Tent Sniffing for Beginners

I've written before about hoping for the best but preparing for the worst. Watching tents at Creamfields and Leeds festivals this weekend made me think about this again. Lots of young people go to festivals and they might have no camping experience, or only have experience of camping as a family holiday, where mum and dad pitched the tent and then every day was a sunny adventure until home-time. So I guess this is for those people, and for you if you don't camp much.  First things first, pop up tents are great. They are super easy to erect and they feel like an instant pitch. but do not be fooled. The fact the tent popped into shape does not mean you do not need to peg it down, nor does it mean you do not need any guy ropes. Bigger tents with flexible poles often give you and your mates lots of space and plenty of room for luggage and clobber, but again, you need to peg them down, all the guy ropes, all the time. People with pyramid style and bell tents will already be familia

 I adore Boomtown. It's the one festival I just can't miss and I have just returned from an exhausting but blissful few days in a field in Hampshire.   I never manager to actually get involved in the story no matter how much I have good intentions to do this and this year was no exception. Despite that I have a wonderful time. I wander the fields, I talk to strangers, I dance, I chill, I walk up and down hills. I climb the steps ( lordy those steps!)   This year it rained on the first full day of the festival, making it a deadly mudslide in many areas leading to some people falling and even breaking bones! I remained intact. I also decided to do the festival sober this year. I don't  take any drugs anyway, but this year I also didn't have any alcohol either, maybe that helped me stay upright!  Walking boots were the show of choice in the mud, but that soon dried on Friday allowing me to move into my crocs and continue my relaxed lounging lifestyle. Food was great, lots