Woodstock Alumni

[dondo]

Great thread

 

@Jduncan51  I see you are from Maine- spent a couple of summers working in Maine up near Acadia national park many years ago.  Had a great time.

Am sure you'll have a blast at Glastonbury

 

[Charm]

11 hours ago, Jduncan51 said:

That would be nice! I’ve booked my bus leaving London Noon Wed. I plan on trying to get a podpad in Worthy View now on Sat. I’m going solo as my wife is not a festival person. We will be traveling from May to Sweden where she is from and my son lives, to the Shetlands and then London. I am retired and in good physical shape considering. I bike 15 or so miles a day when the weather allows. Can’t lug camping gear from the states. Any tips on the camping scene?

You can pre order camping gear from these guys to collect on site.  

Hope you have a amazing festival, I’m sure you will love it. 

Charm x

 

https://www.cosycamper.co.uk/product-category/accessories/

[Jduncan51]

Thanks so much for the link! That’s a great alternative to Glamping which isn’t cheap. As I understand it you can return the gear to them when you leave. I hear people leave their stuff and it’s a real problem.

I understand these camping sites close to the coach terminal are rather quiet and make it easy to arrive and depart. Also if I’m arriving Wed. afternoon one should have no problem finding a good spot as most people head in closer to the central area. Any feedback on this?

[RaphPH]

2 minutes ago, Jduncan51 said:

Thanks so much for the link! That’s a great alternative to Glamping which isn’t cheap. As I understand it you can return the gear to them when you leave. I hear people leave their stuff and it’s a real problem.

I understand these camping sites close to the coach terminal are rather quiet and make it easy to arrive and depart. Also if I’m arriving Wed. afternoon one should have no problem finding a good spot as most people head in closer to the central area. Any feedback on this?

Personally if you can handle the steep hill, I'd go for Worthy View because Glastonbury is a lot to take in on first visit. This will be my 6th time in 2019 and I cannot tell you how jealous I am that you attended Woodstock. The closest "iconic" festival I've attended is Desert Trip!! 

[Hotchilidog]

1 hour ago, Jduncan51 said:

Thanks so much for the link! That’s a great alternative to Glamping which isn’t cheap. As I understand it you can return the gear to them when you leave. I hear people leave their stuff and it’s a real problem.

I understand these camping sites close to the coach terminal are rather quiet and make it easy to arrive and depart. Also if I’m arriving Wed. afternoon one should have no problem finding a good spot as most people head in closer to the central area. Any feedback on this?

Darble and Pylon will have plenty of room on wednesday afternoon. I have camped at Pylon twice primarily because of its proximity to the coach station. It is absolutely fine, not too far from John Peel and the Pyramid, Silver Hayes and Other not too far either. It is a trek back from the south side of the site late at night, but I have rather enjoyed my strolls through a becalmed Glastonbury at stupid o clock in the morning.

If you want somewhere a little more central there will be an info booth just past the entrance gate. There will be a steward there with a map showing  which campsites have space. I would guess that most places will have room for a single small tent. Lime Kiln and Hitchin Hill also near the coach station will, and they offer a bit more of a view of the site than the flatter Darble/Pylon sites.

Enjoy the festival, I think you will enjoy it very much after the chaos of Woodstock, a festival which (even though I was only 2 at the time, changed my life when I saw the movie as a teen).

[Jduncan51]

I’ve only met les than half a dozen people in my lifetime so far that we’re at Woodstock. When we do meet, at a bar or wherever, it’s like talking war stories! I also feel my age when telling younger people I was there as anyone that’s into festivals and music and art kinda see it as the mothership! Having survived cancer two years ago, and as I understand it, Michael Eavis lost his wife to cancer, this journey to Glastonbury means a lot to me!

[Losing my hair]

5 hours ago, Jduncan51 said:

Thanks so much for the link! That’s a great alternative to Glamping which isn’t cheap. As I understand it you can return the gear to them when you leave. I hear people leave their stuff and it’s a real problem.

I understand these camping sites close to the coach terminal are rather quiet and make it easy to arrive and depart. Also if I’m arriving Wed. afternoon one should have no problem finding a good spot as most people head in closer to the central area. Any feedback on this?

