Showers at folk festivals

Subject: Showers at folk festivals
From: Steve in Sidmouth
Date: 04 Sep 06 - 07:42 PM

Following the Shrewsbury festival recently - when on the main camp site we had a superb new shower block but couldn't use it much of the time (!) I have done some rough calculations for gas and water usage.

I doubt if any or many festival sites provide sufficient capacity - so that everyone can have a shower a day. I've been told about the Towersey upgrade (not before time?). For festivals using large heating plant sized to cope with hundreds of schoolchildren things should work OK, but (out of technical interest) what if any design rules are used for temporary installations? Some people at Shrewsbury seemed to expect 'Caravan Club' standards for their £6 for four days camping!

The rough calcs are here - gas and water usage for folkie showers

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: *Laura*
Date: 04 Sep 06 - 07:50 PM

The showers at Towersey were luuverly.
The campsite ones were better than the sport and social club ones!

xLx

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Sorcha
Date: 04 Sep 06 - 08:04 PM

Hey, just count your blessings and take a solar shower bag. Fill with hot water from fire or camper if necessary. Half cold, then half hot. Deal with it, campers.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: GUEST,Rowan
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 12:43 AM

It depends on the location. At my favourite festival there is a creek with a spa in it where everybody swims; nobody uses soap in the creek. There is a cold shower located in a convenient part of the campsite for those who want to use soap and those who like warm water do as Sorcha suggests, well away from the creek.

The National Folk Festival in Canberra is held in what northern hemispehere people might recognise as an agricultural showground (if you're from the British Isles) or a state/county fairground (if you're from the US) with racetrack facilities. There are quite good toilets and showers but the influx of some thousands (many of whom camp there for the whole of Easter) overload the built facilities.

The NFF organisers have coped brilliantly with the extra load by hiring a set of four semi-trailers. The prime movers ("tractors" I think US residents call them) manouvre the trailers into position and then vacate the area, leaving the four trailers plugged into hydrant water supplies; all use water treatment to minimise total use. Two trailers contain showers (male and female) and two (ditto) contain toilets. Because they're still on their bogies (US people call them 18 wheelers but Australian "semis" use triaxled bogies, and are thus "22 wheelers") you have to climb a set of steps to use them, which is OK for those of us who don't get around in wheelchairs. Those of us who DO need wheelchairs are provided for by the already existing facilities.

I suspect such trailers would be available for hire somewhere in Britain. On a large site such trailers would not be out of place.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: MBSLynne
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 02:53 AM

Hear hear Sorcha! In my earlier festival days most festival campsites had no showers. We coped. You give people showers and they want better showers; you make them better and they want a bloody hotel! Camping is about roughing it.

Love Lynne

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Keef
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 03:11 AM

Showers??
Poms??
Does not compute!!

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: skipy
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 04:08 AM

White Horse Folk Festival has:-
10 Ladies showers, 10 gents showers, 20 mixed showers & the referee's shower all open 24 hours a day! Thanks to Grove Rugby Club.
Skipy

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: John J
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 04:11 AM

I don't think camping is roughing it at all, however it IS more about being self-sufficient.

Admittedly I generally use a caravan at festivals although it's not a huge ground-coverer, a Ford Fiesta towing a 2 berth 11'6" van, so I generally don't have the problems (at festivals) that tent users have.

Maintaining personal cleanliness is not difficult in a tent if showers are available or not. I backback quite a lot (wild camping in Scotland) and always manage a top-to-toe wash down before I hit the sack. It's not difficult, it just takes a bit of thought.

Keeping clean isn't rocket science. Showers are wonderful things but they certainly aren't absolutely necessary. What are absolutely necessary on a highly populated campsite are decent bogs, a decent water supply, an adequate waste water disposal system and somewhere to dump your rubbish.

Just my opinion.

John

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 04:13 AM

Showers?

At a festival?

Ah, c'mnon - where has the hippy in you gone?

