V-festival camping advice?

[TonyHetherington]

Hi world

I'm off to the V-festival in a couple of weeks, and just wanted to double check which are the campsites to go to / not go to?

Like LeMans, I guess there's noisey ones and slightly more relaxed ones? Are there any with better facilities (probably not, but thought I'd ask).

I understand yellow is the slightly more relaxed one, red is the crazy one - is that right?

Also - a question about the facilities, I assume they're horrid and you don't shower/go near the toilets?

Thanks all
T (yes, my first festival )

[The Dirty Bubble]

Not sure on the best campsite but:

Don't camp near a path (tent will get trodden/jumped/fallen on)
Don't camp next to the toilets (waking up to them being emptied is not a pleaseant experiance, sometimes they get burnt down or spring a leek)
Don't be tempted to padlock your tent (better to get robbed, than to get robbed and have the front of your tent slashed open).

If there are showers on site (which I doubt) you can expect to queue for a couple of hours to get under a cold dribble. Find a tap and get under that instead.

By an airbed from Argos for £8, after years of sleeping on the ground at festivals I finally bit the bullet, much to the amusement of my mates who felt I had gone soft. The following year they all followed suit after seeing how much kip I was getting compared to them.

If you bring a stereo or guitar with you and make noise till the early hours you can expect to loose it the first time you leave your tent.



Oh, and enjoy yourself!

[shirt]

the only festival i've ever been to with a noticeable difference in camping between fields was glastonbury. V, carling and the like are pretty much pot luck. if you want quiet, camp further out from the stages. look around and think where you'd camp for easy access to amenities and for the main routes to the stages, then avoid them. avoid being near a thoroughfare as even in the dry these will be churned to mud.

is V still at stafford? the camping there had wooded areas with little cul-de-sacs of field poking in where you could have a nice secluded spot.

not been to V for a few years so it may have changed. they were fairly hitler like in their approach to campers. no fires, not even bbq's were allowed, which was an arse if you forgot gas and torches!


my top tip for festivals is to turn up and grab yourself a fresh wheely bin [it will be clean]. put all your gear in it and trundle along to your chosen spot, then take it back. saves hours of walking back and forth carrying stuff.

[Neil_H]

Which one are you going to? I went to the Staffs one in 2001, was good. The showers were a bit nasty as literally hundreds of people had used them previously, and you have to queue for a while.

The toilets obviously get nastier as time goes on, try and avoid whenever possible. Make sure you camp a good distance from them.

[JP_Midget]

I think the campsite will be hit and miss, those who will be noisey don't care where they go, although it is usually better the further away from the main entrance you go.

Toilets in the campsite are horrid, after a night of drunk people trying to use them in the dark I avoided them. Those in the main music area got cleaned and were ok first thing in the morning, without any queue as most people didn't get up til later.

Take your own loo roll and some baby wipes and you'll be fine.

[JP_Midget]

shirt said:

not been to V for a few years so it may have changed. they were fairly hitler like in their approach to campers. no fires, not even bbq's were allowed, which was an arse if you forgot gas and torches!

We weren't allowed to take in the gas bottle we brought, but others did manage to have bbqs. Very hitler-like, there were watch towers set up to spot anyone with any kind of fire.

So, take food which doesn't need cooking is probably a good tip!

[Puggit]

My advice is not to camp

[shirt]

JP_Midget said:

shirt said:

not been to V for a few years so it may have changed. they were fairly hitler like in their approach to campers. no fires, not even bbq's were allowed, which was an arse if you forgot gas and torches!

We weren't allowed to take in the gas bottle we brought, but others did manage to have bbqs. Very hitler-like, there were watch towers set up to spot anyone with any kind of fire.

So, take food which doesn't need cooking is probably a good tip!

i remember the towers as we had forgotten any form of lighting [but had brought a spade to dig a hole to fill with water to keep beer cool]. we pitched to tent with the door facing one of the gantries!

luckily the next day we met 2 lovely ladies who had torches but no means of cooking

ps - who has a shower at a festival? not really in the spirit of things is it?

[TonyHetherington]

Ah ok thanks world!

The shower's not for me - it's for my girlfriend (!) - I'm quite expecting not to go near the showers, besides it's only Friday to Sunday night. What's a bit of smell between mates, eh?!

The fires thing sounds a bit strange? Even gas stoves?

Edited by TonyHetherington on Thursday 7th August 10:21

[ali_kat]

Puggit said:

My advice is not to camp

And mine

But if you have to - take baby wipes - lots of them Tescos have their own unscented ones on offer at the moment

[ofcorsa]

Ooh im off to V too,

Im taking a pack of baby wipes and 4 of us have chipped in for a tent. The less you take the less you have a chance losing


Line up looks ace.

