However while this is the case, there are a number of preparations you should make in advance to fully enjoy the music festival you are going to attend.
Firstly, if it is a multi-day festival (as so many are these days) are you going for the whole thing? If the answer is yes, then the next question is where you are going to sleep.
Most festival goers, if they are allowed, camp on site. It is the cheapest and most fun option. You are surrounded by other festival goers and is the ultimate experience. In this case you will of course need to own (or borrow) a tent together with a sleeping bag and something to lie on. Food can generally be bought from stalls at the music festival unless you think you're going to want to brew up some coffee in the middle of the night.
There are also downsides to camping though which leads other people to either stay in hotels or only visit for a single day.
The camp sites can understandably suffer from petty crime sometimes as things get stolen or damaged by overzealous (and drunk!) festival goers.
Also worth mentioning is the inevitable mud that accompanies such a field. With thousands of people trudging around a field for a weekend - often during rain - the camp sites can often turn into a swamp. Wellington boots are often necessary to walk around safely and people in unsuitable foodwear suffer every year.
It's not just your footwear to be aware of though. The mud can get everywhere - on your clothes, in your hair etc. So take at least one more change of clothes than you think you will need just incase.
Also bear in mind the noise. This is a music festival after all - a field full of drunk fun-lovers listening to loud music. Unless you are a very deep sleeper, some people find they don't manage to drop off to sleep at all overnight, meaning they are too tired to enjoy the following day. So either take ear plugs or consider alternative accommodation.
The last, and possibly most famous, thing to consider are the "facilities". In other words, festival toilets and showers are notoriously bad. The clean-freaks among us have difficulties coping with such conditions and make the thought of a comfy hotel room just that little bit more welcoming.
The long and short of it is this. If you want the full experience and you don't mind roughing it (to put it mildly) then consider camping at the festival. In contrast, you you like your home comforts (even just a little bit!) then I would recommend finding alternative accommodation. Then you can lie in your clean, peaceful hotel room after a lovely hot shower and think about everyone else lying in the mud trying to sleep with rock music pumping through the air just next door!
Dumfries and Galloway is a region of Scotland found in the southwest corner which is becoming increasingly popular with tourists as a vacation destination. While this area of Scotland has all of the usual tourist attractions, ruined abbeys, stately homes and castles, it is the lush countryside and fantastic Solway coast which attracts most. The rather moderate weather and the numerous sandy coves have led to the areas nickname of the "Scottish Riviera" and, with a close association with Robert Burns and the wonderful village of Kirkcudbright (a one-time artists' colony) there is plenty to discover in Dumfries and Galloway.
Dumfries and Galloway is one of the most beautiful regions in Scotland. Found in the southwest corner Dumfries and Galloway has a number of beautiful picturesque places to visit and it was considered so beautiful and inspirational that many artists have, in the past, lived in the quaint village of Kirkcudbright. So beautiful is the Solway coast that it has been dubbed the "Scottish Riviera" and it is becoming extremely popular as a Scottish vacation destination.
Deep in the Dumfries and Galloway countryside, at the end of July, at a place called East Kirkcarswell, near Dundrennan the Wickerman Music Festival is held annually. Ordinarily the area is a lush green farm of rolling hills populated by sheep and cattle but for a few days it is covered by numerous tents and a multitude of diverse people.
Although Wickerman is a music festival it is actually themed upon a 1973 classic of British cinema, The Wicker Man. In 2006 Nicolas Cage appeared in a Hollywood remake but many folk still prefer the quirky original starring Christopher Lee, Britt Ekland and Edward Woodward.
Wandering around any music festival ground you are bound to meet all kinds of people dressed in amusing costumes but at the Wickerman Music Festival the costumes seem to appear more often than usual. Many of the costumes will have an animal theme and this is taken from the 1973 classic movie which saw people dressed in similar costumes. There are a great many references to the movie throughout the Wickerman festival site, with art installations and an open air cinema. The climax to the movie was the burning of a wicker man and this is replicated, minus the human and animals, as a climax to the music festival late on the Saturday night and is enjoyed by a huge crowd of eager onlookers.
Considered by a great many people to be a family friendly music festival, Wickerman has excellent facilities. Of special note are the toilets because usually, at music festivals, they are terrible but at Wickerman they are emptied often and usually rather clean. If you would rather not use one of the portable toilets and would like something a little more similar to yours at home then you should pay a little extra for a "Down n Dirty" ticket as these toilets are superb, porcelain types which are continually monitored by cleaning staff. If you would like to take a shower there is also a block of portable showers available too! Throughout the site there are plenty of family friendly things such as a fairground and circus. Even the food stalls are better than those usually found at festivals.
The order of the day seems to be saving the planet and the organizers of the Wickerman Music Festival are to be congratulated on their efforts to massively reduce the impact of the festival upon the environment. The immediate festival site is permanently kept clean of litter and other debris, usually seen at other festivals, by a squad of volunteers known as "wickerpickers". All waste is carefully sorted ready for recycling and this goes as far as packing up all of the abandoned tents and donating them to good causes.
Strangely I have left the music aspects of the Wickerman Music Festival until the very last and this is for a simple reason that virtually all types make an appearance at this extremely diverse event. Punk, Ska, reggae, folk, dance, electronic, pop, rock, world music and many, many other types appear across a multitude of stages and tents making it, possibly, the most varied UK music event of the year. Obviously this means that many different types of people attend Wickerman but it also gives people the opportunity to experience types of music which they may not otherwise be exposed to. The really great thing about this music festival is that, even though there is an extremely diverse crowd, all folk are warm and friendly to such a degree that the atmosphere is one of the things that will remain with you long after the festival itself has finished.
Both Richard Adams & Wickermanxxx are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.
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