I arrive Wed afternoon by coach and camp in Darble, there will be plenty of room but you are a bit far from the centre of activity. I camp with a group called Camp Solo which is a group (there's about 100 of us now) of people doing Glastonbury on their own. You would be more than welcome to join us if you fancy some company. 

[Quark]

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and state that, in my experience, this is the strongest run of opening posts I've seen on this forum. Let's check it off:

• Opens with Woodstock veteran statement
• Quick follow up with this being a 50 year bucket list
• Early deployment of the travelling to Woodstock anecdote
• Dropping an acid story (pun very much intended)
• Cool street photo to illustrate wider artistic interests
• Referencing the all-knowing glastoearth FAQs
• Glasto virgin with the confidence to travel solo

You sir have either taken the time to go through the mountain of posts on this forum to carefully craft a persona that ticks all of our damn boxes, or you are actually this cool.  Either way, I'm impressed

HMV's definitely right though, you'd be more than welcome at the meet if drinking weird concoctions and talking rubbish with people off the internet is your thing!

[Jduncan51]

Thanks so much for the positive comments! I will just say I hate being called “sir”! I think it comes from my brief stint in the Air Force during the VietNam era. In 70, as you might know,  it was a lottery as to who would be drafted and my number was 120 something so I would have been. I considered Canada but as as 19 year old I found it hard to accept the thought of leaving friends and family behind not knowing if I could ever return. So instead, in Cheyanne Wyoming, I enlisted in the Air Force thinking it would be more educational and I wouldn’t be on the ground. That lasted 9 months. After basic training and school to train as an aircraft mechanic on B-52s, I was stationed in upstate New York. I was a fish out of water in my VW bus. All my free time I spent off base with kids my own age in a small village called Barneveld. After a few months there came a day when they were having a nuclear war drill and everyone ran to the tarmac to do god knows what but I stayed in my barracks and decided I could not put up with the insanity. I got a phone call from the commander and he was screaming at me asking me what I thought I was doing and to get my ass in gear! I told him he was nuts and everything else about the whole place was insane and that I could not participate anymore. At this point he softened his tone, obviously thinking I was borderline and might do something crazy, so I jumped in by bus and drove to his office to confront the guy. Upon walking in I can remember walking down an aisle in the middle of the room with office workers at their desks on both side typing away doing whatever they were doing. He sat directly ahead of me in office enclosed in glass. I sat down across from him at his desk and he perceeded to tell me how it was God’s plan to save the worl from Communism etc etc and I yelled back at him that he and everything about what was going on was insane and that I could not partake of it anymore! After bantering back and forth I just jumped up and charged out flailing my arms yelling how they were all crazy and jumped into my VW bus and started driving across the base. Soon I was pulled over by the military police and they told me they had orders to escort me to the hospital for a urine test. The commander was convinced I was on drugs! When I got to the hospital I had to go into the toilet with an orderly to piss in a cup while he stood next to me. As I was preparing myself he nudged me on the shoulder and said, “ hey man, want me to pee for ya”. I told him I was good and that was that. Next I went to a psychiatrist and met him for a few sessions. This took a few weeks. Meantime I was driving home to Portland, Maine every weekend to party with my friends. 7 hours each way! One weekend I just stayed for 5 days and was AWOL (absent without leave). Anyway to end this story I was classified a “passive dependent character disorder”  and recieved an Honorable Discharge. You can’t make this shit up! To top it all off when I went to get my final discharge papers from a kid my own age in his office he slid the papers across the counter to me and said, “here man”, and handed me the envelope and a hit of Mescaline! End of story!

Edited October 25, 2018 by Jduncan51

[Jduncan51]

Here’s a link to some of my photographic work. I feel it gives as sense of me as a person and how I see things. Really looking forward to capturing some images at Glastonbury! Didn’t have a camera at Woodstock which was probably just as well I most likely would have lost it!?. If you care to check them out, enjoy!

https://photos.app.goo.gl/iTPdoQ736nbfcaW68

The geode belonged to Hunter by the way! Lakshmi, the women holding the poster lived in Aspen and her family wwas friends with him. Took the photo in Bocas Del Toro Panama a couple of years ago where my son lives in the winter. Cheers!