:D (tG)

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Scrump
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 04:28 AM

I agree with John J that showers aren't essential. At Cropredy there weren't enough toilets (in the camping field we were in, anyway) to cope with peak time demand - it's no fun getting up early to answer a call of nature and finding a huge queue of cross-legged festivalgoers already waiting in line. As for showers I can live without them, especially if it's only for a few days - and you really appreciate it when you finally get home afterwards. (On the festival field itself however the toilets were fine, regularly cleaned, emptied and restocked with paper.)

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: julian morbihan
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 04:30 AM

Chippenham's answer to the camping folkies bathing dilema is to provide a ceilidh in the swimming pool on Sunday evening - the Aqueilidh!

Proper barn dances in the swimming pool! Great fun and lots of clean campers afterwards. The festival provide shampoo too.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: open mike
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 05:45 AM

the festival i just returned from (strawberry music fest.) has a model
for the strawberry shower..which includes getting wet, turning off the water while soaping and scrubbing, then turn on H20 again to rinse.
they emphasize this method and remind everyone to save (hot)water for
their neighbor by doing this.Maybe these are also called "navy showers?"

At my house i heat water 3 different ways...solar collector, for summer,
wood stove heat loop with storage tank for winter, and for fall and spring i use a tankless propane hot water heater...which offers endless hot water....limited only by the amount of propane avaialbe and the amount of water avialable--and "on demand" system. It seems like this would be the ideal type of heater for large groups...i think they are sometimes called "blazing showers"

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 06:12 AM

At Broadstairs the showers although using propane heaters were suffering from intermittent electrical supplies - no electricity, no control voltage, no heat.

Then they tried generators, but I gather it was still a lottery.

I used the shower in my caravan.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Hrothgar
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 06:29 AM

Well, when I go to Canberra for the National every year, I stay at my sister's place. The excellence of her hot water system is rivalled only by the high quality of her central heating.

LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: GUEST,The black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 07:28 AM

I can cope without a shower but my wife can't. It does mean that there are some festivals we won't be going to, and some festivals where we camp at a nearby "paying" camp-site, and some where B&B is the order of the day.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Willie-O
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 07:43 AM

I just spent the weekend at Shelter Valley Folk Fest in central Ontario. The showers came from the sky and there was no shortage whatsoever thanks to the remnants of Hurricane Che (Ernesto).

As for on-site cleansing facilities, they were a pretty low priority compared to surviving tent-blow-down winds and heavy rain...

Good though.

W-O

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: GUEST,noddy
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 07:43 AM

Folkies!!! Showers!!!!

Surely an oxymoron!!!!

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: GUEST,Rob The Roadie
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 07:46 AM

Best showers were at Bideford Folk Festival.
Big enough to hold a ceilidh.
Steaming Hot water jets pinning you against the wall.
WOW!
Going back next year if only to get a wash!

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Folkie
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 08:12 AM

I can manage without a shower but do appreciate clean loos in good working order. The loos on the County Ground at Shrewsbury were atrocious.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Seaking
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 09:01 AM

I happily confess to liking my daily shower and am happy to pay for the privilege at whatever campsite through small increase in ticket cost or charge per shower but it doesn't have to be hot, cool to tepid is fine to get the job done. I can be in and out, hair and bits done in a minute or so but am always amazed just how long some people take when there's a great long queue waiting (Just what are they doing in there ? !!)   Same comment on toilets too thinking about it.

Chris

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Hand-Pulled Boy
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 09:10 AM

Use 'Wet Wipes' but dispose of them properly!

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Scrump
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 09:36 AM

Talking about festival bogs, which some people were including me, earlier: one annoying thing at Cropredy was that several gents were queuing for the (ahem) number two facilities, whereas I was only interested in the number 1 facility. When I got near the door I realised I could have just walked in and made use of the No. 1 facility without having had to queue. Poor queue management in my opinion - should be two separate queues ;-)

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: wysiwyg
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 10:15 AM

On our recent camping trip I discovered the BEST showerless hygiene program!

