Thursday night: We finally got going at 7pm, chugged along the A14, M6 (stopping at services ‘cos Tricia was bursting for a pee, and drinking Stella does not help this. Nor apparently, does me talking about gentle mountain streams, but I digress…)

Found ourselves outside the Bradford Arms about 2 miles from Weston Park along with a convoy of other campers etc. The nice pub people didn’t mind us all camping in their carpark for the night (although looking at the mess left in the morning*, they probably do now). After the pub stopped serving and kicked everyone outside, the party started in earnest – there was music coming from everywhere, drunken people wandering from van to van, chatting, smoking, drinking – you get the picture.

I settled down with a couple of joints and the obligatory Stella and was chatting to this guy Chad. He’s in a band – Green Vigo – and entertained Glynn and me (Harriett at this time was drunk and being a little um, obnoxious to him). Still, he gave me half an E (which was very good), sang for a bit, then I crashed out about 3 and he wandered off.

I woke really early – and seeing as the 4 of us were cramped up in the camper, I got out with a can of Stella, and watched the monstrous queue for the festival crawl by our campsite, managed to blag some coffee from the van next door (conicidentally, when we got to our pitch at V, this van was next door to us), had an early morning joint, and mooched about waiting for the lightweights to wake up.

Friday: Got into the festival about 10, went straight to the ticket exchange (scary moment when you’re not QUITE sure if you have a genuine ticket…), all got our wristbands and back to the pitch to setup tents etc.

Took me about 3 minutes to put up my tent, throw everything inside and sit with a beer watching Glynn put his tent up. This entertainment took about half an hour at which point the other 3 decided, as I’d woken them up so early, they were going back to sleep.

Pfft.

I went for a wander 🙂

As it was so hot 🙂 I took my shirt off and was happily meandering along, checking out prices for food, where the bars were – all the important stuff, when I heard some scousers (people from Liverpool) talking loudly behind me:

“He’s got a cock on his arm!” (my Spurs tattoo – we beat Liverpool the previous week). Some banter went back and forth between us, I passed one of them (Mike) my joint, he gave me a swig of his cider, and we became friends. Discussing the lack of E that we had, but lots of weed, Mike suggested we do a trade – he had pills, but little weed.

And so we retired to their campsite. Now V has numerous campsites – there’s one for campervans only which I had a wristband for, and then there’s about 5 or 6 others for just tents. My wristband wouldn’t get me into the camp. Bugger.

So I jumped the fence (several times over the course of the weekend), smoked a few joints, had some more beer, and Mike gave me an E 🙂

~~~ wavy lines showing some time passing ~~~

I get back to our little pitch, everyone is up and wondering where I’ve been. Now, bearing in mind I was high as a kite on E, big ol’ grin on my face, this was a silly question I think.

And so, we wander off to the arena, where I point out the key things I’d noted – cheapest food etc. location of the stages/tents and all that good stuff.

Lovely afternoon just acclimatising to the festival before it all kicked off the next day 🙂

So, in the evening, we had a few more beers, discussed who we wanted to see, who we definitely DIDN’T want to see (I hate Snow Patrol), then the lightweights decided to crash out.

So I wandered off (can you see a pattern emerging here?)

I jumped the double fence into the blue campsite and went to see Mike and his crew who were still partying hard. Spent most of the night with them, having a really good time, managed to actually pull Emma, a 23 year old from Birmingham (lovely body, but horrible accent) and went back to her tent for some *ahem* adult fun (we got caught by one of her friends in the act, but she wasn’t up for a 3some – hey, I was out of my head, these things have to be asked).

Staggered back to my tent about 4 and promptly crashed out.

Saturday: I was up bright and early and as I hadn’t found the showers, I took my towel and washing gear to the cold water standpipe where I had a good all over scrub – made me feel top of the world.

Got back to our pitch and Tricia was up so I had a coffee with her. She remarked that I’d had about 4 hours sleep since we left and how did I manage to be so fucking cheerful in the morning?

Next, Harriett crawled out of her tent full of the joys of spring grumpy as fuck ‘cos she hadn’t got laid. Her mood improved** when I piped up with a cheery smile “I have!”

The rest of the day was spent in the arena listening to various bands – they all walked so slowly, I got separated from them in the crowd*** and just did my own thing.

Now, I’d taken a few drinks into the arena with me – some cans, half a litre of vodka and coke, and another half litre of a combination of vodka, firewater and fruit flavoured water (tasted lovely to sip on). While I was watching Oasis, sipping on this concoction, this tiny woman next to me asked if she could have some of my water, so I passed her the bottle which she had a big swig of…then spent 2 minutes trying to take a breath. Oh, how I giggled. Then felt sorry for her as she was so tiny, so I put her up on my shoulders.

Got back to my tent about 1 and almost straight away Mike called me asking if I was coming over to there place. So off I went…

No idea what time I got back this time, but I did wake up in my tent, so it’s all good.

Sunday: Now this was the biggest day – so many bands clashed on different stages, I knew I didn’t stand a chance of seeing them all if I stuck with the others, so I managed to lose them when we got back in the arena – that was when Pendulum came on actually – my back started really aching, so I headed out of the crowd and sat under a tree, off my head on legal E (2 x Diablo pills – very nice and no come-down), had a bit of a rest then did my thing buzzing between stages watching all the bands I liked, finishing with The Killers who played a blinding set.

Grabbed a burger on my way out of  the arena and headed for my tent (needed some weed as I’d run out). Sat in the tent rolling a couple of joints (the others had already got back and gone to sleep – lightweights) and got a call from Mike:

“Where are you?”
“I’m in my tent building a joint.”
“Oh, it’s just that Emma has been round all day asking where you are…”

Arse. So that killed my party place 🙁 I wandered through the campervan site, found a few people partying and chatted with them until I decided to crash.

Monday: Up really early again, got all my gear packed, wandered down to top up the charge on my phone, grab a coffee and grin at the ‘lost souls’ (well, after a weekend partying, everyone looks like that), then got back to the van where Tricia was up making coffee (yay!)

After Harriett and Glynn woke up, we had the entertainment of watching Glynn pack away his tent, got everything else sorted and left.

And that’s about the weekend – we stopped at a truck stop for breakfast and got home about noon (I headed straight for the pub).

* I never dump rubbish
** She got grumpier
*** Took off at about mach2 through the crowd leaving them in a cloud of dust

This post does not condone the use of drugs – legal or otherwise. In other words kids, JUST SAY NO! (that way there’s more for me…)

EDIT: Oh yeah, forgot to add this: BU’ER – GET A DAMN WORDPRESS BLOG!