[shirt]

[quote=TonyHetherington]
The fires thing sounds a bit strange? Even gas stoves?
quote]

they allow stoves as long as they are the little ones. a burner and seperate bottle is a no-no.

as camping is seperate from the arena, they also don't allow you to take your own alcohol in. this can easily be gotten around with the aid of very baggy flares and some gaffer tape

[ofcorsa]

I reckon a camelbak full of JD and coke should do the trick

[TonyHetherington]

shirt said:

TonyHetherington said:

The fires thing sounds a bit strange? Even gas stoves?

they allow stoves as long as they are the little ones. a burner and seperate bottle is a no-no.

as camping is seperate from the arena, they also don't allow you to take your own alcohol in. this can easily be gotten around with the aid of very baggy flares and some gaffer tape

Ah gotcha - we have a small camping stove with a kettle, so a cup of tea in the morning is do-able.

Thanks all - it's confirmed what I thought

[merc_man]

You're going to a festival and worried about the cup of tea in the morning!

This wouldn't be a mid-life, middle-class gesture to the grim reaper that you've get loads of life left in you would it?

I've never been to a festival and never intend to. The idea of being amongst that many people is abhorrent!

[shirt]

merc_man said:

You're going to a festival and worried about the cup of tea in the morning!

This wouldn't be a mid-life, middle-class gesture to the grim reaper that you've get loads of life left in you would it?

I've never been to a festival and never intend to. The idea of being amongst that many people is abhorrent!

i think tony is mid 20s. a cup of sweet tea does wonders for a hangover.

being in a crowd of 40,000+ likeminded people singing and dancing along to to one of your favourite bands is an experience like no other. like being in the stands as the crowd goes wild when your team scores the winning goal - its electric. the atmosphere at the sets by super furry animals, flamings lips and the who at harewood 2yrs ago will stay with me forever.

Edited by shirt on Thursday 7th August 11:21

[big_treacle]

I went to V last year (the southern one)
The bogs may scare you but I found V wasn't too bad - Toilets were emptied & jetwashed every morning except the last one (try & avoid after the sunday morning rush!). Just bring your bogroll & babywipes. However, there was a company with special eco-bogs which had a nice clean non-stink dump-into-a-special-compost-heap thing going on for a quid or so. My GF used that & said it was worth paying for. I think they had showers too.
As said, avoid camping near paths, toilets, shop areas (they have these market type areas in the campsites with bar, food, clothes/camping kit, bank machine, phone charging, safes etc etc) which become big parties at night).
Get drunk & you won't notice the noise if you wanna sleep at night.
Foodwise - they sell all sorts in the arena. In the campsites they have bacon vans & tea/coffee people.
One thing we did last year was to stick a helium balloon on to our tent - its amazing how full up the campsites get & it made it easy to find when battered. You could hear people using it as a waypoint - 'ah, there's scooby doo, our tent must be just over there...'
I'm off to Endorse it in dorset festival tomorrow wooooooooooo

[TonyHetherington]

shirt said:

merc_man said:

You're going to a festival and worried about the cup of tea in the morning!

This wouldn't be a mid-life, middle-class gesture to the grim reaper that you've get loads of life left in you would it?

I've never been to a festival and never intend to. The idea of being amongst that many people is abhorrent!

i think tony is mid 20s. a cup of sweet tea does wonders for a hangover.

being in a crowd of 40,000+ likeminded people singing and dancing along to to one of your favourite bands is an experience like no other. like being in the stands as the crowd goes wild when your team scores the winning goal - its electric. the atmosphere at the sets by super furry animals, flamings lips and the who at harewood 2yrs ago will stay with me forever.

Yup - I'm 27, as are the other 3 guys coming (all of whom are in our band too )

Tea? First thing in the morning, as is the case at all LeMans events also, is a cup of tea. Sorts hang over, gives you energy, is warm, and enables you to kick onto the drinking shortly after. And goes well with a bacon sandwich.

Cannot wait - some bands that I am frankly moist waiting to see!

[martinhutton]

hello all

just looking at this topic. It is my first time to V this year. I am not a stranger to camping though.
We have read all the rules that are on the website and it says that camping stoves are not a problem and you ARE allowed to bring your own alcohol.

they may have changed the rules since last year....

[Plotloss]

Eat eggs the day before you leave, dont eat whilst there, dont take what you cant afford to lose.

Easy.