My first time at Broadstairs and I thoroughly enjoyed myself. It's a nice little town and the people are friendly and engaged with the festival. It makes you realise how "imposed" on the town Sidmouth has felt.

I didn't have a problem with the campsites apart for the showers - you don't expect five start luxury on a festival site but these icy sods were really taking the micky.

The Neptune was far too crowded for my tastes although it sounded nice from the garden. And as Lynne pointed out there was plenty of opportunity for accompanied music at the folk club, via the Travelling Folk and in the evening singaround. I do think Richard makes a good point about the separation between the sessions and singing.

For me the highlights were my first song in the evening singaround when everybody joined in really well and made it a simply wonderful experience, Ben Pailey and Tab Hunter doing some sort of musical voodoo and Loscoe State Opera who I'd never heard of but was a fan by the time they were half way through their first song!

I did have a couple of reservations - some of the venues were very crowded and an comfortable. Propping up against a pillar looking at the tops of the heads of the band over the crowd is OK for a mates rock gig but it's not much good when you want to close your eyes and concentrate. Also the lack of a late night venue when the pavilion was either full or not to our taste meant there were a couple of evenings when there was nothing to do but go to bed at midnight however I appreciate that this was due to the school being renovated so hopefully that won't be an issue next year.