Download baby, yeah!

It’s a week since Download finished. In fact, exactly one week ago I was moshing, flailing and windmilling to Rammstein while dressed in neon pink and fairy wings.

The journey to the site was pretty uneventful. I was expecting to be stuck in traffic for an hour, but I didn’t spot ANY other cars until I entered the car park. I was starting to worry I’d got the wrong day or something. My joy was short-lived, however, as it was followed by a two mile trek carrying a 38lb back on my back and also dragging a tent, blanket roll, camping chair and separate back pack. I somehow managed to carry all of this in one go!

My sister, Sonja, was coming to meet me to help my carry my stuff, but it turned out we were both going the same way around the track and hence always going away from each other! I eventually decided to stop walking and wait for her and she found me! Sonja and Rob (my nephew) had already been there for two days and saved me a spot for my tent. When we eventually got to the campsite, we quickly erected the tent and then it was beer o’clock!

You can tell I’ve just arrived here, I’m looking far too clean and enthusiastic.

The rain then started and continued to rain almost solidly for about a day and a half. ALL of my clothes got wet and most of them got covered in mud. Here is Sonja combining rain with metal (hand) so she decided it created RUST!

You can see the rain against Rob’s red tent here.

Cosy campsite.

That day we went to see Down, KoRn, Gogol Bordello and Slipknot. Gogol Bordello were amazing! We were quite close to the front and bumped into a load of my friends who were keen for dancing so lots of spinning around happened and Rich fell on me, I fell on Sonja and she fell on a small child. Oops, slightly too enthusiastic!
Here is a photo of us with Slipknot. Yay, standing right at the back, rock and/or roll!

That night I was absolutely bloody freezing and, combined with all the shouting, sleeping about 100 yards away from the airport runway and the sun coming up at 4:30am, suffice to say I didn’t get ANY sleep that night.

Not that it mattered, Saturday brought more beer and more great music! It was raining again. Here are our muddy boots and wet legs.

On Saturday we saw Mastodon, Alice in Chains, Motorhead and Queens of the Stone Age (which I actually missed most of because I arranged to meet someone I went to Romania with and she clearly wasn’t bothered about QOTSA as her and her friend were just wandering about and chatting. I’m afraid I was a bit rude and just ran off and left them. I was looking forward to watching QOTSA with my sister as it was one of the only bands we BOTH wanted to see that weekend. All the others were either her choice or mine. Dammit, I’m still annoyed I missed Feel Good Hit of the Summer and No-one Knows!) Longest sentence inside parentheses ever? Anyway. That night Iron Maiden were headlining but none of us were bothered about them so we went back to the campsite. I decided to have a wander around The Village on my own and ended up in the Rockeoke tent; karaoke to rock music! After it finished, DJs came on and played rock music, which would have been great if I was with people, but on my own? Not so much fun. So I went back to the campsite; Sonja had gone to bed and Rob was still out so I was in bed by midnight. Rock and Roll! (again)

Sunday, the final day, so we decided to dress up, assuming everyone else would do the same. We were wrong! At a metal festival, I was expecting to see lots of different types of goth, but most people were just wearing jeans and a band t-shirt.
This is Sonja dressed as Tank Girl, and me in my neon fairy outfit.

That day we saw Coal Chamber, Stone Sour, Airbourne, 30 Seconds to Mars and Rammstein. AAAAHHHH. I’ve seen Rammstein before but they definitely didn’t disappoint, amazing as ever with their explosions and fire and spraying foam all over the crowds. Love love love!

Here are some more random photos.
Rob and Sonja. I cannot believe my baby nephew is now 18 years old!

Jared Leto of 30 Seconds to Mars!

Sonja gives her opinion of 30 Seconds to Mars

We found this bloke, his friends said we could take him home. He’s partially house trained and we could even name him! We decided to call him Dave.

You can see a tiny helicopter on this photo, top right.

I reckon it was taking photos, one of which is this one.

Look at all those tents! We were camped near the trees on the right hand side. The arena is in the top right of the photo; it was over a mile walk in each direction. But looking at the amount of tents further along, it looks like some people had a walk about twice as far!

To try and sum up our experience, me and Sonja came up with our own set of tips for recreating that authentic festival experience at home.
Sonja:
* Set £5 nots on fire while someone throws hot dogs and stale bread at you while shouting at you to move away.
* Crumble biscuits and frankfurters into a sponge, then try to sleep on said sponge.
* Invite your friends over to shout “Fenton!”, “Jesus Christ!” and “Bollocks!” next to your head while you’re trying to sleep/ eat/ go to the toilet/ walk about.

Me:
* Don’t flush the toilet for a week, then wait outside the bathroom for 40 minutes before going in to hover over the mountain of poo that has accumulated.
* Cover all your clothes in wet mud and spread them around your bedroom.
* Spend half an hour clicking a lighter before eating cold stew and uncooked rice.

All of the above must be carried out while having buckets of water thrown over you.

Despite all this, we’re already looking forward to next year! It’s all part of the festival experience and nothing can detract from the awesome music and the super friendly atmosphere. I lost count of the amounts of high fives I gave and random people starting conversations.Love it.