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Best arrival time (and route in for west side)?


PassingCloud
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Hi. Will be travelling down from the West Midlands on the Wednesday morning.

First question:

I thought about trying to arrive around 7am and need to be at the east side of festival so closer to family camping. What can I expect at that time, once in the car park? Will it be hours of queuing. I think the gates open at 9am (right?), but are we likely to be queuing til like midday or what? 
Haven’t been for 19 years and we used to just get dumped off the minibus and walk down. 
 

Question 2: 

I think I read that best way to get to east side of campsite if travelling from the West Midlands (ie down the M5) is to go via Frome. Any advice? Don’t really want to be in a position of being directed to west side parking and have to lug everything across the festival! 
 

TIA. 

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1 hour ago, PassingCloud said:

Will it be hours of queuing. I think the gates open at 9am (right?), but are we likely to be queuing til like midday or what? 

Yes.  The queue will already be huge by the time you arrive as many arrive on Tuesday now.  So you'll be stationary for a bit once you join the queue and then hours of snaking queues and barriers before you get in.  No way to skip it.  That 's just how it is folks.

Advice.  Only take your tent and a day sack of necessary stuff on the first trip.  Necessities mean water, toilet roll and hand sanitizer, something substantial to snack on, suntan cream, breakfast cider.  You may also want a camping chair if ground is wet to sit in initial stationary queue and once you are pitched for a well deserved breather.  I liked a G&T can to celebrate once the tent was up!  Once pitched, then go back for all other stuff.  This means that you don't bugger your back before you even start the festival. It's simply not worth taking a big initial load when you can get in and out so easily on a second or third trip.  Be realistic and prepared in order to avoid... bad back, exhaustion, heatstroke, major sunburn, fainting via lack of food/drink (all things which have happened to at least someone in my group through not listening to this advice and taking a large rucksack+ on first trip).

Also, garden centre trolleys are a   n i g h t m a r e   in the queue as they can't easily go around the turns in a snaking barrier.  Leave it behind for the first trip or only use a sack trolley for the tents.

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2 hours ago, Glast0baby said:

Yes.  The queue will already be huge by the time you arrive as many arrive on Tuesday now.  So you'll be stationary for a bit once you join the queue and then hours of snaking queues and barriers before you get in.  No way to skip it.  That 's just how it is folks.

Advice.  Only take your tent and a day sack of necessary stuff on the first trip.  Necessities mean water, toilet roll and hand sanitizer, something substantial to snack on, suntan cream, breakfast cider.  You may also want a camping chair if ground is wet to sit in initial stationary queue and once you are pitched for a well deserved breather.  I liked a G&T can to celebrate once the tent was up!  Once pitched, then go back for all other stuff.  This means that you don't bugger your back before you even start the festival. It's simply not worth taking a big initial load when you can get in and out so easily on a second or third trip.  Be realistic and prepared in order to avoid... bad back, exhaustion, heatstroke, major sunburn, fainting via lack of food/drink (all things which have happened to at least someone in my group through not listening to this advice and taking a large rucksack+ on first trip).

Also, garden centre trolleys are a   n i g h t m a r e   in the queue as they can't easily go around the turns in a snaking barrier.  Leave it behind for the first trip or only use a sack trolley for the tents.

Super advice. Thank you. Bit different to what I remember, used to just show ticket and walk through or break in!

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18 hours ago, PassingCloud said:

Hi. Will be travelling down from the West Midlands on the Wednesday morning.

First question:

I thought about trying to arrive around 7am and need to be at the east side of festival so closer to family camping. What can I expect at that time, once in the car park? Will it be hours of queuing. I think the gates open at 9am (right?), but are we likely to be queuing til like midday or what? 
Haven’t been for 19 years and we used to just get dumped off the minibus and walk down. 
 

Question 2: 

I think I read that best way to get to east side of campsite if travelling from the West Midlands (ie down the M5) is to go via Frome. Any advice? Don’t really want to be in a position of being directed to west side parking and have to lug everything across the festival! 
 

TIA. 

Gates open 8am so if arriving at 7 you should get in by 10/11. In which case you will be ok for family camping on Cockmill. This site is very popular with families and space becomes a premium by lunchtime.

As for travelling, approaching via Frome or even down through Shepton Mallot are the accepted routes from the north to the east car parks. You won't be diverted elsewhere if approaching from this directions.

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18 minutes ago, Lycra said:

Gates open 8am so if arriving at 7 you should get in by 10/11. In which case you will be ok for family camping on Cockmill. This site is very popular with families and space becomes a premium by lunchtime.

As for travelling, approaching via Frome or even down through Shepton Mallot are the accepted routes from the north to the east car parks. You won't be diverted elsewhere if approaching from this directions.

Great. Thank you. Yeah my main concern was being able to get into that family campsite, although with us just being one tent I’m sure it’ll be ok. 

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20 hours ago, PassingCloud said:

Hi. Will be travelling down from the West Midlands on the Wednesday morning.

First question:

I thought about trying to arrive around 7am and need to be at the east side of festival so closer to family camping. What can I expect at that time, once in the car park? Will it be hours of queuing. I think the gates open at 9am (right?), but are we likely to be queuing til like midday or what? 
Haven’t been for 19 years and we used to just get dumped off the minibus and walk down. 
 

Question 2: 

I think I read that best way to get to east side of campsite if travelling from the West Midlands (ie down the M5) is to go via Frome. Any advice? Don’t really want to be in a position of being directed to west side parking and have to lug everything across the festival! 
 

TIA. 

If you are in East car parks by 7am you will be in a queue but once the gates open at 8am it moves fairly quickly. It depends where you get directed - it could be purple parking and gate B -( this eventually takes you down muddy lane to Cockmill ) which has a narrower queue so takes a bit longer or blue and via gate C which takes you through all the caravan fields and you go up via the acoustic/kidz field route. Alternatively there is another family camping- Wickets on the West side but is obviously not close to the kidz fields. 
 