LEMONS. A lemon a day is plenty-- maybe even enough for two people, if each has their own washcloth and you divide the "soap" into two containers.

Cut the lemon in half and squeeze it into a paper cup, then add an equal amount of room-temp water. (Don't discard the lemon!)

Squeeze the now-"emptied" lemon HARD into the cup, wrapped in a clean, dry washcloth. More juice will run out, and the cloth will now be lemon-oiled. Before discarding the lemon, rub it well with the cloth to get more lemon oil.

Dip the cloth in the water and wipe your cleaner parts first (your hair for instance). Keep dipping and wiping till the last parts are the nastiest ones. And that's IT, your're done!

Rinse your hands and the cloth. You will not believe how fresh you get, how good it feels, and how good your skin will look.

Lemons don't need to be refrigerated. You don't need to get naked all over at once, and it can be done in cooler weather with no harm-- just uncover one body poart at a time (that's how you freshen horses in winter, under their horse-blanket, with well-diluted liniment).

This also removes/neutralizes chlorine from swimming-- that's how I first discovered it. I'd been swimming earlier in the day and then had a full day of activities, but I was too tired to take the shower required to stop the chlorine itch. Then I remembered an old trick advised for getting chlorine out of hair-- orange or any citrus shampoo. We had a pile of lemons already on hand, and I reckoned the effort couldn't hurt-- we made sure we carried lemons the rest of the trip.

My "travel towel" is the other essential-- I've written about it before. Two and a half yards of cheap flannel wraps and overlaps around just about anyone, and makes a robe, a towel, a light blanket, a lap robe, a table cover-- and dries a LOT faster than a heavy, bulky terrycloth towel.

~Susan

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: MBSLynne
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 10:33 AM

Even when there are showers on campsites, I get fed up with standing in queues to have one. Whatever you do there are times when more people want a shower than at others, and it's usually when I want one too. At Sidmouth this year I gave up and went back to the pre-shower days. I boil a kettle of water, fill the washing bowl in my tent, take my clothes off and, with a flannel, wash all over. Much easier and quicker.

Love Lynne

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Sorcha
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 10:53 AM

Geeze Louise....git big or go home.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Steve in Sidmouth
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 10:55 AM

Commendable but dangerous? Boiling a kettle or a saucepan of water in a tent or a caravan is asking for injury. People do use too much water and some systems encourage it.

My (modest) gravity fed shower at home uses a litre every 10 seconds - many power showers use three or four times as much. The minimum is perhaps about 9 litres per shower - the capacity of the Carver Cascade 2 heater so popular in caravans (see my website for all you need to know!). It used to be temperature adjustable but modern versions are fixed at 70 C - too hot for safety but it is so you get enough hot water to blend for a quick low-flow-rate shower and then have some left over. Maybe festival organisers should invest in design of a low water low gas design of shower cubicle (with a communal unisex shower area?) especially suited to festivals. The ones at Shrewsbury were luxurious but the water (and gas) usage was well over what was reasonably necessary. Thanks for all comments so far.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: MBSLynne
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 02:05 PM

Don't be ridiculous Steve! How on earth would we manage our morning cups of tea and coffee if we didn't boil water in the tent! We are in Sidmouth for between 10 days and two weeks. We have a camping cooker and we cook meals in the evening and some of our breakfasts. Obviously one uses sense when using a cooker in a tent, but what would you have us do instead?

Love Lynne

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Mrs.Duck
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 02:16 PM

I don't have a shower at home and we manage!

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 02:34 PM

i have to wash my hair every day - I have problems with my sebaceous glands otherwise. If I couldn't shower, I wouldn't be able to festival. And I'd hate that!


The showers at Towersey and Sidmouth were lovely this year.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: MBSLynne
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 05:05 PM

I usede to wash my hair under the stand pipes on the campsite at Sidmouth. Admitedly I was younger and hardier...it was BLOODY cold!!

