Begginers help!

[burgess93]

Im going to leeds fest this year with a few of my friends, it'll be my first festival and im just hoping for a few tips from people who have a bit of knowledge on festivals, things like whats essential to bring, which camp site is the safest and just other things i wouldn't know! any comments appreciated!

[OKB]

Red campsite is where it's at. If im going thats where I camp with my mates so you can camp with if you want.

Essentials

- Condoms (TRUST ME You'll need a lot).

- Food (Pot Noodles should last ya).

- Cash (to spend on merch).

- BEER (to drink)

- Drugs (if you are partial to that of course).

- Clothes.

Hope that helped

[rexclark]

Make a list of questions and I'll answer them as best I can.

[Vacant0]

I loathe directing you to this forum but heres a useful checklist of stuff to bring:

http://forums.readingfestival.com/m274927.aspx

[Jackmypie]

I loathe directing you to this forum but heres a useful checklist of stuff to bring:

http://forums.readingfestival.com/m274927.aspx

Edited February 20, 2011 by Jackmypie

[Dave The Hedgehog]

My first Leeds last year too. This board was incredibly helpful - and it pays to actually listen to the serious suggestions people make rather than make the same mistake I made and ignore a lot of it. Don't go over to the official forums.

The key to a good festival, I've found, is not over-preparing. Last year, I went through checklist after checklist of stuff and when I actually got to Leeds, I didn't use half of it - we're talking food and especially equipment. The other mistake I made as well was taking pretty much everything that was in my car through the gate on the wednesday - and if you want to go to Green or Brown camp and end up going through Orange gate (because you don't know which gate is where - download or invest in a map), you'll have a long way to walk with a lot of unnecessary equipment, and it's painful.

That's really the only tip I have. Don't over-prepare or complicate things with long lists. Take only what you need and you don't need a lot.

- Use a car. As much as the festivals try to promote the idea of environmental awareness, a car is always going to be the best way to transport your stuff from wherever you're coming from.

- Take your tent, a sleeping bag and some lightweight pillows. Consider a sleeping mat or some lightweight aluminium camp beds - don't piss about with air beds or gazebos. Consider taking just pillow cases and packing them with clothes if you must. Consider a lightweight chair to sit in. Take your tent through the gate first and if you've come in a car, go back to your car to get everything once you've set up camp.

- Take food for wednesday and thursday, and get food for the mornings on the other days. Take empty bottles of water and fill up once you get there. Use Hexi stoves and Hexi tablets to cook food and boil the kettle. Pack plenty of sachets of instant coffee and tea bags, and nick some sugar and UHT milk from service stations. Consider a barbecue for wednesday night but make sure you store your food in a cool box, although this only really adds weight. The food at Leeds is decent enough (£6 a burger should give you an idea of what you're likely to pay for a meal).

- Take a decent wash kit and include loo roll and lots of hand wipes, along with plenty of deodorant. I would STRONGLY suggest taking disposable toilet seat covers too, and nose plugs - you'll see why once you get to the camp and arena toilets. Or learn how to avoid breathing. Take plenty of industrial strength caffeine pills (or 'other') to wake you up in the mornings, take plenty of painkillers or alka seltzer for the day after - or alternately use alcohol to numb everything. Take sun cream and plasters, and consider taking some TCP in a tube.

- Pack plenty of underwear and some warm jumpers for the evenings, and a waterproof coat. Don't forget your wellies. If you like sleep, invest in some decent earplugs (I used Laser Lite ear plugs on the advice of a biker friend last year and they worked a charm). Wear whatever else you want so long as it's comfortable - it's not a fashion parade.

- Invest in a small, cheap phone that costs no more than £5 and get £10 credit for it. Invest in a portable battery charger with universal charging capabilities. Take plenty of lithium batteries. Some people will advise you to take a disposable camera but you will be safe with a digital camera - just keep it on you at all times. Invest in a 8gb memory card if you want to take plenty of photos.

- £150 will get you plenty of food for the weekend and if you want any merchandise, it'll leave you with plenty to spare to get some too - keep it in a wallet and attach it to a dog chain then keep it on you at all times.

- Other equipment should include stuff like spare tent pegs, some duck tape, sunglasses, some alcohol...

That's about all you need to take with you, and even most of that is a consideration when you can pretty much pick up anything you need at the festival itself, but if you need to pick up anything beforehand then remember thet eBay is your friend.

---Camping---

I was in Green last year and found it to be pretty depressing, so I can't say what it's like to sleep in the other camps. I had a wander through all of them last year on the Thursday, and Brown was clearly the quietest - especially on wednesday - and White and Yellow are basically penned in death camps. Everywhere else in between is a mixture of the two but I found the closer you got to the arena, the more w*nkers you will find populating the vicinity... and there are many. Orange is a shithole. Blue is probably the most 'varied' for different people.

