JUST before 4.44am yesterday hundreds of Glastonbury revellers gathered around the stone circle to witness the perfect daybreak: the sun shimmering in the early-morning haze, rising into a virtually cloudless sky high over the field of Avalon.
Many had come to this pagan site to pay homage to the elements. But unhappily for the 150,000 campers, the elements weren’t listening.
Seven hours of torrential rain, flash floods and lightning later, and the 900-acre site was in disarray. Tents under water, families evacuated, mobile networks down, loudspeakers fused, power zapped and the official start of the festival — 10.30am — put on hold. Lightning struck one tent serving beer, but nobody was hurt.
Top acts staying in luxury accommodation offsite were also inconvenienced: thick cloud prevented their helicopters from landing.
Those perhaps least able to cope — parents camping with their children in the secure family area — were the worst affected. Many families had pitched their tents next to a line of trees for shade, not realising they concealed a stream. This burst its banks at two points.
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Shortly after 11am, Lisa Sayles was standing silent and smoking over the sodden remains of her pitch. A newly formed stream continued to gush through her children’s tent. Dripping sleeping bags belonging to her daughters, aged 10 and 7, were hanging out to dry on the metal fence. Possessions were scattered randomly around the mud.
She remained stoic. “Oh, it’s fine, it really is. We’ve got everything we need: we brought three tents, the sleeping bags are bound to dry and frankly if it rains again, we can just sleep in all our clothes,” she said.
Winnie Herbstein, 15, on her third Glastonbury, watched as water rushed through her camping area. “Our friends from next door came in at 6am and said their tent had been destroyed. I got out to find a river was running down the side of our hill. Soon the water was gushing in our tent and we had to move everything.”
A newfound “Glastonbury spirit” helped many through the morning. Indeed the happiest people yesterday seemed to be those standing, wading, even dancing through two feet of muddy, urine-tinged water. Some even used the mud to do a spot of surfing. Roger Fox, camping with his children Rosie, 17, and Daniel, 14, said: “Everyone was happy, mucking in together. It was a Woodstock spirit. You have just got to go on and do it.”
After two weeks of sun many had found it hard to believe the weather warning. They went to bed nursing sunburn, wearing little and keeping tent flaps open to capture the breeze. No rain here, they thought.
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Ricky Wilson, of the Kaiser Chiefs, was glad not to be in a tent. “I’m determined to have a good time — hang on, is that Kate Moss?” (It wasn’t.) “Is she staring at me? I think she is. Anyway, I’m staying in a house in Pilton. I was feeling a little bit left out because everyone else was putting up their tents. Now I’m not so worried.”
The weather required a new uniform: army surplus chic. By lunchtime clothing huts had sold out of Wellington boots, cagoules and tents. Only a few rainproof sheets were left, some selling for £20 a go.
The flash floods exposed contraband smuggled on site. Stewards discovered hundreds of glass bottles of beer, knives and even a pick axe, and promptly confiscated them. This caused more misery than the rain.
By 2pm the clouds had parted and spirits lifted. The festival was opened by The Undertones. Michael Eavis, the organiser, was defiant: “Two inches of rain in just a few hours mean that the festival will be a muddy one. We get one of these about every five years but it won’t cause any major problems.”
www.timesonline.co.uk/festivals
Dafydd Goff’s Glastonbury log