Watching footage of the rain-sodden tents at Rockness over the weekend, and gloomily contemplating my fast-approaching 30th birthday, I had a moment of wondering whether I am now officially Too Old For Festivals (with the possible exceptions of ATP, where you get to sleep in chalets, or Bestival, which sounds lovely. However, I have come to the conclusion that actually, I am not too old for festivals; it is just that festivals have now fallen into the category of Things I WIll Happily Do In The Name Of Travel, But Are Too Uncomfortable In My Own Country (see also: overnight bus trave - fine in e.g. Turkey; nightmarish in the UK).
Three festivals that I would happily go to, decided completely arbitrarily:
- The Dragacevo Trumpet Festival in Guca, Serbia from 6-10 August this year. I have a bit of a Thing for Balkan brass bands, as well as the Balkans in general, and a Bosnian ex-colleague used to rave about this festival to me. I’m busy that weekend this year, otherwise I would be so there.
- Burning Man, of course: last week of August in the Black Rock Desert, Nevada. Less of a festival than a temporary community, apparently, I have been hearing stories and seeing pictures of Burning Man for years and years. It’s the sort of thing that I will probably never get round to doing, but blimey, it would be awesome.
- The Festival au Desert, Essakane, Mali, 8-10 January 2009. And oh, that is enormously tempting, especially as I was thinking of being in Morocco for xmas - it could be some sort of North African extravaganza! I have longed to go to Mali for years, especially Tombouctou and the Dogon Escarpment; I shall have to think about that one.
Any other ideas?
