Submitted by ballon on
As a veteran of several Green Men, I've seen many people at the festival with children of all ages. Having now joined the parenting club with a pair of twins, we are now wondering how feasible it would be for us to attend this year with young babies or whether we need to wait for them to be a bit older.
If anyone who has brought nippers along to the festival in the past can offer any advice and perhaps highlight any potential pitfalls, must-haves, must avoids or anything else helpful, that would be great! Our main concern is what we would do if it's a wet and muddy year.
A couple of specific questions;
- We've never camped in the family field before - is its car parking closer than for the general camping field?
- We have friends with a live-in vehicle who will be in that field - is that relatively near to family camping?
All thoughts, comments and suggestions gratefully received,
Cheers!
Hi baloon. I can't help with
Hi baloon. I can't help with the specific query regarding young children however as far a camping is concerned the family camping is usually adjacent to the live-in area so you should end up fairly close to your friends. They can also have a 4-man tent pitched beside their live-in vehicle so you could camp beside them (if that's not too close!).
The car park is fairly near although it's a bit of an uphill treck getting your gear back to the car when it's over (especially if there's been the odd drop of rain over the weekend). Even if you're not camping with your friends it might be worth cadging a lift for some of your kit.
Last year we had our (at the
Last year we had our (at the time) 9 month old and 2 and a half year old. The weather was the winner last year, spoiled it for my wife a little (I'm still trying to convince her to go this year). Small wheeled buggies were useless in the mud and as our 2 year old is a big lad it was a struggle even for me with him on the backpack for any length of time. But the mud last year was exceptional in my opinion. Buggies with big wheels are the way forward. We brough a plastic bottle sterilizer and Milton tablets so if you're still needing to sterilize that's an easy solution (literally). The family cmaping is next to the family camping and the walk isn't too bad from the car park. We had a trolly, well worth it but it was useless on the Monday in the mud. If I think of anything else I'll post
Hi Ballon, Peridot makes a
Hi Ballon, Peridot makes a very good point regarding pitching a tent next to your mates live-in vehicle; because it is a seperate area it tends to be less of a thoroughfare, so is not as muddy should it be a rainy Green Man this year.
If you decide to pitch in family camping, I would recommend some sort of small gazebo thingy - it gives you a bit of outside space with protection from sun/rain.
Our twins are now 9 and seasoned Green Manners....although I wasn't brave enough to bring them when they were babies!
In my experience it's all about being prepared for the weather with kids and not having massive expectations for yourself!
The Little Folk area tends to have good covered areas that are good places to hang out with little ones.
We've been for the past six
We've been for the past six years, the first time our younger one was 18 months and very mobile. To be honest, having seen people struggle with buggies I tend to think wheels aren't a good option (though I guess it may be dry!) I echo Elizabeth's sentiments about expectations and you have to grab the 'you' time whenever you can. My son always fell asleep during Cate le Bon's sets obligingly.