Glastonbury Veteran

[blue6field]

This year will be my 5th, volunteering this time.

certainly don’t consider myself a veteran 

92 and 93 both scorchers 

2011 and 2016 both very muddy, been pre and post fence, sunny and wet.

[ceetee]

Is years a valid measure?

The dictionary says "Veteran : a person who has had a lot of experience in a particular activity or job"

Someone who's been 10 times but only stood in front of the pyramid would have a lot less experience than someone who's been 5 times and camped different areas, explored the whole site, made it their purpose to experience as much as possible.

[BambooShanks]

I've managed to go to every one since 2010, either as a punter or volunteering through a number of places so I'd  call myself a veteran compared to someone who's been a few times but here? I think you need to be in double figures which includes at least one of the very muddy years.

 

[plot2pot]

12 hours ago, Punksnotdead said:

I was jobless and homeless in 2000 & decided to go on the Thursday morning with £30 in my pocket. I jibbed the train there. Then patrolled the fence to look for a way in. A group of scousers had pulled one of the fence panels to one side and were charging £5 to let people through. I said no and looked for another way. After a while, I realised there was no way I would be able to scale the fence on my own, so I went back to the scousers to pay the fiver. They then told me it was now £10, so I told them to fuck off. I then noticed that every 20 minutes, a security guard came round & the scousers scattered for a few minutes. I waited until next time this happened & legged it through the hole, chased by the security guard.

I didn't drink at the festival and ate for free at the hare Krishna tent. I spent about £7 at the whole festival, mostly on fags & rizlas for the weed I took with me.

Not quite a twix story I admit, but I'm quite proud I did it so cheap!

There were eight of us who worked at ASDA - we hired a van through work and drove down Tuesday night - one of the guys with us had promised to get some stock for a mate who was touting beer so we had 96 cases of Stella in the back as well as our own beers! Wasn't comfortable for the five people trying to sleep in the back on the way down!

When we got there we walked the perimeter for a bit looking for a way in until we eventually saw a group kicking fuck out of the small boundary fence outside the main fence. They got a panel out, turned it 90 degrees and used it as a ramp to scale the main fence. We followed suit and two of us got over just as a security patrol were about to pass inside. We managed to delay the others while we sat outside a random tent waiting for them to pass and hoping the people in the tent wouldn't give the game away! They soon passed and we shouted the all clear and everyone else got over.  We camped in Big Ground I think and stole somebody's campfire when we arrived.

Was a great festival - I didn't bring a sleeping bag and bought the most uncomfortable ex-military one possible from Joe Banana's - think it's still in my mum's loft!  Had my wallet stolen on the Friday night - woke up with my legs hanging out of the tent and the wallet was gone out of my combats pocket - presumably someone had dragged me out of the tent to get it.

A lot of missed years since then for various reasons so I'm definitely not a veteran - but I've been lucky enough to to get to every festival since 2016 and have tickets for this year so try not to dwell too much on the ones I've missed.

[gfa]

Regarding mudathons - do you think there will be a point when they effectively stop happening. Whether its through better water management or even like rain seeding (where they release mercury or something like that to make it rain before the festival instead of during it).

Given all the improvements, did people ever think something as bad as 2016 would happen again as well?

[Beaver89]

This topic came up years ago and the consensus was one festival.

That said, I think while veteran status can be applied to one festival, you then get additional stripes / medals / points for all the conditions mentioned here and more.

• Medal of honour for surviving 2005/7/11/16 (the muddy years) 
• Badge for getting through 2010 and other hot ones without sunburn
• Stripe for each additional festival - no matter how you do them they are an achievement
• Bonus points for each sunrise seen, each long drop navigated and growler eaten. 
• Maybe a special award for being the one tapping in the reg details to buy tickets? its all part of it!
• Point deductions for douchebaggery like not packing your tent up, contributing to the great wall of camping chairs etc.

I think there is also a knowledge and care aspect. Anyone on these forums defo has one up on most attendees. A friend of mine has one more fest under his belt so while he has the 2007 survival badge, he reckons I'm more of a veteran for being "a walking glastopedia".

But yea, one festival with merits and distinctions for the method imo.