 

Edited October 25, 2018 by Jduncan51

[Quark]

1 hour ago, Jduncan51 said:

Thanks so much for the positive comments! I will just say I hate being called “sir”

Duly noted

[Jduncan51]

No problem! Just a quirk of mine! ?

[Phoenix Girl]

2 hours ago, Jduncan51 said:

Thanks so much for the positive comments! I will just say I hate being called “sir”! I think it comes from my brief stint in the Air Force during the VietNam era. In 70, as you might know,  it was a lottery as to who would be drafted and my number was 120 something so I would have been. I considered Canada but as as 19 year old I found it hard to accept the thought of leaving friends and family behind not knowing if I could ever return. So instead, in Cheyanne Wyoming, I enlisted in the Air Force thinking it would be more educational and I wouldn’t be on the ground. That lasted 9 months. After basic training and school to train as an aircraft mechanic on B-52s, I was stationed in upstate New York. I was a fish out of water in my VW bus. All my free time I spent off base with kids my own age in a small village called Barneveld. After a few months there came a day when they were having a nuclear war drill and everyone ran to the tarmac to do god knows what but I stayed in my barracks and decided I could not put up with the insanity. I got a phone call from the commander and he was screaming at me asking me what I thought I was doing and to get my ass in gear! I told him he was nuts and everything else about the whole place was insane and that I could not participate anymore. At this point he softened his tone, obviously thinking I was borderline and might do something crazy, so I jumped in by bus and drove to his office to confront the guy. Upon walking in I can remember walking down an aisle in the middle of the room with office workers at their desks on both side typing away doing whatever they were doing. He sat directly ahead of me in office enclosed in glass. I sat down across from him at his desk and he perceeded to tell me how it was God’s plan to save the worl from Communism etc etc and I yelled back at him that he and everything about what was going on was insane and that I could not partake of it anymore! After bantering back and forth I just jumped up and charged out flailing my arms yelling how they were all crazy and jumped into my VW bus and started driving across the base. Soon I was pulled over by the military police and they told me they had orders to escort me to the hospital for a urine test. The commander was convinced I was on drugs! When I got to the hospital I had to go into the toilet with an orderly to piss in a cup while he stood next to me. As I was preparing myself he nudged me on the shoulder and said, “ hey man, want me to pee for ya”. I told him I was good and that was that. Next I went to a psychiatrist and met him for a few sessions. This took a few weeks. Meantime I was driving home to Portland, Maine every weekend to party with my friends. 7 hours each way! One weekend I just stayed for 5 days and was AWOL (absent without leave). Anyway to end this story I was classified a “passive dependent character disorder”  and recieved an Honorable Discharge. You can’t make this shit up! To top it all off when I went to get my final discharge papers from a kid my own age in his office he slid the papers across the counter to me and said, “here man”, and handed me the envelope and a hit of Mescaline! End of story!

Wow what interesting stories you have. You put my dreary life to shame. I hope you have an amazing time at your first Glastonbury!

[Jduncan51]

Everybody has a story! I’m sure yours is interesting in and of itself!

[dingbat2]

I couldn't think of anything closer to Woodstock these days than Glastonbury. The Eavis' have tried, and on the whole succeeded, in maintaining the ethos and atmosphere of the early festivals. Yeah, its slightly more sanitised these days, and there are all sorts of H&S rules to comply with, but the festival retains the spirit of those early days, there is little corporate sponsorship still, and folks are free to do and say what they want. Almost everyone is nice there. You will love it

Re where to camp, the west of the site is usually quietest and least 'dense'. We don't arrive until Thursday afternoon and have always found a camping spot in Rivermead or Pylon, but there is also space in Bushy and the other camping fields hugging the western perimeter, etc. Arriving on Wednesday wont be a problem at all, it probably depends on how quite you want it to be at night and how much space you want around you. I have never had a problem getting a decent nights sleep in Pylon/RIvermead, but that's probably helped by being knackered and merry at that time of night

 

[Simpo]

39 minutes ago, dingbat2 said:

I couldn't think of anything closer to Woodstock these days than Glastonbury. The Eavis' have tried, and on the whole succeeded, in maintaining the ethos and atmosphere of the early festivals. Yeah, its slightly more sanitised these days, and there are all sorts of H&S rules to comply with, but the festival retains the spirit of those early days, there is little corporate sponsorship still, and folks are free to do and say what they want. Almost everyone is nice there. You will love it

I feel similar. But also that Glastonbury never lives in its own shadow. It embraces its history, while always evolving and pushing itself further.

