How to Survive a Festival in a Heatwave

Boomtown 2022 – after 2 years off due to ‘you know what’, you came back with a FLAMING HOT vengeance! As we prepared for the festival, by sharing daily updates of the temperature getting HOTTER and HOTTER, I did what I could to prepare myself for not just camping, but going to a festival in a heat wave. Here is my take on what to do… and what not to do in a field at 30 degrees.

1. Ladies and Gentlemen of the class of ’97 Wear sunscreen. If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it. The long term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience…I will dispense this advice now…

2. Take water pistols, and anything that you can fill with water to spray on yourself and your fellow sweaty ravers. My friend bought a hairdressing spray that was like a cool mist… it was heaven. I write this advice, but I actually ended up not being able to find a super soaker in enough time, bought a cruddy shark water pistol from pound stretcher, which didn’t work and replaced with a gardening pest pressuriser thing, that also did not work very well… but the ultimate golden buy was a 89p little water sprayer. It fit perfectly in my bag in between water refills, and provided light relief amongst that hot hot sun.

3.. Do not wear light colours … the ground gets DUSTY.. and your clothes will get GRUBBY. I thought I looked all cute in pink shorts and a pink bralette… no, I looked like a street urchin from Oliver Twist…. and the worst thing was that I didn’t even bring spare clothes ( thinking I was packing light) … so I didn’t even have an alternative.

4. So there’s another tip… if it’s going to be HOT, it won’t hurt to pack an extra top and shorts! Especially as they are so small and light weight!

5. A fan is your number 1 fan … be it a battery fan, rechargeable fan or a hand held fan, take a fan!

6.. It will be so hot that you don’t actually want to drink first thing when you wake up… maybe this was just me, but I had to preserve my energy and strength and try to fill up on H20 first thing! I actually took some alcohol home with me.. ( I know my trolley was broken, but I am not leaving alcohol behind).

7. Forget about the glitter or face paint… you will sweat that off 0.3 seconds after applying.

8. If you are going to buy survival blankets to put on your tent, because you read on the festival Facebook group this was a good idea, also take pegs… so you can actually attach them to the tent… because they will not stick with Sellotape!

9. A hat and a wet flannel is your best friend.

10. If you can find a stall selling bags of ice at an extortionate price, spend that £5 on that frozen water, because that bag of ice will see you through! (well.. about an hour).

11. If you are going to be cocky like me and think “oooo I’ve got a lovely new fantangled trolley. i’ll take a cool box’ .. which is something I have never done in all my 10 years of festival going, so I thought I was going to be living in cold drink luxury … DO NOT OVER LOAD YOUR TROLLEY, AS IT WILL BREAK WHEN YOU DROP IT OUT OF THE COACH LUGGAGE COMPARTMENT. So the trolley got a good trip from my flat to the coach pick up, and then needed to be held up right due to the wonky wheel by 1 person, and pulled (UP A HILL I MIGHT ADD) by another!

12. Take some thing sheets of material to hang up between tents, or on a gazebo to provide extra shade! (thank me later)