Love Lynne

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: *Laura*
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 05:21 PM

You can't stay somehwere all WEEK and not have a shower (like Sidmouth). But Sidmouth's easier cos theres the yacht club and the swimming pool too...
and Towersey - SOME of us were there from Tuesday till Tuesday, and again that's a week with no showers. If it wasn't for the fact that the showers were great this year. :-)

xLx

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Col K
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 06:45 PM

We had plenty of showers at Fylde this year.
Cold windy ones that is.
Some hardy people worked hard during the windy showers saving the tents of many others who were enjoying the music at that time.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Steve in Sidmouth
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 06:53 PM

"Don't be ridiculous Steve!"

I was thinking of the poor mortals in tiny tents in the dark where it would be inadvisable if not plain daft to try and heat water using an open gas stove. Fine if you have a huge tent or (in my case) a centrally heated caravan (but no shower).

To survive, festivals may need to attract more than the dyed in the wool folkies who have cold showers and live on seaweed sandwiches and bean sprouts. People pay £70 or more for tickets, often as much again on fuel and many people now expect decent facilities.

It just seems that infrastructure that can give rise to so many of the complaints is low in the pecking order when it comes to allocating resources (and maybe low in management priorities)

Showers at Sidmouth were lovely this year? Is that a first?

Why can't Towersey run twice a year now it apparently has civilised showers? Surely the market is out there? You couldn't do Sidmouth in the winter to be sure.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Sorcha
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 06:53 PM

Actually, if there is no shower, you put the STOVE outside the tent....heat water. Take inside. Do Cat Bath, etc.. Use 2 bowls. One for with soap, one without.

When done cat bathing the bits, pour first the soap water over head...scrub. Then pour the Not Soap water over head. I've done it many many times.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Mr Happy
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 06:59 PM

What a shower o' winge-ers!!

The bowl + allover wash is perfectly adequate if yer only away fer a w/end.

Also you can pack the en-suite bathroom [pack of wetwipes, scented or plain].

Me + chums often go places for folking do's with the most minimalist or non-existant facilities.

We're all tent campers & often have some disabled fiends with us.

We all manage perfectly well keeping clean + Mr Happy's patent DIY toilet tent keeps everyone sitting comfortably.


And always remember the old adage 'only dirty people wash'!!

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: GUEST,Jim
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 07:28 PM

Boy were there ever showers at the SHELTER VALLEY FOLK FESTIVAL just east of Grafton Ontario last weekend. Saturday night's concert was posponed to Sunday morning due to heavy showers and winds. Sarah Harmer came all the way back from Kingston to do her Sunday morning show.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Mr Happy
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 07:32 PM

Gasp!!

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: GUEST,Pelrad
Date: 05 Sep 06 - 10:01 PM

One of my favorite festivals in younger years was the Cajun and Bluegrass Festival in Escoheag, RI (now the Rhythm and Roots Festival in Charlestown RI) in the U.S. Basically, several thousand people sat around in a very dusty hot field for four days listening to Bluegrass, Cajun and Zydeco music, two-stepping, and eating spicy food. Any drinking water was carried in buckets from the faucet about 1/4 mile away, across the field, through the crowd, to the volunteer camping area, by yours truly and a few others. There it was poured into a canvas bag set up on a tripod and anyone who needed a drink came along and filled their cups and pitchers and coffee pots. I must have traipsed across that field fifty times a day.

Bathroom facilities were portable potties, and it was a big deal the year someone thought to put soap in nylon stockings next to them. As for the shower, it was a waterfall about three miles away, accessible only through a hiking path in the woods. Only people who knew the secret path could get there, but they were dirty and hot again by the time they got back so I never saw the point of going in the first place.

Now that I'm a germ-phobic mother of small children, no way could I hack that kind of weekend. Back then, it was a dusty, dirty adventure; and somehow the heat and dirt fit right in with the music and the spicy Louisiana cooking.

Festival high point: Michael Doucet (of Beausoleil) taking over the hospitality tent on Sunday each year to cook gumbo - which he then served out to the performers and volunteers. I always thought he was so generous, but maybe he was just worried about our dirty hands preparing his dinner!

