On Friday evening after school (and after making sure we had negative tests on Thursday) we headed over to Marylebone Station and hopped on a train up to Warwick Parkway, where we got a taxi up to Ragley Hall, the venue for Bigfoot Festival. Annoyingly the taxi driver dropped us off at the wrong spot and we were told by volunteers that it would be ‘quicker to walk up the road’ rather than through the festival itself. We took their word for it and headed off in that direction, only for it to become quickly apparent that it absolutely was not quicker. We trekked 40 minutes on tiny pathways next to the road lined by nettles, and were feeling a bit grumpy by the time we found the second gate that led to the ‘VIP’ camping.

We finally arrived though, and once they’d scanned our covid test results (which were linked to our tickets), we made our way into the boutique camping area. The bell tents were reasonably spaced out and we found ours without a problem – right by the toilets and showers! Once we’d dropped off our clothes we headed in to the festival, past everyone watching the England v Scotland game on a big screen. The first stop was DEYA and Verdant breweries to get a drink, and then we explored the layout. The tents were all partly open to allow airflow, and everything was spaced out with plenty of outdoor seating on haybales and picnic benches. We spent the first evening just checking everything out and having a wander around and a beer before heading back to bed – feeling grateful for a bed instead of a sleeping mat!

In the morning we went and got a coffee before heading in to the main festival and getting a proper breakfast of ‘tater tots’ and sausages at a hot dog stall. The morning was very relaxed, alternating between wandering around and reading in our tent, before things started opening up again after midday. We took our picnic blanket over to the hill by the lake and found a spot to sit in the sun while we had it! When we picked up our gear to go for more of a walk later, we got sucked in to playing ‘Drag Music Bingo’ at the Big Drop Brewing tent – a new brewery who make low-alcohol beers who were very clever with their marketing at the event! It was a lot of fun and Peter ended up winning a couple of beers and a t-shirt, so he was very pleased with that. The beers were even surprisingly nice for no/low-alcohol beers, with Peter saying he’d prefer their IPA to Punk IPA (BrewDog’s standard beer).

After Drag Bingo, we watched the Germany v Portugal game for a while and then grabbed a burger and chips for lunch, which was absolutely spectacular! We wandered around for a bit and then had a rest in the tent. In the early evening they were playing Jurassic Park on the big screen so we sat down to the end of that before heading over to a few of the stages to listen to some music (from the back of the stage avoiding the crowds!). The amount of people around made us quite nervous, but we were being very careful to avoid being within 2 metres of anyone at any point.

On Sunday morning we had a similar start to Saturday, with a quiet coffee and breakfast and then wandering around until things started to open up. It was much colder on Sunday and I definitely felt like a bit of a rookie not having brought a heavier coat. We mostly huddled in corners with our ponchos on and tried to stay warm, before enjoying a few last beers in the afternoon. At about 3:30 we said goodbye to the festival and headed up the path (definitely quicker than all the way around!) to the taxi rank, where we were ferried back to Warwick Parkway. Annoyingly, we got on to an absolutely packed train and were shocked to hear an announcement that it was usually a 5 train carriage from Birmingham to London and had been reduced to 3 carriages. Luckily we got a seat, but we were surrounded by people and were very grumpy about it. On the other end we went to M & S to get some food and avoid the initial crowds into the tube and then made our way home for an early night – and for Peter to start night shifts!