There certainly were teething problems, and one or two were sorted out at the time, but the main ones were those not enocuntered at Bridgnorth - crossover noise from one venue to another, and the failure to allocate camping space correctly on the county ground, such that those arriving later found the early arrivals had sprawled so liberally there was no room left.

I was pleased to see that another gate was opened by Marquee 2, clearly the organisers had only thought about people returning to the county ground and not those staying in town, who had to walk all the way round the dingle on the Friday night.

There also seemed to be some poor decisions on allocation of venues and artists. We watched the Doonans and Vin Garbutt in Marquee 1 on Friday night, then went across to Marquee 2 to see New Rope String Band - and the place was packed. Even when we managed to get a seat we found that someone had thoughtfully stuck two whacking great loudspeakers in the way so it was not possible to see what was going on. Idea for next time: put the aisles in line with the speakers, so no-one's view is blocked. And whilst on the subject of sound, the voal/instrumental mix was poor on almost every artis we watched in Marquee 2. A lot of folk songs have lyrics, and it would be nice to hear them above the instruments.

It struck me that all the big names had been booked for Saturday, and Sunday was a bit of an anticlimax.

I also thought that the traders in town could have been better informed, we found several restaurants that had "Closed Sunday and Momday" signs - you'd nver find that in Bridgnorth!

The final comment is with regard to stewarding. One of my party choked on some food, and we manged to get him out, but the stewards were less than helpful. There was no first-aider in Marquee 2 and the stewards sent us down to the main entrance, where we found an amateur vrew who wer not well versed in first aid or adequately equipped. THe best advice they could give us to dislodge the sharp object in my friend's throat was to wat some bread. We ended up trailing round Shrewsbury on SUnday afternoon trying to find an open bread shop!

John