Kim

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Scrump
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 04:43 AM

MBSLynne wrote: "Don't be ridiculous Steve! How on earth would we manage our morning cups of tea and coffee if we didn't boil water in the tent! We are in Sidmouth for between 10 days and two weeks. We have a camping cooker and we cook meals in the evening and some of our breakfasts. Obviously one uses sense when using a cooker in a tent, but what would you have us do instead?"

Perhaps he thought you had a campfire inside the tent? Now that would be ridiculous! ;-)

We just use a small butane ("Camping Gaz") burner to boil our kettle - if you keep it away from the tent walls and don't touch it when hot it's safe enough, being designed for the purpose. We have a small table though, as our tent's just about high enough to stand up in, and the stove is on that when in use. I agree you have to be more careful in a small tent when using a stove of any kind (or a gas light for that matter - they get bl**dy hot too!)

MBSLynne also wrote: "I usede to wash my hair under the stand pipes on the campsite at Sidmouth. Admitedly I was younger and hardier...it was BLOODY cold!!"

Ah, the days when we used to have water - I can remember that! ;-)

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 05:16 AM

Oh good grief!!!

I've never seen a folkie eat seaweed sandwiches... I've made 2 course meals and boiled tea/washing water on our double stove in the tent for years now with no accidents... I've kept clean(ish) and relatively fragrant without the aid of a shower and now there are many MANY products available for hygiene purposes for tops, bottoms and middles.

With one or two exceptions, I have far more smelly people thrust at me daily on the train.

Get a life and get deodorant!

LTS

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: GUEST,Connie
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 05:17 AM

There are showers at the footie club house on the Bromyard festival site. I think it's 50p a go and all proceeds go to the club. Failing that - we have an emergency back up shower that consists of a watering can and a small inflatable paddling pool.
cheers Connie

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: GUEST
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 05:31 AM

What a bunch of woosses.
I remember going on the 'hippy trail' in Cornwall back in Summer of 1966, and coming home after 3 months having not washed at all. It was a badge of honour then.
Let's face it, you're not going to die from not washing for a weekend. Maybe smell a bit. But back in said 60s, it was normal for most people to only have a bath ONCE A WEEK, and many not even that. OK, I guess everybody used to smell (it was before the advent of universal deodorant use), but I don't remember anybody particularly noticing much.
However, I must admit to liking a daily shower if at all poss these days.
How soft we have all become.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Mrs.Duck
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 05:49 AM

Although I would not find it in the least bit difficult to keep thoroughly clean and fresh for weeks without shower or bath I think there is another issue here. Many festival campsites are now charging more than commercial sites. We camp regularly on sites charging around £8 per unit (this is for five of us) and these sites have showers, washers, clubhouse, kids entertainment etc. Festivals are charging anything up to £6 per night per person for which we should at very least expect good quality shower blocks and toilets.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: manitas_at_work
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 07:06 AM

The festivals have to provide temporary facilities which work out much more expensive than fixed units in a permanent campsite.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 07:09 AM

The answer would be to have festivals in already existing commercial campsites, but experience has taught me that these are very VERY rarely within staggering distance of a pub.

LTS

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 07:21 AM

Also commercial campsites are often too small for a festival audience, depending on the festival, but when they are large enough the solution is if the festival is onsite a good beer tent, or if the festival is offsite, a half-hour shuttle from camping to drinking/singing, much like Cambridge.

Real trendies could use a traction engine and road train (if the road traffic implications could be sorted).

Such a shuttle would be good for Tenterden, rather than the "go in at 9, come back at midnight..."

And probably for Deal too

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: fiddler
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 07:56 AM

The crux of this thread shows the changing times we live in.

When I was young we had a bath once a week and changed out vests on the same rota!

We only had one heated room in winter

Now it is clean clothes every day, shower every day, central heating and even at festivals we don't like to be grubby!

No personal preferences given away here - it is just the way it is rightly or wrongly.

