Chapter 108: Grab Your Wristband
Fleet to Glastonbury
The van had the same last 3 letters as my parents’ car. I rolled open the back door. It was full to eye level. Electrical wires tangled around water bottles, a canvas tool kit, hi-vis jackets. A gas cannister lay at an angle like an unexploded bomb. I chucked my bag in and wedged a box of beers by an unopened pack of lightbulbs.
Lewis was a refrigeration engineer. He’d never been to Glastonbury but was happy to take me some of the way. He shouldn’t have been driving the route he was, past me on the Fleet junction on the M3, but Winchester town was closed so he had to reroute. It was Freedom Day there he told me. A few hundred soldiers were parading through with pipe and drums and the mayor would be saying how proud he was of a link with the military that went back to the Romans. Lewis couldn’t fix the fridge he was meant to because of it. “It’s all right,” he said, “I’ll go this afternoon.”
He followed his dad into the business though it wasn’t his dad’s own business. It took him all around the country from Bridport to London and his van had done 208,000 miles. That’s halfway to the moon I said. “I just sent it to scrap,” he replied, “This one’s a rental. I’m sorry, it’s not got any AC.” It was sticky in the car and the open windows did little but let in hot loud air.
We cruised off the M3 and merged into the A303. I pointed to a service station and he slowed into it. Lewis was already going out of his way and this was the best place for a ride on. I’d made good progress. The slow morning had finally got going. Glastonbury was still nearly two hours away but for the first time, there were signs suggesting something was going on. A coach load of festival goers were sitting outside the M&S. Sparkly sequin dresses caught the sun, pink flesh on display. Others wore broad-rimmed hats and walking boots. After a while, they got back on their coach and with a hiss and a clunk pulled away.
I said goodbye to Lewis then lugged my rucksack to the exit and sat down to text my friends. They had arrived at 5 that morning to join the 10,000 people waiting for the gates to open. The few square meters they’d reserved for our tents were already under pressure.
I heard the window of a small white Toyota winding down. A lady with frizzy hair and sunglasses peered out. “Are you going to Glastonbury?” She asked with a slightly husky voice, “Do you want a lift?”
Annemarie was cool and easy company. She was from Kells near Navan in County Meath, Ireland but she worked and lived in France most of the time now, on narrow boats. Hers were like luxury yachts but on canals.
She was going to Glastonbury but not to the festival. Or at least, not inside the festival. She was working in Camp Kerala. “Have you ever heard of it?” She asked. I hadn’t. “It’s the glamping. The proper glamping, that costs £25,000 a night.”
In fact, Annemarie wasn’t even working in the camp itself. She was hosting some guests in a farmhouse nearby. Camp Kerala had rented it for the weekend and they hired it out to the super-rich. Last time, she told me, the guests only came for a couple of nights. They flew in on Friday and were driven into the festival in Bentleys. There was a professional chef, swimming pools and beds with Egyptian cotton sheets. We both agreed the real winner was the owner of the house.
She was a little nervous about the weekend. In moments of quiet I could see her mulling the possibilities in her head. You never know what you’ll get with clients like that. Some were quite nice, others horrible, but either way, they get what they want and that could be anything.
We came off the A303 and wound onto country lanes. Though still half an hour away, we were now among a snake of cars, most with little red triangle stickers on the windscreen, signs that they were going. 250,000 people, I thought to myself. The countryside was alive with the movement, even this far away.
The phone rang. Annemarie apologised and pressed the green button. It was her half-sister. “I’ve picked up a hitchhiker,” she said coolly. - That’s so you! was the reply. They spoke for a long time about the sister’s troublesome husband. Annemarie listened patiently and gave her advice calmly. It seemed to be a gripe she’d heard before.
The lanes continued to narrow, and the traffic continued its tight convoy, quarrying through the hedgerows. We hoped no one ahead would break down. Eventually, we emerged onto a main road. There were flags everywhere and traffic cones, road signs pointed in different directions to different campsites and car parks. Stewards in red and yellow hi-vis vests marshalled the endless stream. It felt like an army on the move.
The way to Camp Kerala was not congested. Unsurprisingly perhaps. Annemarie picked up the key for the house in a farm shop, then we drove towards the festival, feeling our way to the right entrance, winding down the windows at each checkpoint to ask the stewards. They were mostly young volunteers working in return for a ticket.
Eventually, at about 4 o’clock we came to a fork. The pedestrian gate was one way, Camp Kerala the other. We wished each other luck and said goodbye. A gangly steward in blue square sunglasses saw my sign and asked cheerfully if I’d hitchhiked. I asked if I could wee in the bush. He said sure. His boss came round the corner and told us both off.
The walk to the gate took twenty minutes, along long green fences. There were tents everywhere. Stewards were smiling, bopping to inaudible music, wooping and saying ‘Welcome to Glastonbury.’ I walked past the exact place I’d been caught trying to break in two years before. Security guards were stationed in the same places. Even the dog unit van, the one that caught me, was parked in the exact same place, facing the same way, blocking the same lane. I was glad I had a ticket this time.
A steady stream of revellers sweated under their rucksacks at the gate. Some were pulled to the side and searched. A steward said a friendly hello at the barrier. The machine beeped
as my QR code scanned. “You’re in,” she smiled, “Grab your wristband and enjoy.”