Don't worry too much about camping, actually, because after wandering through most of the camps it seemed as if they all had a bit of a bad vibe around them. Just try to integrate yourself into it as much as possible and get to know your neighbours.

Long read but I hope it's helpful.

[Dave The Hedgehog]

Another tip I'd like to add, actually, is to enjoy the festival and get involved in it as much as possible from the start - mainly because I found the boredom of just sitting around waiting for something to happen killed the experience.

Wednesday is bad for this if you arrive early. Last year, we got into the campsites quite early in the afternoon and it took 5 minutes for us to set up the tent and significantly longer to erect the pointless gazebo that weighed a ton. We had nothing to do for about 2 hours. After that, we fannied about with a [tasty] barbecue until around 6pm then went to the eFests meet... the experience of which we didn't especially enjoy; though I gather others did - then we went on an exploration mission. After that, we went back to the tent and had nothing to do. We didn't get a sound night's sleep because... well you don't on the first night when you go somewhere strange, do you?

So that led into Thursday morning, knackered, extremely groggy and very bloody miserable, waking up at 5:30am, and more or less just sitting by our tents all day staring at our watches, and of course the longer you do that, the longer it seems to take for time to dwindle. We'd planned to have a cooked breakfast that we made ourselves - took the necessary heavy equipment too - but by the time we woke up, we were so tired we couldn't be arsed to piss about with setting up the cooking tools... but we did anyway, and it made us a bit more miserable in the process, even if the food was nice. We thought the cooking would take up a lot of time but in reality we looked at our watches and it was still only 6:45am. We went to explore the area some more, look at the different camp sites, see if we could find anywhere to go or meet new and exciting people... but that only took us through to 9:30am, and then we went back to the tent. So from then until night time again, we had absolutely nothing to do or anywhere remotely interesting to go. That drove me nuts - the waiting.

Basically what I'm saying is - the fact I can identify the exact times that things happened is proof enough that I focused too much on what my watch said, and if you focus too heavily on what your clock is doing, you're f**ked, so try to forget about what time it is and just go with the flow of things; find things to do, etc.

[burgess93]

Thanks! I've never really camped at a festival before so i just wanted an insight into how it is and that, We were thinking of going up on the wednesday and setting up, but after reading that it seems a bit pointless, would you suggest going up on the thursday or the friday instead? Another thing is i dont want to be surrounded by a group of w*nkers that i've read about, the ones setting fires to tents and that, but i guess sometimes thats just inevitable aha (:

[Guckeery]

I'd say definitely go up on thursday, earlier the better really. that way you have more choice of camping spots and can avoid the 'w*ankers'. If you went up on wednesday you would have nothing to do untill the friday when it gets interesting

[harderfaster]

Socks. A f**k load of socks. Nothing worse than wet socks.

[harderfaster]

There used to be a brilliant forum for this kind of stuff...

[bennyk]

Thanks! I've never really camped at a festival before so i just wanted an insight into how it is and that, We were thinking of going up on the wednesday and setting up, but after reading that it seems a bit pointless, would you suggest going up on the thursday or the friday instead? Another thing is i dont want to be surrounded by a group of w*nkers that i've read about, the ones setting fires to tents and that, but i guess sometimes thats just inevitable aha (:

Edited February 20, 2011 by bennyk

[harderfaster]

If you have the time to spare then I'd suggest going Wednesday. It's only as "pointless" as you let it be - it's a chance to have a few drinks with your mates and get everything sorted before the weekend and you'll get a much nicer tent spot than you would on Thursday.

[purplehaze81]

I would say there's no point going on the Wednesday as some people seem to think it's essential. I've always arrived after midday on the Thursday and never had any trouble finding somewhere to pitch. Don't leave it too late though, and if you're a big group it probably would be advisable to go early.

Also, this may sound silly, but check your tent is all there before you go. In 2008 I was all ready to pitch my tent, got the tent out, then realised I hadn't got any poles. Fortunately this was at Reading and I went over to Tescos to buy a new one. I'm not sure what I would have done if I was at Leeds.

Thirdly, if you like Leeds, don't go to Reading. I've been to both and much prefer Leeds.

[Dave The Hedgehog]

Thanks! I've never really camped at a festival before so i just wanted an insight into how it is and that, We were thinking of going up on the wednesday and setting up, but after reading that it seems a bit pointless, would you suggest going up on the thursday or the friday instead? Another thing is i dont want to be surrounded by a group of w*nkers that i've read about, the ones setting fires to tents and that, but i guess sometimes thats just inevitable aha (:

[allan14]

i normally arrive at about midday thursday at reading and i hant had trouble finding a spot. i can imagen if there is a big group of you then it would be worth going on the wed. i would suggest just pack as lightly as you think you can get away with and remeber to take toilet paper!! also bring some of your own food.. in 2009 i bought all my food from the festival and it cost me loads!!

