) does a Q&A session in there around 6pm ish. Last year and the year before he was followed by tony benn (this is in a tiny tent with a max of about 40 people in it
I always gravitate towards the Caberet tent - swear the comedy mainly happens and it's great
Stages I hate:
Other stage (just nasty)
John Peel (hate the stage)
6. Depends entirely on the stage/act - it's not that hard to push through but most people who absolutely want to get the to front for a particular act get there VERY early (see my above story re: REM headlining the pyramid).
7. Depends on the weather this year it will be scorching and dry and wonderful - to ensure this happens you must bring some wellies
8. Wet wipes, a blanket for the evenings to wrap up in while still out, wellies, if it's forecast to be even slightly wet then either bring a folding chair or buy one (they were for sale last year for £10) after you arrive - not sitting down anywhere for 4/5/6 days is hard work...most important SMILE
9. Yes there is a LOT of weed about. However it's not in a negative way - my mum last year went from being very anti-drugs pre festival to saying she was quite sad that she'd never had an opportunity to try it out when she was younger. If you head for the stone circle you'll hear people selling EVERYTHING (apart from acid - apparently it's almost impossible to source onsite) but even there there's no pressure. I don't think my cousin really noticed the drugs at all when she went - it's very much treated as a background understated part of the festival -noone shoves it in your face but if you look for it you'll see it everywhere.
10. Yes if you put in the effort, smile, say hello and most people will be happy to have a chat with you - Glastonbury is how the world should be in in this respect.
11. It's very mixed - if you hang around the john peel area it's full of teenagers, the road along the back of the pyramid stage is always full of old (ish) people (40s or so - they nab the camping spots and stay there all weekend), the bars near the pyramid stage are the main place where you find lager louts (so I always avoid). The east holts area (caberet, circus tent/field and theatre) and avalon/green fields are the main place where there are kids and the green fields houses the old hippies. It's still quite a young festival but the timing often means there aren't that many students (it clashes with exams most year so A level/uni students aren't as common as at reading on august bank holiday).
12. Very easy to lose people, very difficult to find them again unless you actually arrange a sensible meeting point (there's a main meeting point near Williams green/tony benn tower) - meeting people at stages is just not worth trying.
13. yes yes YES do it - if there's an afternoon/evening when something is on that you want to see then go and do it.
14. The program that you get on arrival has the full listings in it. I usually use that, plus the clashfinder (once it's finalised) to put together a rough schedule of when my MUST SEE acts are on. Don't expect to be able to leave one stage and get to another in time for the next act - leave yourself about an acts length of time to get between stages - more if it's muddy. I've sat through a lot of bands that I've never heard of but I wouldn't call any of them crap.
15. Personally yes and yes - but then I'm a lazy greedy pig . I try to stay up to see the sunrise at the stone circle one night but apart from that I usually crash by about 1/2am at the latest (). If it's sunny then sleeping in a tent during the day is awful so I'm usually up and about by 8/9am (but I'll sometimes have a nap in the afternoon - either back in my tent or at one of the stages). See food comments above - I personally have 4 meals a day while I'm at glasto
16. No, not at all. There are nutters but they're pretty much the harmless confused nutters that people will make sure to put a blanket over when they've passed out.
17. Yes there's crime but not much. The festival has a population larger than bath - and a much lower crime rate. If you're worried about your phone then there are FREE property lock ups run by charities (also a source of free loo roll) that you can leave stuff in. You're most likely to lose your phone due to losing it than to crime.
18. Layers, lots of layers. Bring wellies and waterproof trousers (not sexy but if it's nasty then they're worth it). With waterproof trousers I only take 1 pair of jeans [plus the ones I wear to travel] (waterproofs keep the mud off them). A decent waterproof jacket is worthwhile (though lots of people take ponchos?) too. I take my wellies, trainers and crocs and wear the wellies to travel in. Bring plenty of socks because wet socks are nasty. And bring a woolly hat for sleeping in (it gets very cold at night). If you bring this all it will be blazing sunshine and you'll be wearing t shirts and shorts all weekend ;yes;.
19. I was completely overwhelmed in 97 - had no idea. In 2003 I had my bearings by thursday and since then I've always found it quite easy to navigate. However my mum was USELESS at navigating. On arrival go to an info point in the markets and get a copy of the A3 full map - it's really detailed and much nicer than the one in the program. Mark your campsite on it so that you can find it again after a million other tents have sprung up blocking your way.
20. The Park, the dance tents and lost vagueness (or whatever has replaced it) go on until 3/4am. The main stages shut down at midnight ish. There's a party at the stone circle until dawn at 4/5am and for a few hours after that. There are a few things that are on on thursday officially, even more things on unofficially. Wednesday is usually a pretty quite evening/day (but the stone circle will always be busy unless it's pissing it down and cold).
21. I can't think of anything right now but watch this space.....
]I thought of another - most important of all - tip
Avoid the portaloos - the long drops might take a bit of getting used to but they don't smell so bad and at least the drop is long (while the turdis's suffer from "heaping" which can make clearance an issue if you don't want to squat on the seat)
The compost loos are AMAZING.
Original post by lustawny
Those 'bobble bottles' sound really clever, actually. How exactly do they filter tap water? I'd never even heard of one before reading this.
They've got a carbon filter in them which the water passes through when you drink.
Obviously they can't make non-drinking water safe for drinking, but if the tap water isn't brilliant then it makes it a bit nicer Original post by Puddles the Monkey
They've got a carbon filter in them which the water passes through when you drink. Obviously they can't make non-drinking water safe for drinking, but if the tap water isn't brilliant then it makes it a bit nicer
Obviously they can't make non-drinking water safe for drinking, but if the tap water isn't brilliant then it makes it a bit nicer Every festival I've been involved with has had it's tap water connected directly to the main system. It's the same water you'll get from your tap at home and so perfectly safe (although of course some people might not like the taste).
Original post by Puddles the Monkey
They've got a carbon filter in them which the water passes through when you drink. Obviously they can't make non-drinking water safe for drinking, but if the tap water isn't brilliant then it makes it a bit nicer
Obviously they can't make non-drinking water safe for drinking, but if the tap water isn't brilliant then it makes it a bit nicer Thanks for explaining it, Puddles - I'm probably gonna get one now
Original post by Reue
Every festival I've been involved with has had it's tap water connected directly to the main system. It's the same water you'll get from your tap at home and so perfectly safe (although of course some people might not like the taste).
Oh yeah of course
Just makes it taste a bit nicer. Also convenient as well to have water to carry around with you.
Original post by Puddles the Monkey
Also convenient as well to have water to carry around with you.
I prefer to drink from the cups of water they hand out at the front which have been passed around and drunk from by at least 10 other people
Original post by lustawny
Thanks for explaining it, Puddles - I'm probably gonna get one now
I've got one for the gym and I love it
Go to Debenhams because they've often got them a bit cheaper. The only thing which confuses me about them is they say that one filter = 300 water bottles which doesn't sound very environmentally friendly to me
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