It feels like weeks since I was at Camp Bestival, but despite having been to Spain in between there are still a couple of acts that have stuck in my mind.

The wonderful thing about festivals is that you get to listen to all kinds of new music that you wouldn’t normally see, and this opens you up to all kinds of fun new experiences. One thing I particularly love about live music, and what draws me to the smaller stages to watch less well known acts, is being able to actually get up close and watch the musicians actually playing their instruments – you get to see the passion and concentration in their faces, individual muscles straining.

Anyway, enough of my babbling, here are my two favourite acts from Camp Bestival – my ones to watch. You should definitely check them out: View Post

Follow:

Hoorah!

Less than a month to go now until I get a legitimate excuse to go for several days on the trot without a shower! There’s the music and everything too of course, but I do hate showers.

Camp Bestival have now announced their full day-by-day line-up, so as well as the live-like-a-tramp excitement I can also think about exactly who and what I want to see. Plus, if you’re not so keen on being a bit stinky then a limited number of day tickets are now on sale at www.campbestival.net.

Check out the full Camp Bestival line-up here: View Post

Follow:

Festival season is upon us.

(You can tell because it has been raining a lot lately.)

We’ve been to quite a few festivals over the years, and there are a few essentials that all families need at a festival. Wipes and wellies obviously are a must, as is a wallet bulging with twenty pound notes to pay for overpriced pies and chai teas, but one thing you absolutely cannot do without is a tutu.

Honestly, if I had a pound for every tutu I had seen at a festival – on everyone from babies to large bare-chested men in pink wigs – I’d have almost enough to pay for churros and chocolate for the whole family. (If I could be bothered to stand in the queue for half a day). View Post

Follow:

I’ve been to quite a few festivals in my time, (any excuse not to wash for a few days), but I’ve never seen anything like the fireworks and animation display that celebrated the end of Camp Bestival 2012.

The weekend had been fantastic already, with surprise treats such as Chic – who’d have thought they wrote so many songs?? – and more predictably incredible entertainment in the form of Rolf Harris, but who’d have thought that something so amazing was going to be tucked away last thing on Sunday, long after I’ve normally given up and dragged the kids home?

The afternoon had been warm and relaxed. I’d spent a happy hour lying on the floor of the spoken word tent, thinking about how much more I liked Russell Kane as an author than a comedian, and then I’d teamed up with some strangers for a music quiz. A quick pint of pear cider and a last-minute entry into Ecover’s ‘Feel Good Giveaway’* on my way to meet Boyfriend, and after a special moment sharing our dislike of the Happy Mondays, we were ready for some firework fun.

This video, courtesy of BrightonArt, is about fifteen minutes long, but it is well worth the watch. Set against the already stunning backdrop of Lulworth Castle, the combination of fireworks and animation was just breathtaking and made for a really spectacular end to a wonderful weekend.

 

*I could win £2,000 of family clothes from Boden! Nice. Fingers crossed I get lucky, so I can fit right in with all the yummy mummies at Camp Bestival next year.

Follow:

If you follow me on twitter, you may have picked up on the fact that I was at Camp Bestival this weekend, courtesy of the very lovely people at Ecover.

"Ecover at Camp Bestival"

Yay for Ecover!

Despite the BBC predicting heavy rain, the sun shone for the whole weekend, and Boyfriend and I had a really wonderful time. I’ve been to Camp Bestival a few times before, so understood the whole family friendly vibe, but it was interesting to see Boyfriend’s confusion, as he compared it to his only other festival experience at Leeds. ‘When are people going to start pushing over the portaloos?’ he asked at one point, after telling me a rather nasty story about a guy, not wanting to lose his place at the front of a crowd, doing a poo on the floor.

Camp Bestival, needless to say, is not like this.

I shall be doing a proper round-up later in the week, including my personal highlights, but this is just a post to say thank you very much indeed to Ecover, for sending me off on such a fantastic weekend. If it wasn’t for Ecover, I’d never have seen this legend would I?

"Rolf Harris at Camp Bestival"

Can you tell who it is yet??

Thank you Ecover!

Follow:

It’s official, the Sunday we spent at Camp Bestival was The Best Day of Bee’s Life.

We had a lovely weekend generally, helped along by the Pimms bus in the kid’s field, but the whole weekend was totally made for us all – well me and Bee at least – by our encounter with Seth Lakeman.

Bee has always been a massive Seth fan and over the last few years we have been to loads of gigs, seen him at festivals, and generally followed him about in a slightly stalkerish way. We were absolutely thrilled then to find out that Seth and his band were a late addition to the Camp Bestival line-up.

Much of the first day there was spent trying to find out exactly where and when he was playing, as he wasn’t in the programme, but eventually we tracked him down to a small bandstand on the Sunday afternoon. A bandstand! Did they not know who he is??

View Post

Follow:

For me, putting up a tent is a bit like giving birth.

Bear with me on this…

Obviously there isn’t the same actual physical pain involved, no one would ever camp if there was, but there are plenty of parallels. Think for instance of that moment when you come to pack the tent away. You look at the tiny bag, you look at the tent, surely one just isn’t going to fit in the other? See what I’m saying here?

I don’t camp often if I’m honest, (why would you pee in a bucket and eat food warm that’s meant to be cold/cold that’s meant to be hot when you could stay in a hotel?) and all my camping is at festivals. I set out full of enthusiasm, I’m confident I can do it without pain relief/crying, but the minute I set the bags down on the inevitably sloped and rocky patch of grass next to the toilets, I turn into a monster. Give me a pre-pitched tent any day.

I give the children harmless jobs to do – hold the tent pegs, pass the hammer – but within minutes I am overcome with the urge to punch someone in the face. It’s not even that I struggle with tents, I can put them up fine, I just hate it. Every time I promise myself never again, but then the months pass, the sun comes out and I find myself thinking ‘it wasn’t really that bad was it? Let’s have another go…’ (At camping, not babies).

So, that’s where I find myself today – gazing at the blue sky and thinking back fondly to the festivals I’ve taken Bee and Belle to over the last few years. Not all of them have been sunny, but they’ve all be a break from routine at least. And a change is as good as a rest after all. So I’ve been told.

As a single parent, I like to go to festivals where I can let the kids wander off for a bit, so I can at least have ten minutes lying happily in the sun on my own. My absolute favourite for this is Camp Bestival – baby sister of Bestival, set in the grounds of Lulworth Castle. Last year Bee took a friend, and the site is small and safe enough that I felt happy letting them go off on their own for the whole day. It is really family orientated – one of the headline acts is Mr Tumble – and the kids’ field has a lovely relaxed feel. Belle really enjoyed being able to run off on her own, and I felt sure she’d be able to find me again in my sunny spot.

We will definitely be going again this year, but my tent memories haven’t quite faded enough to feel ready for camping yet. To spare us all the two hours of rage on arrival (I need a good hour to calm down afterwards too), I am going to be camping in style this year in the Tangerine Fields. Not only do they put the tent up for me, they even blow up the airbeds and lay out the sleeping bags. On top of that we get private showers and toilets – complete heaven. And at the end of the weekend we can just walk away and someone else clears up. Speaking as a woman who has three-day old dishes in the kitchen, you can imagine just how fantastic I find this prospect.

So if you’re taking the kids to Camp Bestival this year, look for the posh camping and come and say hi – I might even let you have a go on my private loo.

Follow: