I need me some Oxegen

Went to bed at 11pm on the Thursday after procrastinating packing with Natalie. My alarm went off at 1:15am telling me to get up so I could shower and change before heading to the airport. Got the night bus at 2:15, got the coach bus at 3am, and finally arrived at the airport by 5am for our 6:30 flight. It wouldn't be a proper trip if there wasn't some issue at the airport. I get through security just fine while Natalie ends up being patted down for 10 minutes. We thought we were in the clear and then one of our carry on bags got redirected to be inspected. It was a good thing we got there well early because we certainly would've missed our flight. Those guys take absolutely forever to check a few bags. When it was finally our turn he removed some items, rummaged around, wanded it for a bit, and then sent us on our way.

Once we finally got to Dublin and into the city centre I decided to buy another pair of wellies because I knew it was going to be nasty and Natalie would get destroyed by mud and rain. BEST IDEA EVER! By the end of the weekend she was very grateful to say the least. Anyhow, we got our bus tickets, did some grocery shopping, sat in a cafe for awhile and then finally boarded the bus to the festival. As the bus trudged on through the Irish countryside the sky opened up and it started chucking it down. The rain was so intense that when we were actually able to see out of the bus windows all we saw were mini lakes forming on the motorway that somehow the bus managed to get through.

Fortunately when we got to the festival the rain had stopped. It was still spitting on and off a bit but nothing we couldn't handle. We made our way to the campsite and just as we were trying to scope out a good spot it started pouring again. We chose the closest open space in the sea of tents and started the fastest tent pitching job ever. We had that baby up within a matter of 2 or 3 minutes. Despite getting it up so quickly we were still soaked as was our stuff. We changed into dry clothes and decided to take a nap through the rain, especially since the concert wasn't starting for another few hours.

The actual festival was absolutely amazing. I never thought I'd see so many bands in such a short amount of time. I'm not going to go through the entire list because that's nearly impossible. You can check out the full line up on their website: http://www.oxegen.ie/line-up/  Some of the big names that we saw were: Black Eyed Peas, The Strokes, Weezer, Noah and the Whale, Foo Fighters, Arctic Monkey, Bruno Mars, The Vaccines, City and Colour, Coldplay, Beyonce, Slash, Kesha and Jimmy Eat World. There were a few bands that I wanted to see but missed because they were playing at times that conflicted with others but overall it was a great success. Absolutely every show was amazingly done. I was impressed by them all.

Camping was a whole other experience. The spot that we chose ended up being beside these 19 year old Irish kids who were an absolute riot. We loved them and hated them at the same time. They provided much amusement as they ripped into each other, taped each other up, put makeup on men, tried to climb the light post, and had an ongoing feud with the Norwegians on the other side of us. Natalie and I could not believe how much energy these kids had. They were up drinking and partying every night until 5 or 6am and then were back up at 7 or 8 to start it all over again. I swear some did not sleep the entire weekend. We offered them smores on the last night in order to avoid our tent getting trashed which proved to be a good idea as the Norwegians tent was tossed over the fence.

Breakfast of champions: coffee and peanut butter sandwiches

 On the Monday morning we packed up our stuff into the two backpacks and made our way back to Dublin. We met up with my friend Peter, who I had met in Edinburgh, who let us leave our bags at his place and then took us for a tour of the city. I'd been there before but it was nice to see the city again. After touring for a few hours we sat down for a proper meal where I had a Guinness. It really does taste better in Ireland. We lost track of time and almost ended up having an amazing race to the airport to catch our flight back to London.

Helpful tips for an enjoyable camping festival:

• Wellies are an absolute must! They will save your life. Bring comfy wellie socks too. 
• Make sure to have proper rain gear. Jackets, umbrellas, ponchos, tarps for inside the tent. These were so helpful and I'm glad we thought about these when packing.
• Showers are open stalls. Bring a bathing suit unless you're comfortable in the nude or your undies. 
• Get there early to scope out a good spot. Or alternatively, if you can afford it, rent a pod pad for luxury camping. You don't have to worry about pitching a tent, the crowd is a little quieter, and cleanup is easy. 
• Bring ear plugs or an ipod to listen to at night if you get stuck beside loud young people.
• Have your camera at the ready at all times. You never know when you're going to see some people in fancy dress.
• Bring a variety of snacks. Food is not terribly expensive but it adds up if you're buying something every time you want to munch.

Showing off my festival gear

Enjoying the rare bit of dry weather and sun