Well this is its baby sibling, risen out of the ashes of the sadly ( due to no fault of its own) defunct BGG which was cancelled at the last moment in 2009.
I traveled down to Peacefield Park, Chepstow during the last week of August, in beautiful weather, to set up camp for a week in the "temporary intentional village" which is the Permaculture area;
I set up my tent and a spare one for my daughter and a friend, who were coming for the first two days of the festival proper. I also had Algy and Mrs the Serama miniature chickens with me, as I was doing a workshop on chicken keeping during the festival. So my car was full to the brim as you can see! You can just see the pen that Algy and Mrs shared in the lhs tent (it's the red thing)
I also helped to set up various structures - tents, yurts and helped with the chores in the Permaculture village.
I had fun with fellow Forest School Leaders, we were providing sessions for the festival goers and their children as well as any one else who wanted to have some fun :)
On Wednesday I was pleased to meet up again with John "Compost" Cossham and I spent a lot of time recording the process of setting up his compost waste reduction area.
The recycling areas dotted around the festival site are quite something! The dedicated recycling crew collect the carefully separated resources from the festival and all is recycled.
This is last years compost pile and the composting area on Wednesday morning, before John got clearing it up.
All the festival compostable waste was brought to John in bags and over the course of the week and the festival he (mostly single handedly!) created a huge compost heap which allows the festival putrecibles to compost down rather than going to landfill. The pile remains there unattended until next years GG.
This is a waste minimization process rather than a soil improver process, as the compost made is full of all sorts of stuff which won't decompose.
But is an amazing feat of work from the Recycling crew and John to reduce landfill from the festival site.
The composting area on Sunday
As well as helping John with the compost area and helping in the Permaculture village and with Forest School I also gave three workshops over the course of the festival, on chicken keeping and composting. here is Algy the Serama cockerel meeting his adoring public
Apart from working hard, I met up with loads of other friends I have not seen for a long time.
I went to some excellent talks, chatted to so many people, bought an lovely poncho from The Woolly Pedlar,
saw some amazing artists and craft people
and of course listened to lots of bands :) Seize The Day, Martha Tilson and Sentient were excellent!
We had two days of terrible rain but apart from that the weather was kind to us - on Wednesday night I was able to watch the meteor showers for several hours lying on my back in the grass :)
I came home Tuesday tired and in need of a shower and with aching knees after a week in a tent, but very happy :)
