Camp Bestival 2012

[Grockle]

Is anyone going?

I've never been before and have questions...

Do we need camping plus?
Will the showers be a nightmare?
How much does food cost?

Any tips?

[JollyBear]

Ooh good tips.

I'm in a dilemma about how to transport the DCs. They will be 3 and a half and 16 months in July. Would a p&ts be ok or should we hire a trolley? I don't want to take a huge double pram if we're going to end up hiring a trolley.

[winefairy]

Grockle The trolley hire is at the entrance to Camping Plus as you come out of the car park so for lugging the stuff to and from the car I would hire one if you're opting for Camping Plus. Wouldn't bother with a trolley for a 6 year old for the very reasons DCMB and I said about them being useless in crowds. You can hire them for the evening too should there be an act you really want to stay out for and you think DS would comply and fall asleep.

Jolly I would take the Phil&Teds, if I were you. If you're relying on hiring a trolley you'll find it expensive and you can only book them by the hour for a max of 3 hours at any one time, I seem to remember. They are really popular at nights and you will queue forever to secure one.

[Grockle]

I think I shall get one anyway - we'll use it for various other events so I don't think it would be a waste. We can use it for lugging tent etc and leave it there during the day. DS is generally really good about walking & is a night owl so hopefully he'll be ok without it at night - he'll be nearly 7 by then anyway.

[DontCallMeBaby]

Obviously Camp Bestival should hire out strapping young men. For sherpaing only obviously (actually I'm sure some kind of sherpa service was advertised last year, but I never saw it).

Jolly in your shoes I would take P&T. Just don't park it in front of me if I'm trying to watch something.

[Grockle]

I would pay for a strapping young man

[JollyBear]

Grand, thanks! I will be a responsible, considerate pram pusher!

[tyaca]

jolly - ours were 3 and 2 last year, i dusted off our mountain buggy for bestival last year and it was a very very smart move. the trolleys are huge and have to be pulled, which is a lot harder work than pushing.

IIRC the trolley hire was either hourly at the start and end of festival, or for the whole weekend??

gosh i am really really looking forward to this year.

[BerryLellow]

We're first timers this year, still dithering about Camping plus but will probably go for it.

I shall be back with many questions when I think of them, too :)

[nicecupofteaplease]

Oooh, how exciting - more newbie campers and first time Camp Bestival goers with two under 4s, one of which is not a fun person to be around when tired. I'm sure it'll be FINE! Am employing blind optimism as a coping mechanism.

[CuttedUpPear]

Festival food is always expensive, considering that you're depending on it to keep alive.
Take cereal and those small half litre cartons of long life milk, then if they go off you don't lose too much. That's at least one meal a day sorted, or more. If you plan to take some way of heating water then you can have lots of cheapo noodles (we just pour water over them in the bowl, leave to soak for 3 mins then drain the water away again to save sloppy spillages...then put half the flavouring from the sachet in [healthy]).

If you do cook please never do it inside your tent and certainly NEVER change gas canisters inside your tent.

Take dried fruit for snacks, and we always pre cook a load of veggie sausages to snack on cold. We are veggie anyway but they have the advantage of not being likely to give us food poisoning if they are a few days old.

And don't forget - a Pringles lid completely seals an Ikea coloured plastic tumbler!
[swoons with joy]

[sailorsgal]

We have a competition in a local mag to win 2 full adult tickets to Camp Bestival this year. If anyone wants details PM me. We already have our tickets.

[FannyBazaar]

We went last year, too late to book the camping plus, we travelled by public transport which unfortunately does not give you the option of trolley hire as it was nowhere near the coach stop! Trolleys could be booked for a cheaper rate for evenings once the festival was underway.

We took some food for breakfasts and one meal a day at the tent, eating out in between. My DS loved the farmers market salad bar. I can thoroughly recommend dried vegetarian sausage mix for easy to store breakfast sausages and snacks. My cool bag/stool was next to useless at keeping stuff cold because I didn't take anything frozen - this year I will be taking frozen juice/wine/longlife milk etc just to keep it cold.

I had a sponge bath in the front porch of my tent with my collapsible washing up bowl, even managed to wash my hair, although did use the dry shampoo for the first couple of days. This year I will be taking a solar shower and pressure shower! I can't do queuing for showers.