I beleive the generic word is progress!

Andy

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Scrump
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 08:12 AM

Yes, even though things have moved on since the 60s, I think most people can survive without proper showers for a few days (with the aid of modern deodorants and anti-perspirants) without stinking too badly (I hope I don't anyway). And if you wear the almost obligatory funny hat, it won't matter if your hair needs washing ;-)

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: MBSLynne
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 09:08 AM

Not only would people in tiny tents probably not be stupid enough to try boiling water in them, but they would have to be silly to try doing the all over wash in them too. You do need to be able to be upright!

And it doesn't matter what facilities you give people, they (or at least some of them) will always want more and better.

Love Lynne

Love Lynne

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: MBSLynne
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 09:08 AM

...and complain about what there is...

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 09:55 AM

Strictly speaking, you don't have to be upright to wash... otherwise the torture known as Hospital Bed Baths wouldn't exist.

Amazing what you can do with a bit of flexibility and a cold, damp flannel.

LTS

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Hamish
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 10:05 AM

Well, I went to the Reading Festival this year. You know, the infamous rock thing with mud and drunk kids and loud music. And...

...it was great! No mud and generally only happy-drunk kids. Fantastic atmosphere. And...

...great showers. They had a huge block and they were warm, efficient and clean (when I used them, anyway. Don't ask about the bogs tho'!)

Also, they had the "Lynx ManWash", or, as we called it "BabeWash". Which was open fronted: a conveyor belt with a scantilly-clad babe to wet, one to soap down and another to rinse. And a commentator. Most chaps kept some clothing on: I even saw one who kept his jeans on! (I don't think he was too interested in getting clean.)

And, no, I didn't have a go of that facility.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Scrump
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 10:12 AM

Hmm, that "babe wash" doesn't sound very environmentally friendly - all that extra soap and water...

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: GUEST,Rob the Roadie
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 11:35 AM

Booked at Bideford for the week this year. £30 for festival plus lots and lots of FREE concerts.
Camping was £6.00 per night or £35 for the week (7 nights)
SHOWERS were FREE and brilliant.

I have the date marked in my diary for next year!

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: MBSLynne
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 02:50 PM

Well that's true Liz, but you don't have to wash yourself in a hospital bed bath, someone does it for you. TWO people unable to stand up in a small tent and washing each other could get veeery interesting....

Love Lynne

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Willie-O
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 03:24 PM

So, I guess Guest Jim didn't read my post. Shelter Valley my ass. Hurricane Hill Folk Festival...

W-O

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Girl Friday
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 08:32 PM

Boiling water in our caravan, no problem. Essential as us leopards love our tea. Trevor Leopard(Mumbling Len) had a lovely hot shower at Broadstairs. When I went, I found that my little legs and my hip replacement wouldn't get me up the stairs, as there was no handrail. (They have made a note, and will do something about it next year) I boiled a kettle in the caravan, and had a strip wash and shampoo in a washing up bowl, flannel, soap, shampoo, and a plastic jug.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Mr Happy
Date: 06 Sep 06 - 08:36 PM

Exactly!

where there's a will, there's a way!

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 07 Sep 06 - 06:41 AM

Mumblin Len - only one shower all week?

Bloody good job you were playing in the open air on the prom!

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Scrump
Date: 07 Sep 06 - 06:44 AM

Ah, so that's what the smell was - nothing to do with the tide being out then.

:-)

(Just kidding!)

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: GUEST,noddy
Date: 07 Sep 06 - 09:44 AM

Only dirty people wash. I dont get dirty so I dont wash.

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: GUEST,Jim
Date: 07 Sep 06 - 11:19 AM

Sorry Willie, I didn't read your previous post, but I went back and checked it out. I was a wuss and went home to Port Hope each night. Did you camp out?

Subject: RE: Showers at folk festivals
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 07 Sep 06 - 11:52 AM

If you think that hummed, try the Medway just upstream of Rochester Bridge, when the tide is out.