What does a midlife lady do when it’s pouring with rain, on a August Bank Holiday Saturday in the Cotswolds? Go to the Big Feastival of course!
This festival held over the August Bank Holiday weekend every year takes place in Kingham. It originally began in 2012 when Jamie Oliver, celebrity chef, restauranteur and cookbook author and Alex James, bassist for Blur, decided to create a combined music and food festival. The duo initially planned to host the event in Victoria Park in London to coincide with the London Summer Olympics, however due to branding restrictions this plan was cancelled and it was moved to Alex’s farm in the Cotswolds.
Being a massive fan of Jamie Oliver I had thought about attending for many years. Not only do I have nearly every cookbook he has ever written but I love his down to earth approach, family orientated vibe and crusade to bring good, healthy food to every household.
I don’t have time for all that Michelin star “pretty food” where after three bites you’ve eaten over £100 worth of fancy cooking. I want to watch cookery programmes full of honest to goodness recipes that I can easily follow and reproduce at home with a presenter that just knows how to talk to us “normal folk”. I never miss a cookery series if Jamie is fronting it!
Alex James conversely plays in a band that I would never buy tickets to see. While Blur and Oasis were competing for the Britpop top act in the mid 90’s I was busy going to see Bon Jovi at the Milton Keynes Bowl!
Alex did, however, realise the words of his famous song Country House “Oh, he lives in a house/A very big house/In the country” when he and his new wife famously bought the farm in Kingham whilst on their honeymoon in 2003. Together they renovated the 200 acre estate and turned it into, amongst other things, a cheese farm.
Despite the fact that Jamie left as co-host of the Festival after just five years in 2017, I felt that if I was to fulfil my ambition of actually “getting down with the kids” and attending a festival this would be the right starting point for me.
The Feastival is billed as “the place to experience music from top acts, tuck into top chef demos in the Big Kitchen and have your fill from The Menu, featuring the cream of the UK’s street food crop”
We had toyed with the idea, initially, of going all out and staying in a bell tent for the weekend. With various levels of this type of accommodation to choose from you could opt for a tent “offering top-notch facilities for ultimate relaxation and comfort. Expect everything from raised beds with memory foam mattresses, power sockets and hanging clothes storage, to hot showers and flushing toilets; plus a cinema tent to chill out with a film and some popcorn; and even a pamper tent to get yourself feeling festival fabulous.”
But with prices starting around the £750 mark we opted instead to part with £220 including parking, refund protection and a “keep sake” programme to just try it out for one day to begin with. This transpired to be the right decision for as subsequently I photographed some of the bell tents up on the hillock overlooking the feastival activities and they were so close together, there cannot of been any privacy!
And so on the day we rolled up, around 10.30 in the morning, in my 4×4 truck happily anticipating a gentle introduction to festival life having never experienced anything like this before. We put on our walking boots, raincoats, plastered a smile on our faces and stepped out into the pouring rain ready to explore this music/ food phenomenon.
And this is the point where if you are looking for a rave review of what is considered by some to be the ‘Glastonbury of the Cotswolds’, you need to put this blog post to one side and do your own research. There are many wonderful reviews of this event including a report by a site called “buildingyourownnashville.com” which will extol the virtues of the event.
We, however, didn’t get it “at all”……
We began our exploration by turning right, passing the Marks and Spencer bar and store (they are one of the main sponsors this year) and heading to the merchandise stand to pick up our very small programme incased in a plastic sleeve with a Big Feastival ribbon to hang it around your neck.
Heading across to the right we stopped at the Nespresso stand to grab a morning coffee. The covered hay bales with comfy cushions offered an early respite from the rain and gave us a chance to have a look through the programme. I then handed it over to hubby to navigate us around and thus we set off on a clockwise exploration of the Village Green.
We strolled past the M&S Cookery School where you can book to take part in an interactive cooking experience, personally this wasn’t very appealing to us. Next door is their “Little Cooks” Tent where the aim is to educate children about food whilst allowing them to get hands on in an interactive cooking class. The whole weekend is very geared around being a family festival and this was very evident throughout.