[Charm]

Loving this thread x

[Dancers Stand Very Still]

I've not been to Glastonbury, but in general my opinion is if you've done something you are a veteran of that thing. So, once!

[fred quimby]

Just realised that this year will be the 5th decade of going

[tigertoo]

10 hours ago, Spindles said:

 

It's going to be great to be back there, it's going to be a massively emotional gathering for us I think, back as a huge swarming collective for a few days in June, all motivated by the idea of having the best time we can together.  I look forward to being surrounded again by you beautiful bastards and hope you have the time of your fucking lives.

I love this 😊 it sums it up beautifully.

Ive done the last 21,  I thought the amazing run of luck was over and i had been to my last glasto. But just got tickets in the resale last weekend, whoohoo 😁

97 and 98 were beasts not helped by us not opening the tent after 97 until we got there again in 98 and it was all mouldy and disintigrating 🤣. Had to get our act together after that as we had a little one in tow ( under one year old right up to teenager). I remember the rain forming a river going under our tent in family camping one year someone with a better memory will know what year that was i recall some tents in kidney mead being under water overnight the poor souls. In recent years we have been in a van which is a sheer luxury.

I had reconciled myself to not going this year, getting tickets has reignited my enthusiasm massively and spindles' words are spot on. 

[jimmillen]

2 hours ago, gfa said:

Regarding mudathons - do you think there will be a point when they effectively stop happening. Whether its through better water management or even like rain seeding (where they release mercury or something like that to make it rain before the festival instead of during it).

Given all the improvements, did people ever think something as bad as 2016 would happen again as well?

The drainage is absolutely first class at removing surface water, but does very little to prevent waterlogged grass turning into mud when thousands of people repeatedly walk over it. 🤷‍♂️

Unless there’s some crazy science fiction breakthrough in rain control technology, we just need to accept that rain right before or during the festival = mud. 

[Dave_c]

This year will be my 6th in a row. I survived the 2016 trenches and 2019 without sunburn, and have been the person who secured the tickets for our group every year. That's a few stripes I've earned, but wouldn't consider myself a veteran at all. 

[stuartbert two hats]

4 hours ago, Neil said:

you're fprgetting 1998 and 1999, both horific for mud.

You're thinking 97 and 98.  1999 was fine.  Not 100% mud free, but basically ok + nice weather.

[stuartbert two hats]

3 hours ago, gfa said:

Regarding mudathons - do you think there will be a point when they effectively stop happening. Whether its through better water management or even like rain seeding (where they release mercury or something like that to make it rain before the festival instead of during it).

Given all the improvements, did people ever think something as bad as 2016 would happen again as well?

I don't think there's much a farm can do to stop severe weather conditions like 2016 leading to a mudfest.  Sure, they can mitigate - a 2014 downpour would have been disastrous 10 or 20 years earlier, but the drainage made a huge difference.  But weeks of shitting it down during the site build, followed by occasional heavy showers during the actual festival?  Not a lot you can do about that.  Same for 2007 where it rains heavily all weekend. 

[shuttlep]

20 hours ago, incident said:

This has been done a million times before before but not relative to 2007 and 2016 - neither were an endurance test in the same way. 2004 was muddy in places throughout, but nowhere near as deep or as pervasive. 2005 was really bad, briefly, but pretty much only for about a day and a half - the site dried out quickly (helped by the weather being properly fantastic aside from that one overnight storm) and you could safely wander around in Trainers on the Sunday.

I must have been having a belter 07 and 16 as I don;t remember them being that bad , I do remember my first really hot one 2010 and thinking  "oh my god if thsi is what it is like when it is hot, why the hell did i come back after the last 3 "

[jfaragher]

16 hours ago, Punksnotdead said:

A group of scousers had pulled one of the fence panels to one side and were charging £5 to let people through. I said no and looked for another way.

I think it was '99 that I met a similar bunch of scousers whilst trying to get in.  Told them they could get to fuck with their £5 and they just went "alright la, in you go then"...

Then traded a couple of smokes with some kids in exchange for a half ticket so that I could camp with my mates in the campervan field and still get in and out.

Simpler times!

[al_coholic]

10 up for me this year. I have done 2005/11/16 all were very grim.

