Happy monday, guys! 🙂

Welcome to part one of my festival feature, which will get you prepared for your festival step for step, right from the beginning!

When it comes to music festivals in summer I would say we reached the end spurt! Many have found place already but there are still some more to come, like the “FM4 Frequency Festival” in St. Pölten (Austria), which I will be going to. Ellie Goulding, Linkin Park, José Gonzaléz and many other cool artists are gonna be there! *fangirling*

I’ve never been there since in the last 3 years I always attended the “Urban Art Forms Festival” (which is in Austria too), but because their focus is mainly on electronic music and since I’m not that into Dubstep anymore (and actually never really was, but it was still fun going there!) – I decided that maybe I should try something different and new for once.

And I’m really excited about it!

But anyway – I’m getting off track again. The intention in writing this post is to help you getting prepared and maybe give you some details and ideas you haven’t thought of in the first place – especially when it’s your first time going to a festival.

In part two you’ll get my downloadable packing list just to make sure you haven’t forgotten anything important!

But in the meantime, have fun reading the basics!
Stay tuned!

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The (basic but very useful) advice

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• Pick your wolf pack
  

  Once you’ve picked a festival you need a gang. Grab a few people you like and ask them to come along. Festival-people usually travel in ‘big’ groups of 5-10 persons or even more – for a reason! It’s much more fun this way, you always have good company, and there’s nothing about some relaxing evenings in a campingchair-circle.

  But my advice here is: Quality over quantity. Simply make sure you’re travelling with the ‘right’ people, meaning those who you can be weird around and have fun with and not those who will turn your trip into a nightmare.

• Get organized!
  

  This is the meat and potatoes of going on a festival. You already have a group? Awesome, then put all of them in a group-chat and start discussing.

  • Buy the tickets (and make sure you don’t forget them!)
  • How will you be travelling? Car, train, bus?
  • Who brings what? Whether it’s the tent or some medical supplies: Sharing will make your life so much easier… and your backpack less heavy!
  • Pick a “grocery-group” and let them buy all the food and drinks for everyone! (Make sure to keep the receipt though 🙂 )

• Murphy’s law
  

  “Everything that can happen, will happen.”
  So be prepared for any weather situation that could possibly occur! Advice: bring rain boots and ponchos, a sweater and long trousers (even if it’s summer) and the greatest thing you can do is to buy one of these ‘party tents’ (or tarps) with no walls but a plastic roof which will protect you from sun and rain. Pretty smart, right?

  Plus: everyone who doesn’t have one at the festival will be super jealous when they see yours!

  Little update: I checked the weather for this coming weekend and it doesn’t sound too nice for the first days… So, just as a precaution, we will be bringing a plastic tarpaulin too, to either put under or over the tent when necessary! 🙂

• Garbage bags. Big time.
  

  When I think back to my first festival ever it’s hard to understand how I could survive in our little camping spot. It was disgusting. Garbage was everywhere! At most festivals you get a garbage bag at the entry for a fee of 5-10€ and when you bring it back filled, you get your money back.

  But one garbage bag a person is NOT enough. Trust me, I think it was and I failed, so remember: Bring. Garbage bags.

• Prepare yourself mentally
  

  This is especially for the girls but also everyone else: Keep in mind that you’re camping. You won’t be able to look your best everyday let alone wash your hair. If there’s showers than you most probably have to wait in a looong line for your turn and your clothes will get dirty and sweaty from spending all day outside. So make sure not to bring anything you will be absolutely heartbroken about when it’s ruined.

  Chances are that you won’t get much sleep and that it’s gonna be noisy depending on where your camping spot is. If it’s far away, you also have to be prepared to walk some distance to get to the stages. The further away you camp the less people there are. It’s quieter but it can also get sketchy at times. So make sure to never walk alone!

• Print it away!
  

  This you will be thankful for once you get there. It’s likely that you get a map and timetable when you’re at the entry but it’s crazy how fast you can lose certain stuff. So my advice is: while you’re still at home, get to know the area and print out a festival map (they’re usually available on the festival’s website). Check out where the stages and campsides are and maybe also decide where you’d like to camp. This takes some stress off your shoulders when you’re there among thousands of other people who’ll be trying to get in as the first.

  Along with the map also print out the timetable and mark all the artists and concerts you wanna to go. Then take everything and make photocopies of them. Two, Three… You can never have enough of these!

• Be reachable
  

  With thousands of other people on a festival it can get very easy to lose your group. And it happens faster than you think! So always bring your mobile phone with you to be able to call your wolfpack or your mom to tell her you’re not drunk even when you obviously are.

  If you decide to bring your mobile phone with you, better bring 2-3 travel chargers because we all know that your smartphone won’t even survive day 1 with you constantly putting video updates on your 300 second long snapchat story (which no one wants to watch anyway). (I mean come on, 300 seconds? Seriously?)
  

  Another option I chose 2 years ago was to bring my super old Nokia phone.
  Con’s: Can’t take photos. (brought my little, compact camera instead)
  Pro’s: Indestructable and infinite battery life time~*

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  I hope these could help you a little! Let me know if you want to know anything else and if you’re going on a Festival as well! Maybe also the Frequency? Who knows – we could be seeing each other there!
  Don’t forget to keep checking for the packing list which will go online later today or tomorrow! 🙂

  Stay tuned and party on!