Passing the Bandstand which hadn’t opened up yet we managed to secure a seat in the “The Big Kitchen”. With a programme of daily events clearly displayed outside and also incorporated in our nifty programme we decided to sit and watch “Meliz Berg”. Having researched this lady on the internet, whilst sat awaiting her demonstration at 11.30, she is “a self-taught cook, recipe developer, and food content creator. Inspired by her Turkish-Cypriot heritage, and her experience of growing up in a household that combined both traditional Cypriot and London living, she created the blog and Instagram page Meliz Cooks”. We had never heard of her but then we are midlifers who don’t spend every waking minute attached to a phone.
To be fair she was very engaging and following her class, if that is what you call it, I did pop next door afterwards to peruse her new cookery book.
Moving on we passed the “Table Sessions” tent which again is a bookable, thirty minute experience where you can take part in a workshop or tasting session with chefs, brands and industry experts. I had perused this on line when I was sent an email, in advance, notifying me of the need to book but frankly didn’t recognise any of the names listed? Maybe that’s not the point and you are suppose to just “give it a go” but I’m afraid I didn’t feel inspired.
Heading on past The Big Top, another feature for children, we left the Village Green and headed out and left into the Udder Field. Coming across The Exchange which hosts everything from comedy to karaoke, quizzes and live podcasts we noticed the tented area filling up and on checking the programme found the next session featured live on stage “James and Clair Buckley”. We had no idea who they were but decided to find ourselves a spot to sit/stand and await their arrival on stage.
Again with Google to the rescue I discovered they are “co-hosts of the acclaimed podcast ‘In Sickness and In Health’ and the creative minds behind the hit YouTube channel ‘At Home with the Buckleys’ “.
All credit to them, having never been a fan of the “Inbetweeners” and having rarely listened to anyone’s podcast and only used Youtube for the basic enquiry they did raise a laugh or two and I was drawn into their honest, marital banter.
It highlighted to me, however, how again I don’t spend my life watching reality tv and searching endlessly for something to pique my interest every night at home.
As we made our way past the Sundown Saloon in the quest for some food there was a duo called “Two Ways Home” doing their best to entertain but they didn’t stop me in my tracks I’m afraid and we walked on by.
Beyond the Saloon are a series of food stands centred around outdoorsy food and bbq’s known as The Smokery. We decided it was time to find some lunch and having perused all the different offerings settled upon “Temper” who were shortly scheduled to do a session in The Fire Pit, another cookery style demonstration. We opted for their “Greedy Cow” meat plate at a cost of £15 each.
While hubby made the purchase I managed to squeeze onto the end of a wooden picnic bench which was undercover. The four young people already seated happily allowed us “oldies” to eat our lunch in relative comfort. Whilst we sat and ate our fairly small portion of bbq they seemed to be veterans and individually, at intervals, would pop out to a vendor and return with a plate big enough I guess to count as a starter for four in a restaurant. Thus getting to sample four different offerings between them for lunch. Perhaps this is the way you are supposed to do it?
When they departed we were joined by another two couples, more in line with our age group, who were delightedly camping for three nights. I was hoping, in chatting to them, to discover the secret to this type of event, to understand the attraction. The rain had started in the early hours of Friday morning they explained to us and not stopped since. Personally I couldn’t think of anything worse than to be under soggy canvas with wet clothes at our age but they seemed to be quite happy having come all the way up from Kent!
We finished our lunch with two fairly decent size portions of cake which we had purchased in a small tent of about six businesses before heading back out this time into a burst of sunshine and briefly returned to watch the end of an act ” Swing Patrol” at the Saloon. They had certainly managed to pull a crowd and whilst displaying their dancing techniques themselves had successfully encouraged patrons to get up on the temporary dance floor. I’ve dabbled in Ciroc some years ago and would probably have enjoyed watching their 45 minute set had I known.
