Thursday morning was spent packing the
Espace full to bursting point, and then two of us set off to Brighton Kite
Festival two days early. Having guzzled four gallons of Crofter's at Teston,
there were those who felt we should get more of the same. However, going via
Won't do that again. Whilst the range of
ales they have is unbeatable, they are somewhat pricey - £1.80 per pint
for the Crofters compared with £2.30 per pint with Middle Farm. And the
bottled beers were just as bad. Whilst the range is very good, it's again 50p
per bottle more. However, time was pressing so we stumped up for the beer and
continued on to Peacehaven where we were met with a
most excellent tea, and we sat down with the girls to watch "Shrek 2" and "Hookwinked"
until "the very nice man from PeacehavenTM
" arrived when we carried on watching the films. The girls went beddy-byes and we sat chatting and then got the cards out
and invented a new poker hand - the "manky
straight" in which the hand is a straight which is missing the
necessary jack, but then wins by mistake because of the full house or two pairs
that the player didn't see. "Manky
straights" won two hands that night, and as the wine, whisky and port
had been consumed to excess we waddled off to kip around 1.30am.
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Despite having been asked not to
arrive before mid day on the Friday, many people had set up camp the previous
evening. In fact by the time we arrived at about 10am, most of the bottom of
the field was full of campers already. For the last five years we've always
camped at the top of the slope at Stanmer park, but it had been mentioned by
several people that we were too far away from all the action at the bottom of
the hill. This year we planned to set up at the bottom of the hill, and so we
did. In a hurricane. I must admit that as we set up I had
reservations about the location. Even once we were all set up I was still
seriously considering chucking all the gear back in the Espace and driving
back up the hill. But variety is the spice of life, and so I steeled myself
to give this new location. There was a minor hiccup with the new-style
tent technology. Is it a tent or a Teenage Mutant Hero Turtle costume? |
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Before long the rest of our party had arrived
and we thought we'd make the most of the wind before the normal people
arrived tomorrow. Kat got dragged around the field by a Super-10 for half an
hour before we went for tea. Chicken pasta went down very well, and it was at
this point I found one of the benefits of our new location. The toilets had
hot running water and huge sinks in which I could do the washing up. What
usually takes ages was done in a few minutes. But everyone else had figured
this out years ago, and one of the drawbacks of our new location was the
seemingly endless stream of people through our camp to get to the loos. Our
new location was certainly in the thick of it, and whilst it was good to meet
new friends from France and the Isle of Wight, it was somewhat disconcerting
to find that people we barely knew were sending people we didn't know into
our tent because it was "the bar". At one point I had some stranger
asking me where the red wine was. "Probably
in your caravan" I told him and carried on with my pint. Whilst I do
want to be everyone's mate, I'm stuffed if I'm going to be providing a free
bar (yet again). As the evening wore on, far too much ale was
downed, and about 1am it was bed time. One of many things I dislike about
camping is the lack of facilities so it was good to be able to have a late
night shower before going to kip. |
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As the wind had slackened
off somewhat from yesterday's hurricane it was safe to put up our banners.
The simple job of putting up five banners took half an hour before it was
time for me to take up my post. Provided someone who knows what they are
doing sets up the large kites, I'm very happy to look after them, re-launch
them when they crash, etc. It's a great job. I get to be at the top of the
hill all day long, flying the biggest kites going. I get to see all of the
festival going on around me, the organised events in the arena, the skilled kiters flying the fun kites, the general public tying it
all up in knots. It's great. I even get my dinner & beers fetched up to
me and have some quality time with my eldest nephew. It's the best job in the
festival. And best of all, I don't actually have to do very much. The kite
pretty much flies itself. Periodically I give the line a bit of a tug to make
it look like I know what I'm doing, and all the normal people think I'm
wonderful. At one point the nice man from the paper came up to me and asked
to interview me. Before I could get a single word in edgeways he'd set up his
video camera, positioned me where he wanted me and strapped me up with a
microphone. So I thought I'd have a bit of a laugh with him. "OK" he
said, "tell me in your own words why you are doing this". So I
stared into hs camera and said in a monotone "my - name - is - david
- and - on Saturdays - if - I - take - the - special - tabliks
- they - let - me - out - of - the - hospickal -
until - tea - time - but - I - have - to - be - back - by - tea - time - or -
the - nurse - has - to - call - the - policeman - cos
- of - wot - happened - last - time -…"
As the colour drained from the chap's face I grinned and asked if he'd like
me to do it properly. Oh how we laughed. You can see the final result on line
at Thousands
Flock To Kite Festival (from The Argus) and I'm told it made the local
papers. |
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After a while we took the octopus kite off
and just flew the Manta Ray. It was pulling like a train, and when the normal
people weren't watching we played zip-lines with it. When the youngsters were
about we used the lift to raise them up a foot or so and explained about how
the ancient Chinese used to do man-lifting for military purposes. All too soon the day's kiting was over and
we packed the stuff away and made our way back down the hill. Saturday night
is the traditional BKF barbeque and after some pretty stunning scoff Simon
formally awarded me the BKF pin for my help over the weekend. As I say, the
best job at the festival, I got an award AND they paid for my tea. Can't be
bad. |
Sunday was one of those days. It started
badly at 1am when some brat was running around the camp site in tears and
screaming fits. When it finally shut up, the noisy conversation right outside
my tent started. When that stopped, the brat had another fit. And so the night
wore on. Another drawback of being in the centre of things.