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34 minutes ago, sedra said:

If you are in East car parks by 7am you will be in a queue but once the gates open at 8am it moves fairly quickly. It depends where you get directed - it could be purple parking and gate B -( this eventually takes you down muddy lane to Cockmill ) which has a narrower queue so takes a bit longer or blue and via gate C which takes you through all the caravan fields and you go up via the acoustic/kidz field route. Alternatively there is another family camping- Wickets on the West side but is obviously not close to the kidz fields. 
 

 Cheers. Yeah, queuing isn’t an issue (and fully expected long queues), I am just trying to plan so not to end up in 6 hour traffic jam  or 6 hour queue through the gate. 
Definitely will be aiming for the fields closer to acoustic tent as the other is too out of the way. 

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As per above heading to East car parks via Frome is the way to go.  Note that if you use Frome bypass there is a Sainsbury superstore, plus Homebase, Halfords and McD's 200m right from the roundabout where you turn left onto the A361 on west side of town which is handy for last minute stuff or a loo stop before you hit the queue for east parking at Shepton.

Ref traffic you should only hit it once you turn onto the A37 south of Shepton and heading into the east car parks as the vast majority of traffic will have been queuing and parking late Tuesday night.

Edited by parsonjack
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Just extending the question slightly.

Does anyone know if it is possible to access the West car parks if heading towards the site via Shepton or will the traffic be diverted to the East car parks? (This’ll be on Thursday morning)

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57 minutes ago, T Dob said:

Just extending the question slightly.

Does anyone know if it is possible to access the West car parks if heading towards the site via Shepton or will the traffic be diverted to the East car parks? (This’ll be on Thursday morning)

I don't believe you can get through the village to the west car parks if coming from Shepton Mallet on the A361.

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2 minutes ago, al_coholic said:

I don't believe you can get through the village to the west car parks if coming from Shepton Mallet on the A361.

Correct....although there is a route from Shepton that *may* allow you to do so the jury is out on whether it's viable or not so best avoided. 

Best bet to get to West car parks from East approach would probably be to go straight through Shepton on the A371 towards Wells then head south from Wells to Glastonbury on the A39. You'll then get directed left off the A39 through Launcherly and North Wootton villages and into Pink parking just north of the A361. 

By Thursday you should be OK to approach Shepton on A361 from Frome without getting stuck in traffic queuing for East parking. 

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11 hours ago, Helsbels said:

Hmm, we are staying in Frome the night before but want the west car parks. Any idea of what detour we would have to do to achieve this Wednesday morning?

Pretty much exactly what @parsonjack said above. 

A361 Frome > Shepton Mallet

A371 Shepton Mallet > Wells

A39 Wells > Glastonbury

A361 Glastonbury > West Car Parks

However there is another route from Frome to Wells that avoids Shepton Mallet altogether if the traffic is really bad, its labelled Old Wells Road and old Frome Road on Google Maps.

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Probably shouldn’t shout about this but we come from South Wales and go down the m5 all the way to Bridgwater then across on a39 through Street and Glastonbury to access the west side. Avoids a lot of north/east traffic and both Bristol and Bath entirely. Love trying to get worthy fm on the radio as we approach 

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4 hours ago, Wherethewildthingsare said:

Probably shouldn’t shout about this but we come from South Wales and go down the m5 all the way to Bridgwater then across on a39 through Street and Glastonbury to access the west side. Avoids a lot of north/east traffic and both Bristol and Bath entirely. Love trying to get worthy fm on the radio as we approach 

Ooh sounds intriguing, so what do I put in my satnav? 😉

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40 minutes ago, Wherethewildthingsare said:

For me it is literally m4, m5 south to j23 (Bridgewater) then a39, three roads the whole way until you see directions after Glastonbury. Most traffic is coming from somewhere else… 

 

So looking on Google maps I would normally leave the a39 to join the a631 to the site, are you saying to ignore this and carry on the a39 until Wells?

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6 hours ago, zico martin said:

So looking on Google maps I would normally leave the a39 to join the a631 to the site, are you saying to ignore this and carry on the a39 until Wells?

No sorry you’re probably right about the a361,  I’m sure the signs start quite early and I follow them not the sat nav from about Glastonbury. The real saving is before that by avoiding Bristol 

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6 minutes ago, Wherethewildthingsare said:

No sorry you’re probably right about the a361,  I’m sure the signs start quite early and I follow them not the sat nav from about Glastonbury. The real saving is before that by avoiding Bristol 

OK, stick with Google maps then?

Screenshot_20220519-065123_Maps.jpg

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19 hours ago, Wherethewildthingsare said:

Probably shouldn’t shout about this but we come from South Wales and go down the m5 all the way to Bridgwater then across on a39 through Street and Glastonbury to access the west side. Avoids a lot of north/east traffic and both Bristol and Bath entirely. Love trying to get worthy fm on the radio as we approach 

This is the recognised route in for all those travelling from the west and north west to the west car park. Avoids the Bristol & Bath jams.

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Im travelling from Llanelli (first timer). We were planning on camping at Big Ground so ideally would arrive East. Is this reasonable/feasible if travelling down Tuesday evening? Any recommended routes welcome.

 

Im assuming the default route would be bring us in to the West side?

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Yeah quickest would be West Side, but if you want East, I would avoid Bristol and carry on to the A46, skirt round Bath then go either A39/A37 to Shepton Mallet or A36 to Frome and A361 to Shepton Mallet

Or you could still come down the M5 take the slower roads through Cheddar to Wells and then onto Shepton Mallet. 

So many choices!

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