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Best time to arrive on Wednesday and best place to camp?


Guest dinthepark
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It's my first time going to Glastonbury and will be arriving by car on the Wednesday and Travelling from the North West. Was wondering what the best time would be to arrive to avoid queuing for a long time to get in? Early like 8am? or would it be best to arrive later in the day?

Also if we're travelling from the west what would be the best place to camp? Ideally we'd like to be on higher ground incase of any flooding.

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Arrive mid-afternoon if you want to avoid queues and just find some friendly people and camp up! You can't really miss just avoid the loos - don't risk it to camp further in and don't spend forever wandering packed fields. Ask the campsite assistants (in the caravans, shown on the map) and avoid Pyramid area/Pennards/Park Home as they'll be packed and you'll just end up knackered

There's only one small area that flooded and it's not a public camping area, do not worry about it - though as usual don't point your tent door uphill, never good.

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Arrive mid-afternoon if you want to avoid queues and just find some friendly people and camp up! You can't really miss just avoid the loos - don't risk it to camp further in and don't spend forever wandering packed fields. Ask the campsite assistants (in the caravans, shown on the map) and avoid Pyramid area/Pennards/Park Home as they'll be packed and you'll just end up knackered

There's only one small area that flooded and it's not a public camping area, do not worry about it - though as usual don't point your tent door uphill, never good.

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Another tip,I know people don't want to talk about leaving,you won't want to! but don't rush to leave you'll only hit a traffic jam for hours so have a lie in and leave late Monday afternoon if you can,its a lot easier!

Also Glastonbury really takes it out of you,don't even think about going into work Tuesday or even Wednesday,book it off if you can.

Have fun! :)

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It's my first time going to Glastonbury and will be arriving by car on the Wednesday and Travelling from the North West. Was wondering what the best time would be to arrive to avoid queuing for a long time to get in? Early like 8am? or would it be best to arrive later in the day?

Also if we're travelling from the west what would be the best place to camp? Ideally we'd like to be on higher ground incase of any flooding.

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Everyone on here will have their favourite spot and the reasons why. In part it depends on the music you're into.

When we camped our favourite was up near the top of Big Ground. Not far from some real, clean, flushing toilets (referred to by our gang as Flushing Meadows). Good view over the site, a 24 hour cafe, ATM machines, and a reasonable walk to the areas we liked to visit.

Pick your spot and take time to get properly set up. Don't rush. It's worth an extra hour or two at the start to have a comfortable week.

And be prepared to walk lots. Explore, explore, explore.

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In terms of arrival queues, there is quite a big difference between the various Gates and whether you're on public transport, car, or bike.

If you're arriving by Car, then most gates will have have heavy queues from 8am gates opening through to at least noon, and will be fairly quiet in the afternoon. Anecdotal evidence suggests that (in the last couple years) Gate D has the longest waits, followed in order by C, A, and B.

Gate A is a bit different as all the Public Transport goes there so queues will vary a lot more throughout the day depending on coach arrivals - they do attempt to stagger coach arrivals, but it's entirely likely that a large number of coaches arrive at the same time which can cause bottlenecks - unfortunately this is difficult to predict as can massively vary based on road conditions both around the festival site and further afield.

It's worth knowing that the queuing system at Gate A prioritises Public Transport arrivals over people coming from the Car Parks. As a result, in 2013 my coach arrived at 7:50am and I was able to waltz straight in with no queue whatsoever - someone who'd arrived by Car at the same time and even same Gate could easily have been waiting 3+ hours.

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I'm arriving at about 10/11am by coach, didn't really think it through because it's probably going to be the busiest time. I just wanted to get the earliest coach from Birmingham that I could! If Gate A prioritises public transport then even if it's really busy does that mean I'll probably not have to wait any longer than say an hour or so?

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I'd be surprised if you'd have to wait anywhere near that long to be honest.

It may not seem like it to those who've waited 4+ hours to get in from the Car Parks in the past, but the Gates can and do handle a fairly substantial amount of people in a short space of time. PGA will be able to easily cope with a full coach of passengers in a couple of minutes.

Given that the coach/bus passengers are effectively joining the queue at the front, it'd take a serious number of coaches/buses arriving at pretty much exactly the same time to cause a delay anywhere near an hour.

To be honest in that situation the bottleneck is more likely to be the vehicle movements within the festival bus station - which is why arrival times are carefully planned to be staggered throughout the day.

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I'd be surprised if you'd have to wait anywhere near that long to be honest.

It may not seem like it to those who've waited 4+ hours to get in from the Car Parks in the past, but the Gates can and do handle a fairly substantial amount of people in a short space of time. PGA will be able to easily cope with a full coach of passengers in a couple of minutes.

Given that the coach/bus passengers are effectively joining the queue at the front, it'd take a serious number of coaches/buses arriving at pretty much exactly the same time to cause a delay anywhere near an hour.

To be honest in that situation the bottleneck is more likely to be the vehicle movements within the festival bus station - which is why arrival times are carefully planned to be staggered throughout the day.

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What do you want me to prove exactly? I don't think you've actually disagreed with anything I said.

In terms of staggering - they attempt to do so (as you acknowledge). Yes, it's subject to other factors as I said in my previous post on the thread and so doesn't always work out as they intend.

And I've definitely not said that arriving at a certain time can guarantee to avoid queues, I don't think anyone is. The best you can do is try to minimise the chances/length.

Edited by incident
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well I thought you may have had access to the GFL onsite traffic logs - they can plan everything to the minute but it never goes to plan.
In 2011 on the Tuesday there was a traffic jam onsite and they were all standing about trying to work out why - not for vehicles entering - it was vehicles trying to leave.
I have no idea why so many wanted to leave at the same time all I know was Our Coach was held in a queue for a good two hours { even although arriving the same time 2010 and 2013 there was no exit queue } - Our Crew camp is near the end of the one way system and as that is only used for people leaving { or getting to crew camps near that road }
its just one of these things and that was 24 hours before any public coaches have access.
Unless a person has onsite access and can arrive on the Monday/Tuesday there is not much anyone can do to minimise anything.
you just have to go with the flow.
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