Day 79: Sunday 26th June 2022

Day 79: Sunday 26th June 2022

Our last day here at the festival! :( We left the campsite by 10am in order to have time to explore a few more areas this morning before our last shift. One of the areas we wanted to go back to was the Sacred Space, with the Peace Garden. The previous days we had ventured here, the Peace Garden hadn’t been open, so I’m pleased we got to look around it close up finally. It was really pretty - lots of garden envy here at all the beautiful flowers! We also saw the stonewall that Michael Eavis had wanted for the entrance to the Sacred Space, having read about it in one of the copies of the Glastonbury Free Press. 

IICON by day

Part of the Peace Garden

We walked back through the Green Fields, and were given some free vegan cupcakes on the way!  Lunch was paella again whilst watching Ferris & Sylvester on the Avalon Stage. We were given two huge portions of paella for £5 each due to being Oxfam volunteers which was great! 

I felt quite nervous about this shift, as we were back on the vehicle and pedestrian gate, where we were for our first shift on Thursday. It actually was fine, and went quite quickly. Mum and I were mainly checking with traffic which direction they were going, but everyone was starting to leave the festival for good and so it was fairly straight forward. We had to dismantle a gazebo as it had blown over the fence onto the road, but other than that, the shift didn’t have many problems. About 9pm, it became clear that we would be the last stewards guarding the gate, and once our shift was over, only security would be there. This meant that the roles decreased so there was no longer a need to scan the EPO wristbands, then no longer a need to count people in and out. By 9.30pm, we were just waiting for the equipment to be picked up and then we were done! We took some team photos by the gate, then headed to the Other Stage with a few volunteers. 

So strange leaving the gate without more stewards arriving!

Mum and I decided to go and see the South East Corner before it got too busy. The South East Corner is the place to go at night - some of the music / DJing doesn’t finish until 6am! There are a few main areas - Block9, The Common, Unfairground and Shangri-La. We have never been to this area before at night, so it was fun to see a different part of Glastonbury. It is just incredible how much to see and do at this festival, in the Shangri-La area alone there is so much art to look at, and lots of different smaller venues. 

The Temple

IICON by night

Shangri-La

Seen in Shangri-La

Feeling quite tired now, we walked back, stopping at the Pyramid Stage for the last time, and getting back to our motorhome at 12.30. I am tired and looking forward to getting home, having nice toilets and showers and most importantly of course, seeing Dad and Rusty again! But I really have loved it here. It has been brilliant!! Working here has been an interesting experience, and there are definitely both advantages and disadvantages to volunteering, particularly with missing out on some of the bigger acts due to needing to work, like Billie Eilish. However, being onsite for two days before everybody else was so much fun, as it made getting to know the site a lot easier, and also nice to see some areas without the crowds. I am so pleased I got to go to the festival this year - we loved it in 2019, and have again had an amazing time over the past week. 

There were a few things we didn’t get to see this year, including going to Glastonbury-On-Sea, Shangri-La during the day (to see the art in better light), taking part in some of the crafts in the Green Fields, watching debates in the Left Field and free vegan cookery classes to name a few! Obviously there is just too much to do at Glastonbury that you can never do it all, especially when having to work for 24 hours over the course of the festival. However, it was really cool to work at the festival and be part of the ‘crew’! We also didn’t have to pay for our ticket, so managed to see Paul McCartney, Rufus Wainwright, Sam Fender and so much more for free! It was such an incredible week, and the best way to end our first roadtrip!!!

We will be leaving for our second, shorter roadtrip on Wednesday 13th July. Our trip will be going to a few more festivals - we will be working at two of them, and as a ticket holder for the other one. We will also be travelling round some of Wales, and a few different places in England too. I haven’t quite decided about how to do the blog for this next trip yet, but am really glad to have done a day by day account for our first roadtrip. Thanks for reading, and I hope everyone is enjoying the summer and the amazing weather!!