[SJWMum]

Hubby has been asked to be best man at a close friends wedding. Festival do not offer refunds. Gutted we cannot go.

Face value 380 GBP. Will consider any reasonable offer.

Happy to show you my passport, driving license and original council tax bill to guarantee their authenticity.

I live in Central London, but often in Middlesex and Oxfordshire out and about.

www.campbestival.net/#/home

[BerryLellow]

It's dawned on me I've done nothing about getting organised for this and it's creeping up rapidly!

How is everyone else's planning going?!

We booked camping plus in the end, now I'm debating trolley/buggy dilemma. I have a 2 and a 6 yr old, what I need is some sort of collapsible wheelbarrow!

[Grockle]

Not long now! I have nothing organised other than a few cans of Pimms, a trolley & a dog-sitter. Am excited though & hoping for good weather.

[DontCallMeYourMajesty]

My dad has bought me a trolley for my birthday. :)

Now I just have to fit it, us, and gear in the car.

Started a list based on going back through this, and last year's thread:

Bucket
Lock (for trolley)
Money belt (where on earth has it gone?)
Earplugs
Wine

Phoebechicken would like it to be known that her DD2 was four, not five, and still walked everywhere. She's had a year at school now so she'll probably be all full of ATTITUDE like the other two ...

[BerryLellow]

I have ordered ear defenders!

Have seen a fold up trolley, two different ones in fact, which I am coveting. Dp seems to think we won't need one and we can just take the buggy for ds2.

[phoebechicken]

DontCallMeYourMajesty's friend reporting for duty :) And yes, I have a sneaky feeling that DD2's additional year will have made her a little more stroppy and a little more stubborn. The joy!

As DCMYM said, I didn't think the food prices were that expensive, although it does help that I only had to buy for myself and 2 quite small children. We took breakfast and a LOT of snacks, plus carried water bottles that we refilled from the numerous taps around the site. Whenever one of the kids started to whine about being hungry we'd whip out a cereal bar or a packet of Cheddars and they'd be placated :) We bought all but 1 lunch out, I think, and all our dinners, and a few treats of the icecream/strawberries and cream/cupcake variety. I took £200 and came home with a little change, having also bought tat souveniers for the girls from that. The food was a big part of the experience for us though, I think - I do love my food (sadly it shows!) :) I'm really looking forward to my burrito and curry already, and I believe Hummingbird Bakery will be there this year :o

I will say though that the whole 'queue for hours to get on site, walk half a mile plus to the trolley place, drag trolley half a mile back, load trolley, attempt to find relatively flat space to camp, drag trolley back up hill to carpark, re load trolley, all while DD2 is whining for the toilet but refusing to use portable potty (understandable)' etc experience was one of the worst of my entire life. And I have had some pretty grim experiences ;) I HOPE we'll make it a little better this time by taking a trolley (yay DCMYM's dad!), arriving much much earlier, and having a better plan re campsites and car parks, now we know a bit more of what to expect. I guess the experience must have made up for the set up part or we wouldn't be going back.. At least we didn't have any of the trouble with the drugged up teenagers that many reported last year, and it sounds like they're clamping down massively on that this year anyway.

[Grockle]

When is a good time to arrive? We have tickets for Thursday and only live an hour away so are hoping to get there as early as possible.

[BerryLellow]

I wish they would hurry up with a site map etc. I want to peruse everything!

My tarp arrived today, so I will have somewhere to sit outside my tent if it rains. If!

[phoebechicken]

I'd aim for whatever time it is that they open the site to be honest!

[tyaca]

last year the carpark opened at ten and the site at twelve. we arrived at half eleven, by the time we'd got our stuff out of car and got to ticket gate they were letting people in. i wouldn't want to get there much later tbh, as it all got quite cramped quite quickly tbh.

phoebe, that hike with tent and kids from car up steep hill then pitch tent thing nearly ended in divorce for the couple we were with. it's fecking stressful, isn't it?

[BerryLellow]

How far is it from camping plus car park to the pitches?

[fivegomadindorset]

Barry you are coming!!!!!!!!

[BerryLellow]

Yes! And dragging cousin with us :o