[rachbon]

Socks. A f**k load of socks. Nothing worse than wet socks.

[harderfaster]

To all those saying there's no point going on the Wednesday... whatever happened to having a good time?!

[rachbon]

take LOADS of toilet roll. you'll end up using most of it just wiping the toilet seat before you can go anywhere near it. and for spillages, a can always gets spilled in my tent at least once over the weekend.

[kev1664]

I would say wednesday and Thursday are really good. Its nice to just chill out and let your hair down with a few drinks at times where it wouldn't be deemed correct outside a festival. Just the feel of no worrys, nothing pressing as theres nothing your planning for and just gererally having a laugh with your mates and people you meet.

If your a music fan then friday is when the music begins and your always thinking about what your doing next and where you have to be, sometimes that in itself makes you a little stressed. But I would reccomend Wednesday. Especially if you work all year round. Its just a nice break.

[Dave The Hedgehog]

also, you're the only person i can think of who has complained about being bored on the wednesday and thursday. i think it's good having a few chilled out days before the festival properly starts. the wednesday is good for just walking around seeing where everything is, having a look round all the wee shops. having a few drinks at the campsite bars and just chilling out at your tent with a few drinks. same on thursday, til about 6pm when the arena is open and then you have all of the campsite entertainment on the thursday night aswell.

[thetime]

Well, it's nice to be unique - different people take different things from the festival; I'm just giving an honest opinion about how I felt on those two days. It's not necessarily a fact - just a subjective experience that I shared with my girlfriend. I'm not going to say that there's plenty of stuff provided for everybody to do when it's simply not the case. Some people may find solace hanging around a burger van from 2pm Wednesday to 6pm Thursday but I'm just not one of them. The market stalls also don't really have much to offer but then I'm the sort of person who likes going into places like that with something specific in mind to buy rather than browse and laugh half-heartedly at the tediously post-modern assortment of masks on sale, and taking into account my tent was already full of shit I didn't really need, I wasn't really going to add to it by buying a hookah I'll never use. And even if I were to buy one, it'd only take about 10 minutes to see what all the shops sell. Christ, I go to Donington Market every other Sunday and can get through that place in an hour, and that's one of the largest outdoor markets in Europe.

Some people like the downtime - I don't. I like activity. I like things happening. I like entertainment, or being given something to see or do. Some people work in jobs that aren't especially stressful but are quite boring and monotonous, students have the same problem too, so to have the relief of a fun activity is more than enough for me to refresh the senses.

[Dave The Hedgehog]

Can't you just chill and chat and let the world go by?

[rachbon]

Well, it's nice to be unique - different people take different things from the festival; I'm just giving an honest opinion about how I felt on those two days. It's not necessarily a fact - just a subjective experience that I shared with my girlfriend. I'm not going to say that there's plenty of stuff provided for everybody to do when it's simply not the case. Some people may find solace hanging around a burger van from 2pm Wednesday to 6pm Thursday but I'm just not one of them. The market stalls also don't really have much to offer but then I'm the sort of person who likes going into places like that with something specific in mind to buy rather than browse and laugh half-heartedly at the tediously post-modern assortment of masks on sale, and taking into account my tent was already full of shit I didn't really need, I wasn't really going to add to it by buying a hookah I'll never use. And even if I were to buy one, it'd only take about 10 minutes to see what all the shops sell. Christ, I go to Donington Market every other Sunday and can get through that place in an hour, and that's one of the largest outdoor markets in Europe.

Some people like the downtime - I don't. I like activity. I like things happening. I like entertainment, or being given something to see or do. Some people work in jobs that aren't especially stressful but are quite boring and monotonous, students have the same problem too, so to have the relief of a fun activity is more than enough for me to refresh the senses.

Edited February 20, 2011 by _rachelbon

[jimmyd93]

As others have said, make sure you have plenty of socks and other clothes. The last thing you want after three nights of heavy drinking is to be waking up and putting on wet clothes...

Aside from that, I'd say that something to sleep on is a must - a foam roll mat will do the trick, don't need anything fancy, but it'll make a world of difference from sleeping on random mounds of earth.

Obviously, alcohol. Costs an absolute fortune once you're inside, so a crate won't go amiss!

Make sure you have wellies! I went to V last year without them, and it started raining on Sunday, not particularly heavy, but with 90,000 people walking over the ground, it doesn't need to be. By the time I'd walked to the coach, I was caked in mud from the knee down, and ended up just throwing my trainers away once I got home

Loo roll. So useful.

Apart from that, just make sure you take some good mates, and you won't need much else. My advice would be don't make a schedule of acts you want to see - that way, if you miss one, you won't be worrying about it. Sometimes the stuff you see by accident is what you'll remember as being some of the best bits.