[scorp]

On 10/24/2018 at 6:25 PM, Jduncan51 said:

One of my friends went to 99 and said how bad it was! The spontaneity of Woodstock was a huge part of what made it so special! Glastonbury seems to have much of the same spirit and vibe although much more organized. I can’t wait to experience it.

 

One of my friends [she's English] went to Woodstock 1969 and said how great it was :-)   I have friends who went to  Isle of Wight 1970 and loved it, despite its various problems, which were not dissimilar to Woodstock's the year before. 

[alanr]

On 10/25/2018 at 5:30 PM, Jduncan51 said:

Thanks so much for the positive comments! I will just say I hate being called “sir”! I think it comes from my brief stint in the Air Force during the VietNam era. In 70, as you might know,  it was a lottery as to who would be drafted and my number was 120 something so I would have been. I considered Canada but as as 19 year old I found it hard to accept the thought of leaving friends and family behind not knowing if I could ever return. So instead, in Cheyanne Wyoming, I enlisted in the Air Force thinking it would be more educational and I wouldn’t be on the ground. That lasted 9 months. After basic training and school to train as an aircraft mechanic on B-52s, I was stationed in upstate New York. I was a fish out of water in my VW bus. All my free time I spent off base with kids my own age in a small village called Barneveld. After a few months there came a day when they were having a nuclear war drill and everyone ran to the tarmac to do god knows what but I stayed in my barracks and decided I could not put up with the insanity. I got a phone call from the commander and he was screaming at me asking me what I thought I was doing and to get my ass in gear! I told him he was nuts and everything else about the whole place was insane and that I could not participate anymore. At this point he softened his tone, obviously thinking I was borderline and might do something crazy, so I jumped in by bus and drove to his office to confront the guy. Upon walking in I can remember walking down an aisle in the middle of the room with office workers at their desks on both side typing away doing whatever they were doing. He sat directly ahead of me in office enclosed in glass. I sat down across from him at his desk and he perceeded to tell me how it was God’s plan to save the worl from Communism etc etc and I yelled back at him that he and everything about what was going on was insane and that I could not partake of it anymore! After bantering back and forth I just jumped up and charged out flailing my arms yelling how they were all crazy and jumped into my VW bus and started driving across the base. Soon I was pulled over by the military police and they told me they had orders to escort me to the hospital for a urine test. The commander was convinced I was on drugs! When I got to the hospital I had to go into the toilet with an orderly to piss in a cup while he stood next to me. As I was preparing myself he nudged me on the shoulder and said, “ hey man, want me to pee for ya”. I told him I was good and that was that. Next I went to a psychiatrist and met him for a few sessions. This took a few weeks. Meantime I was driving home to Portland, Maine every weekend to party with my friends. 7 hours each way! One weekend I just stayed for 5 days and was AWOL (absent without leave). Anyway to end this story I was classified a “passive dependent character disorder”  and recieved an Honorable Discharge. You can’t make this shit up! To top it all off when I went to get my final discharge papers from a kid my own age in his office he slid the papers across the counter to me and said, “here man”, and handed me the envelope and a hit of Mescaline! End of story!

Great story, made me think of "Arlo Guthrie's Alice's Restaurant"

Like you I had a long gap between festivals, I went to Weeley in 1971, not quite Woodstock but a great weekend.  

( http://www.ukrockfestivals.com/weeley-festival.html )

My next real festival was The Big Chill in 2007, since then I have done 1 festival each year. My first Glastonbury was 2011, and I've been to every one since then. Hope to continue for a few more years.

Festival History

Big Chill 2007, 2009 & 2010

Womad 2008, 2012 & 2018

Glastonbury 2011, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 & 2019

Alan

[Jduncan51]

Yes Alan I also think of Alice’s Restaurant in relationship to my experience! I actually did go to Strawberry Fields, I think it was called, in Watkins Glen, NY but was turned off by the vibe my first night there and just left. I know Glastonbury will not disappoint. Cheers!

Edited October 30, 2018 by Jduncan51