Making our way past the independent retail businesses on our left, none of which really attracted us to stop, we headed back past our starting point and up towards the Main Stage. It had become evident, by this point, that real die hard festival goers come well equipped with big trollies to carry their fold up chairs, small children and relevant accoutrements.
They are easily spotted, even when not pulling a trolley, because they have glitter on their faces or silver sparkly clothes.
Three acts had already been and gone, none of which we had recognised but maybe again that’s the point. You are suppose to listen, regardless, in case you happen to see the next, currently not yet spotted, new big talent?
It was odd to see not just the normal flock of people standing up near the stage but how this then drifted quite quickly into crowds of attendees sat on their camping chairs. Some in rows but others had claimed their own space on the field forming semi or full circles of chairs. As if to say “this is our piece of the action” walk around! The majority of these folk were not listening to the music on stage but chatting, eating, drinking and generally socialising. I’m guessing they had claimed their spot for the day and were awaiting some other act due on later in the programme?
It was fairly obvious, quite quickly, that if you had intentions of watching a bigger name later such as Cat Burns who was due on at 6.30 you would be struggling to find somewhere to stand much less park a chair without being miles away from the stage.
Kate Nash was on stage, at this point and whilst I remembered her first hit single from 2007 called “Foundations” she wasn’t again someone who I necessarily wanted to listen to. This wasn’t helped, to be frank, by what appeared to be either a poor sound system or a voice that seemed to be off key at times.
Behind us, at this point, was the Alex James’ Cheese Hub which is apparently a double decker disco. It certainly looked very busy from the outside even in the afternoon.
Next door is the Roller Disco aimed at giving whole families a chance to amuse themselves and then the Street Food Circus which is billed as an immersive food dining experience with DJ’s, cocktails and performances.
We didn’t get a chance to check this out properly because the heavens opened and the rain came down in torrents and like so many others we all piled into this covered circus tent to just take refuge from the rain. There was a DJ, to be fair, playing some fairly classic 80’s tunes and another gentleman we had seen earlier making massive liquid bubbles for the enjoyment of the children. Just to prove that I’m not a complete old fogie I asked hubby to put one on my Christmas list!
Once the rain had finally taken a break we ventured back out to explore the street food sellers in this area. There was a vast selection and to be honest I’m not sure what we really expected but it just wasn’t this. They were all basically stand alone food stalls like you would see at any large event. I equated it to Badminton Horse Trials where these type of food conveyors are scattered, at intervals, throughout the course. We love this type of food but it just didn’t equate to the food trucks (actual trucks not food outlets) that we have frequented on our travels particularly in the USA. Two of which stand out still in our memories and both weirdly in Key West!
Hubby purchased some churros with an unwanted pot of melted chocolate but I was not in need of any more food and we suddenly found ourselves at about 4.30 in the afternoon looking at each other and wondering “what next?” We’d finished our exploration and thus stood and debated.
“Do we pop back to the car and take refuge for a couple of hours with the intention of returning to watch Cat Burns who we have actually heard of and enjoy?” or do we “put this Festival Experience down to exactly that -an experience and head home?”
And so it was that we waved goodbye to our Festival experience and drove away, glad to be in a 4×4 while other cars were sliding their way to the exit whilst other festival goers were still arriving. I guess at £100 a ticket to watch an evening full of entertainment and more known acts isn’t that expensive these days when you are familiar with the extortionate prices charged for a ticket to see a headliner such Ed Sheeran, Adele or Taylor Swift in concert these days!
NB: This is the tenth post in my series about the wonderful “Cotswolds”. Whilst this is a fairly one off post about the joys or otherwise of visiting a festival, the Cotswolds, as a whole, is an area that you really shouldn’t miss out on visiting if you are coming to the UK.
It’s full of olde world charm, history going back to the Roman era and beautiful architecture.
Check out previous posts in this series. Please don’t forget to comment and/or like. I’m intrigued to hear other midlife adventurers experiences of festivals, they might tempt us to try again!
Thank you
A Midlife Adventure 