It was gone 4am before I got some quiet. And to add insult to injury everyone
else slept through the noise.
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But I was going to be up the hill again flying
the big kites, so life would be good. We put up the Manta Ray and the teddy,
and before long a chap set up to our right. He put up a lifter, the shark,
and the duck pictured here, and then he shoved off and left it there. As his
line flew over, under and around ours I desperately heaved and hauled in order
to avoid collisions, but eventually there was the crossing that needed him to
haul on his line. And because he'd shoved off, he couldn't. So the whole lot
knotted up and crashed. Then he appeared, all stressy
about crashing his kites. I smiled a lot, we re-launched. He added a smaller
inflatable teddy and shoved off again. I hauled heroically but after ten more
minutes his stuff was unavoidable and so another crash ensued. And he
appeared again muttering as he added yet more stuff to leave unattended. After
about the twentieth crash of his causing, his kite cut off our lifter kite.
My nephew told me that he found it, but it was Batty who retrieved from the
tree. It was during this episode that our "new found friend"
offered to help us pack away the Manta. I told him that it didn't need
packing away and that we'd still be flying. He wandered off muttering and
wound in our main line for us. Once our lifer was retrieved I unwound our
main line and re-launched. And…. |
Yes - you can guess. He'd shoved off again, his
kites were all over the sky, it all crashed again. When he appeared this time
I'd decided on no more Mr Nice Guy, and told him politely but firmly that all
these crashes were entirely his fault because he kept wandering off and leaving
his stuff unattended. He just looked blankly at me as though I was talking a
foreign language and carried on leaving his stuff unattended. The next
collision resulted in his lifter being cut off. I commented "one all"
with a smile.
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Eventually one of the normal people flew a 50p
kite through the Manta's bridle destroying at least three of the bridle
lines. I took this to be divine intervention. By the time we'd put the
wreckage of the Manta away, loads more of the normal people had set up in our
way. It was past 3pm, so I took the executive decision that most of the
public had seen a huge kite, and furthermore seeing that Brian had gone to
the trouble of lugging a gallon of ale to the top of the hill, it wouldn't be
fair to carry it back down again. So we packed all the gear back into the
trailer, hitched the trailer back onto the Land Rover, and guzzled a gallon
of ale whilst watching the world go by. All too soon the world had gone by, and it was
back to camp. Tea time - fajitas!! A particular favourite of mine. Three of
those, more ale and then one of our kiting friends asked if we'd like to play
with his man-lifter. I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole, but I know people
who would…… |
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It would seem the noisy element
went home On the Sunday night as I slept well. After a good breakfast I decided
it is handy having the hot water nearby for the washing up. It was on my third
trip to the toilets to do washing up that the heavens opened. For the last few
weeks the weather has been on the wet side, and we were so lucky to have had
such glorious weather over the weekend. But, for the third kite festival in a
row we put away our camp in the rain. The tents were sodden, the ground was
becoming a swamp. Normally I leave
Same time next year? Definitely! But where? The top of the hill is just too far away from
what's going on at the bottom. The bottom of the hill has the shower block,
running hot water for the washing up, close to everyone else, but it's close to
everyone else, too close, too noisy and it did get swampy when it
rained.…. How about trying half way up the hill?