In The Secret Garden

I'm back from a long weekend in the Cambridgeshire countryside. Yes, I went to Secret Garden Party & it was absolutely awesome!

The trip there was a bit, errr, unplanned. I was supposed to get a lift from Jon's girlfriend on Friday, which was great as I had already taken Thursday to Monday off work which meant one more day of relaxing & getting ready. It also meant not paying £100 for a rental car that I couldn't really drive as my arm is still slightly dodgy. All was chilled & fine until I got a call around 4pm on Thursday asking if it would be ok if we drive down that evening... well, it was not really what I had had in mind, but it was her driving & who am I to argue. So I got my stuff ready & we left mine around 8.30pm. Then proceeded to get lost & got on the wrong motorway (why am I supposed to know that there's a M1 and a A1M???), subsequently arriving at the venue around 10.30pm. A LOT of faffing ensued while she got her stuff ready to meet the boys at the gate. I think we finally made it to our camp an hour later, where I had the pleasure to set up my tent in the dark (thank god my tent & I are good friends & I can quite easily set it up in most conditions). I didn't bother to head down to the festie once I was done & moved in around 2am, but decided to call it a night & postpone explorations until the morning.

The following days were filled with

* fish nibbling on my feet, which tickled a lot & left my feet a bit softer * witnessing a gorilla getting married to a banana * weird bunnies walking around & throwing shapes * a fantastic gig by Stereo:Type & Hybrid * the blimp on the lake burning on Saturday night with lots of fireworks & Chinese lanterns floating into the air * watching a dog fashion show * standing up for the British anthem & subsequently doing the birdie dance * watching mud wrestling at the Collo Silly Um * walking around lots * crossing the lake various times via a very wobbly bridge * being a total hippie * attending a raw food workshop * watching Shitfaced Shakespeare * trying on a Boe jumpsuit & it looked really good on me * eating very tasty vegan food * giving up on waiting for my camp mates who were the kings of faff * going on the ferris wheel at dawn * drinking tasty chai * & quite possibly a lot more that I don't quite remember...

Overall, a really good festival. The experience was slightly hampered by the trip home, which happened about half a day too late for my taste. I was kinda happy with the thought of going home Sunday night, as the festival calms down loads by then & there really wasn't anything new to do any more. My festival saturation was reached. But everybody else wanted to stay, so we did & I finally got home Monday 6pm, thanks to the extreme faffiness of my driver. I waited for half an hour by the car because she had to say goodbye to people she'd just met & of course all took much longer than it would have needed to. Next time I'm driving there myself again.

But despite of that, I had huge amounts of fun. The Friday night was spent with Stu & Robin, just wandering about. The Saturday night was spent watching The Gorillaz Soundsystem with a lovely stranger, who tagged along for the rest of the night with my camp.

I'm a bit under the weather right now, my stomach's gone somewhat wonky & I probably still need to catch up on quite a lot of sleep, but it was worth it.

See you in the garden...