Secret Garden Party 2010

[tuff]

SGP sent out this by email:

An Apology and An Explanation

Four days of extraordinary happenings were book-ended by two problems with access and egress to the Garden. Thousands of you are sending in messages of warmth and thanks but a good few are also looking for an explanation and an apology for the queues experienced getting in and out of the festival.

First an explanation for Thursday. In contrast to previous years almost every Gardener arrived Thursday afternoon. The ticketing gate had been built to cope with the usual ratio of half the audience arriving on Thursday and half on Friday. A backlog built up very quickly. Security searches then limited the speed at which we could process the tickets and safety requirements ruled that we could not reduce the searches. Despite opening four new lanes to speed up the wrist-banding many of you queued for over three hours.

We cannot apologise enough to those of you who experienced these waiting times. For 2011 the main access gate will have the capacity to process all ticket holders in an efficient and brief manner. This will be the number one priority for Thursday (alongside guaranteeing a mind-blowing party).

Monday morning. A further explanation! The Garden has three exit routes to ensure all traffic can leave smoothly, as has happened in all previous years. At 11am Monday we discovered that a gate had wrongly been locked on the west exit route. By the time we had opened the exit a pool of traffic had built up exiting east. As with the queues on Thursday, this took a while to clear and many of you were again caught in the jam. It will not happen again.

We know for some Gardeners the queues took the shine off your festival; we sincerely hope it did not mar the entire Party.

We are a hundred percent confident that all the problems and niggles of 2010 will be removed next year.

We will not rest until we have perfected the Secret Garden Party.

[tuff]

I had an great time, one of the best festivals I've been to for a long time. Will definitely be attending next year. The unsigned acts were really good. Went to the village stage saw a band Rudeboy and Rascal (Ska band) they filled the tent and it rocked. I would like to see them on a bigger stage next time. I only have one complaint where was the West-Indian food???

Edited August 2, 2010 by tuff

[kerplunk]

Review of 2004 here - http://www.efestivals.co.uk/festivals/secretgarden/2004/review-overview.shtml

"potential for expansion in the future"

well I got that right

must try and get back one year

[mr_bizarre]

I disagree with the comment made above that the alcohol sales on site are required to keep the fessie going....The capacity was doubled this year, if £150 per ticket and 26000 were sold(and having a live in vehicle set me back a further £50) doesn't keep them ticking over, nothing will.

The perimeter fence should've been for the main site only, if tent campers could've set up outside they would've been allowed to take in as much booze as they could carry, fair enough about not allowing into the arena but we in vans were able to be WELL stocked...doesn't seem fair.

Still, it's one of my fave fessies, I can take my dogs which makes life so much easier, however, if you double sales then double stewards, makes mathematical sense to me.

Also, Spangly Parking were not very spangly....more pissed off and stressed. We didn't even try to get into the main arena until 9pm, we'd been set up since 3pm but the queues were horrendous.

I think this fessie has something for everyone, nice and chilled on the near side of the lake and full mash up on the far side. The fireworks and boat burning this year were truly spectacular.

Will definetly be going again next year as well.....it's only a 45 min drive home...she says smuggly....xxxx

[elfweirdigan]

Yes it does, which is why Green Stewards had 400 stewards onsite, 200 more then last year. That is double