On Friday morning I didn't have work and I made sure all my camping stuff was all ready and packed. Josh came home and was followed by Mez's Dad in the van and Claire, Whitty and Rob in Claire's car. We packed all our stuff into the van and Josh got in the van with Mez's Dad and I got in the car with Claire, Whitty and Rob. Then we went to pick up Mez and we drove (via Gregg's!) to Glastonbudget Festival!
Once we got there, we went to sign in. I was Alex's +1 so I was on the guest list and we got purple wrist bands so we could park and camp in the special bands' only area which made me feel very special (even though I'm not actually very special at all)! Then Josh and I set up a massive tent that we'd borrowed from the other house that we could use as a communal tent for if it rained (it didn't so that was a waste of time it turns out, but we weren't to know!) and Josh and Hannah's tent and then mine and Alex's tent. We called our camp 'Camptain Horizon'
We then met up with Maria who is the band's manager and she showed us some of the merchandise that she'd got. There were some T shirts and badges and stickers and Claire and I helped Maria set up a board to display it all that we can take to gigs and flog stuff :)
Then I popped in Claire's car again with Whitty and Rob and Mez and Mez's Dad and Josh went in the van and we drove into Leicester to the Pavillion where Captain Horizon were playing a gig that night. We'd been told to get there for 6pm, though when we arrived the promoter guy wasn't even there for another hour or so. We met up with Alex and Hannah there as they'd come there straight from work that day. Instead we had a nice curry and hung out being a cool bunch of people.
The venue itself was quite weird. It was basically in a park and seemed a little bit like it should have been a tea room (and probably was at one time I guess) but it had a bar and served curry and had live music.
Anyway the guys played their set and it was pretty good.
Then we went back to Camptain Horizon and ate and drank and were merry.
The next day Alex, Josh, Hannah and I had to get up really early as we went to Santa Pod to see the drag racing! We met Stu, Russ and Kelly there too.
It was pretty immense and they were so fast you could feel them before you could even see or hear them sometimes. Pretty damn cool. Even though they were too fast for me to get a picture of them!
We also saw some cool monster trucks!
And a
WWW2 memorial flight by a spitfire and a lancaster bomber and I can't remember the other one.
It was a really hot day and I got a bit sunburnt too. Whoops. But not as bad as Alex or Kelly. Josh and Alex went on a helicopter ride. I really wanted to as well because I think that would be cool but I couldn't really justify spending lots of money on that when I'm still nto sure about the job situation. So that was a shame. I wish I'd said sod it and done it anyway now because it sounded so cool.
We also saw a drag racer crash. He was going so immensely fast and then after he'd crossed the line it sort of span wildly out of controal accross the track and spun upside down a few times and I thought that's it. He's dead. No one could survive that. But he just got up and walked away! It took a long time for them to clean up the track and everything after that so it was all running quite behind schedule so it was a shame that we had to leave when we did because there was so much more to see.
But leave we did. Russ, Stu and Kelly went home and Alex, Josh, Hannah and I drove into Leicester to The Shed, where Captain Horizon had their second gig of the weekend. It rocked my socks.
They've played at The Shed a few times now, but that night it was pretty much packed with people. To start off with Hannah, Claire, Rob and I kind of wandered towards the front to watch them and we were the only people standing up to start with I think. Then about half way through I turned around and the whole room had packed out behind us with people standing up to watch them. And they were all getting into it too. I like gigs like that because even though I really like the band and really enjoy all their gigs, I quite often think that maybe I'm just quite biased because Josh and Alex are my best friends. But when I see other people enjoying it too I think yeh, I was right all along. They are awesome!
After that we packed up pretty sharpish and drove back to Glastonbudget (via a supermarket for booze and bbq stuff). We got back in time ot see the headlining tribute act for Saturday night who were a Metallica tribute act called Metalisha. Quite good I thought. I'm not a huge Metallica fan but it was pretty good. I was also asked to hand out some flyers to tell people to go and see Captain Horizon when they played their festival slot. But I wasn't very good at it :/
Then after that we went back to Camptain Horizon and Alex cooked us all a BBQ in the dark(!) and Josh got out his guitar and we all sang some Captain Horizon sonsg kind of acoustically which was quite nice and cool that everyone was singing, not just the band! Then some other sing-a-longs and we ate and drank and were merry and then went to bed.