2005 was bad because I was pushing a 3 wheeled buggy around in that mud, and they put straw down on the trackway and the front wheel on the buggy got jammed up and I had to carry the buggy after that.

2011 was very strange, I think it rained heavily up until Saturday lunchtime, then the sun came out. I was in full wet weather gear and suddenly sweating badly. Also on the Sunday it was about 26 degrees sunshine the humidity was terrible and Paul Simon was absolutely shit on the Pyramid.

But the worst of the previous 9 by far for me was 2016. The mud was terrible, wore wellies for 5 days solid, Sunday morning I was broken and nearly bailed. Rang the Mrs for support, then said sod it and opened a tin of Dark Fruits Cider and didnt look back after that. But I skipped 2017 because of 2016 and didnt get a ticket in 2019. 

[gfa]

Add having a fresh n black tent to the veteran list i reckon 😉 

[jfaragher]

40 minutes ago, al_coholic said:

The mud was terrible, wore wellies for 5 days solid, Sunday morning I was broken and nearly bailed. Rang the Mrs for support

Same in 2016.  Sunday morning "I'm broken call" - she told me to go and eat something and have a couple of pints, then call her back if I needed more of a pep talk.  Didn't make that call.

[Dave_c]

16 was wild but strangely it was my favourite that I have been to so far. Dragging my garden trolley through the mire to gate A nearly ended me, I never want to experience that again! There were a few scary moments getting in and out of the pyramid at busy times with the mud being so deep and sticky, was proper dodgy and I'm surprised nobody fell over and got trampled on.

[Spindles]

5 hours ago, Neil said:

you're right. a true veteran has too many years to get it right.

I still maintain that either Wikipedia is wrong or my memory is seriously fucked as half the things I remember seeing and doing seem to have happened on different days or even years when I look back now.  2000 in particular seems to be a bit of a scrambled mess now.  

In fairness to your getting it right about 99, there was a brief thunderstorm and heavy rain Saturday afternoon (when Travis were on the other stage playing Why does it always rain on me, which got media attention due to the timing and I swear is the only reason they headlined the following year) and a bit overnight Saturday so there was that thin, slippy, runny surface mud for Sunday morning that soon cleared up.  Apart from that it was blazing sunshine all week.

[Calvin Klein]

I consider myself a veteran of going to Glastonbury from overseas. This will be my 5th. 

[gigpusher]

8 minutes ago, Calvin Klein said:

I consider myself a veteran of going to Glastonbury from overseas. This will be my 5th. 

To be fair the planning to come from overseas must be immense so you probably do get a reduction. 

Terms like veteran are difficult as some people will do and learn more in 1 festival than others will in 10. I remember chatting to someone who was at their 4th festival and they still had never even seen The Park. They had a large group and spent most of their days by pyramid and other and rarely wandered at all. 

I suppose when you are at a stage where you feel comfortable imparting advice and people feed back that it's good advice then you are a veteran of sorts. 

[efcfanwirral]

Not sure how serious this topic is but I'll answer it as if it is- I think it's relative to the people you're going with. I don't see myself as a veteran having done 8 of them, but the first timers we took last time saw me as one, same as the 2016 first timers I went with (all coming back in 2022!). I see those who went in the 90s or 80s as veterans now, but when I first went in 09 the group I went with had been to 3 and I thought that was loads then.

Edited April 6, 2022 by efcfanwirral

[gooner1990]

2 minutes ago, efcfanwirral said:

Not sure how serious this topic is but I'll answer it as if it is- I think it's relative to the people you're going with. I don't see myself as a veteran having done 8 of them, but the first timers we took last time saw me as one, same as the 2016 first timers I went with (all coming back in 2022!). I see those who went in the 90s or 80s as veterans now, but when I first went in 09 the group I went with had been to 3 and I thought that was loads then.

When I first went in 2004, I went with a few mates who had started going in 1997 and hadn't missed one at that point and I thought they were the hardened veterans at 7 visits.

Those friends stopped going in 2014 having been to the farm 15 times..... and the mantle then went to me and another two mates who've now had the longest run at going at 13 times (14 this year)

All relevant I guess. 🙂