What kind of tune at Latitude?

Latitude is a fun festival and one of the friendliest I’ve been to. Based in Suffolk, Latitude has now been going on for 10 years and displays all kind of art: music, dance, drama, film, poetry, literature, comedy and so much more. It really is a festival for everyone (it really is – my 9 month old cousin went).

As the festival is set in my home county there have been some interesting things I have noticed over the weekend:

1. First of all Suffolk has an area of about 3,800 km² which seems quite large compared to other counties in the UK. (Wikipedia tells me it’s the 8th largest) and it doesn’t seem possible (and yet it happens) that you will bump into people you know. It’s the Suffolk curse in that no matter where you go Suffolk it is always around you. Always. However, the Suffolk curse only hindered my weekend – seeing guys I had crushes on when I was a teenager (never good experiences) and missing out on famous Suffolk man Ed Sheeran (TWICE). Bad Suffolk.

2. People are actually okay. Festivals can be a place of intense alcohol consumption and queue quarrelling. However, I found that people were incredibly friendly and polite when it came down to it. I especially discovered this when people were very understanding of Kieran, my 6ft tall brother who likes to jump around and pays absolutely no attention of where he is walking.

3. So this slightly relates to the second point but accessibility at Latitude was fantastic. Big shout out to Festival Republic, Attitude is Everything and Mencap for providing our family with a much easier experience of festivalling. Viewing platforms were a godsend if Kieran needed to jump around and the disabled toilets made life so much easier. Alongside the closeness of the accessible camping, the staff were absolutely strict when it came to others trying to take advantage which I appreciated and I bloody loved the signing that took place at some of the events.

4. Oh man I bloody hate midges. I especially hate the ones that clearly don’t do a decent job of biting either. Saturday night I became a victim to the minging midge (that I hope has been fired from his job). A bite that became half the size of my thigh and resulted in a new mental state where I had to overcome any urge to itch.

5. Suffolk is notorious for having dreadful signal. While this can scare many with the prospect of several days without phone signal (never mind internet) I believe it is a fantastic thing to not be able to access technology. Sure, having phone signal can be crucial when losing others but otherwise all phones do is distract you from the whole point of going to a festival. To have fun and be present, not to go on social media. (Although if I had social media I may have learned of Ed Sheeran’s surprise appearances. Swings and roundabouts.)

I enjoyed Latitude immensely. Food was fab and music was marvellous. I particularly enjoyed The Last Leg (so much so I have attempted to get tickets for the live show and have purchased a ticket to see Josh Widdecombe live) and Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds. I also really enjoyed seeing Michael Rosen in the Poetry tent and I got him to sign one of my favourite books as a child called Little Rabbit Foo Foo I think he found it endearing I brought it along and made a comment like “well this is age appropriate” but then again, the book was published in 1992 and I’m sure it made him feel old. Anyway, Michael Rosen is the best.