Sunday was a stunning day weather-wise. And the day of Captain Horizon's first festival appearance! Pretty exciting. Got up, hung around camp until I got a call from Stu to say he and Russ and Kelly had arrived. Josh also got a call from his dad to say he'd arrived with his partner and her daughter, so Alex, Hannah, Josh and I went to the arena to meet them. We sat around in the sun drinking and such.
Then it was time for me to do some more flyering. I watched Stu do a couple and then I tried it on my own and I was better this time. Maybe it was becuase it was light so I could make eye contact with people and once I'd seen someone else do it (Alex and Hannah are lone-flyer-ers) it didn't seem so awful.
Then I went back to Camptain Horizon to have lunch. I managed to get Stu and Russ and Kelly (and possibly Josh's family?) back into the bands-only camping area (they only hd day tickets and weren't on the guest list so weren't really allowed there) but telling a huge lie to the security person that I was in a band and I was only a weak little girl and I needed them to help me carry my equipment for me. I didn't really seem to think twice about it but it amused some people so I'm glad I made people chuckle with my convincing lies.
I went back into the arena with some of the others for lunch. I ate a spicy chicken fajita and watched Chesney Hawkes! Haha! and an REM tribute band which were quite enjoyable.
Then wandered over to the BigTop tent where Captain Horizon were just about to set up. Helped Claire and Hannah and Maria set up the merchandising stuff. And then the band started to play. Me and the others thought they were just sound checking at first because they were on too early so we just kind of hung out near the back but then we realised nope, it was actually the start of their set and they'd pulled thme on abour 20 mins too early. That was a bit annoying because I'd spent most of the morning telling people to be there at 6.50pm. Grr.
Anyway to start with the tent wasn't very full. It was tricky because the act on at the main stage at the same time as them was (not Chesney as previously thought) but a The Who tribute band. It's a shame because basically the kind of people who would have enjoyed to watch Captain Horizon would probably want to go to watch The Who.
But once they started playing, people started to stop outside as they walked past and peer in and Maria went outside to usher a load of curious people in. Also Whitty has a radio microphone and he went running out through the crowd and also outside of the tent while singing and not missing a note to sing at passers by which drew a few more people in. Also there was a bar in the tent and even though some people only came into the tent to get a beer and intended to go back to see The Who Tribute or whatever, they all stayed.
After a while there was a decent sized crowd. It wasn't full but there were enough people to make it feel like they weren't playing to an empty tent. It was, in the words of Mez's dad, shit hot.
Also towards the end some guys came in with professional looking cameras and started filming the boys.
(yes, thatis Alex and Whitty on the other side of the barrier, rocking out in with the crowd! I think the camera guys were from the festival itself and were filming it for the website so if that video ever emerges I'll post it here for you and you can tell me what you think!
The set went down really well with absolutely everyone there. Everyone went mental during their last song. And when they finished Mez's dad was in absolute floods of tears.
After that we had a few celebratory drinkie poos.
We then all went on the bumper cars! I can't rememeber if I've ever been on them before but it was really good fun and (apart from initially not being able to work out why my car would only go backwards) I wasn't as bad at it as I thought I'd be. It was such a giggle.
Then we all went to see the headline tribute act, a tribute to Oasis called Oasish (I love the silly names tribute bands have. Pun-a-licious!) I initally thought oh I haven't listened to Oasis much in years I'm not that bothered. But I really really enjoyed it. What's The Story Morning Glory was the first album I ever bought so it was nostalgia fest time. Although they were stopped in the middle of Wonderwall because security said there was a girl who had fallen down in the crowd and been trampled. After trying to find her for what seemed like ages, it transpired that was all just a wind up. Some people.
Anyway we all trundled back to camp and got drunk drunk drunk (--er than we already were!) and sat around the BBQ to keep warm until we couldn't stay awake any longer and retired to our respective tents.
This morning we got up very early and did the tedious task of packing all the tents down, loading up the van and driving home. Even though I was longing for a bath and my own bed I didn't want the weekend to be over!
I came home and fell asleep pretty much straight away, before the van even got to our house with our stuff in. I was so knackered. I woke up, had a bath and found that my lovely housemates had got me some lunch. Aw.
Now I'm preparing to go back to work tomorrow. Yuk. It all seems so wrong to be going back to work after that!
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