The Darkness

THURSDAY

After weeks of nice sunshine, OF COURSE it is widdling it down the day we’re heading out to Camp Bestival Shropshire. Regardless, we are determined to have an excellent time and head into Weston Park with glee to collect our wristbands.

After wrangling two very excited children, four adults, ten tonnes of snackage, a crate of fancy dress and a partridge in a pear-tree into our home for the weekend – a fancy shmancy bell-tent – we are all knackered and hungry. The arena calls us, with it’s beautiful silk flags waving in the wind (the rain has thankfully subsided). We make our way over to The Feast Collective, find a long bench to house everyone, and go about selecting some delicious dinners to fuel our tanks. Plant-based tacos, chicken katsu bowls, steak frites, smoothies and cocktails served in pineapples… you name it, you can find it at Bestival.

After dinner, a walk around the site is in order and I can definitely say that more attention to layout and decoration has been taken this year. There seems to be something fun to look at everywhere you turn, and things seem to flow more easily than in last year’s set-up. The new Navigation Town, tacked onto the back of Caravanserai and the bandstand, looks absolutely beautiful, and I love the new stamp-able passport initiative for the kids.

We spend the rest of the evening playing in smoke bubbles at the Bubble shop, and buying a Cheshire cat tail at the Tail shop, from a lady dressed as a disco lemur. 10/10 Bestival evening of weirdness, but we defect to camp to get some much-needed sleep before the big weekend.

FRIDAY

A morning of pancakes and delight at the fact that the rain has gone, is followed by donning our brightest funnest clothing and heading out to see what’s up. There’s already a huge queue for the World’s Biggest Bouncy Castle, heaps of people already queuing up for water sports like paddle-boarding and wild swimming, and lovely morning Yoga going on at Slow Motion. You couldn’t pay me to take a dip in the ice-bath though, I’m just not that person.

We talk a walk through the woods, which have been significantly developed since last year – now housing the Scouts and woodland activities such as fabric weaving between trees, bug catching and even mini-archery. We have a go at toasting s’mores on the open fire, crack-out the dressing up box on the woodland stage for a quick soliloquy, and have a good old crash around in the Orchestra of Objects. I particularly liked the teaspoon and tea-pot glockenspiel.

On the main stage, Hacker T Dog & Katie Thistleton from CBBC are getting rowdy in the crowd and blasting interesting versions of the theme tunes from Paw Patrol and Fireman Sam, which is obviously going down a storm with the small beings (and the Dads). During the explosive Braniac show, we pop over to pick up our Kids Pass food packs – at a mere £40 for the entire weekend, I genuinely Believe this is the best initiative a UK festival has ever come up with.

So first up, we show our QR codes to pick up the pack itself, which consists of a Camp Bestival printed drawstring bag (which is a really nice quality souvenir in itself) and a printed water bottle, as well as our sheet of vouchers. The vouchers consist of; 1 lunch, 1 snack, 1 dinner and 1 sweet treat per day. In the next tent over, we go to pick up the lunch items for day one – hand in our token and are offered a choice between a sandwich, a wrap and a pot of pasta. These are full-size meal-deal type offerings, which are then supplemented with a fruit snack bar, a squeezable yoghurt, a box of fruit juice and then two pieces of actual fruit (which you can go back and get more of at any time of day, unlimited. Filling up the water bottle with filtered tap water is also a nice touch, it tastes better than the other water points on site.

I realise I am waxing lyrical about a food scheme here, but I can’t tell you how much stress it took off our shoulders for the weekend. We didn’t have to think about whether the kids would like their lunches – it’s all kid-friendly options, we didn’t worry about getting nutrients into them thanks to the fruit, we could carry the snacks around all day instead of being blindsided by “I’m hungry” every two minutes. The main meals were redeemable at heaps of outlets around the site (personal pizza, kids tacos, hotdogs and chips, even ramen bowls!) and ours chose exclusively ice-cream as their daily sweet treat, of course.

So after our picnic lunch, we took a squiz at all the other entertainments on offer across this area, including skate ramp lessons, a giant game of football and roller disco. Everywhere we wandered had stamp stations for the Navigation passports, so we spent a good deal of time trying to get those done as well.

Rick Parfitt Jr. covers pop bangers from U2 to The Black Eyed Peas, but Say She She really bring the party, with their funky disco sounds. All three of them are not only mesmerisingly beautiful, but incredible vocalists – if you have the chance, they are a must-see.

McFly are my stand-out band of the weekend, coming in with so much energy and joy you can’t help but get up and dance with them. A huge crowd is going absolutely bonkers for ‘Where Did All The Guitars Go’, Tom is jumping around the stage, we get a cover of Bon Jovi’s ‘Livin’ On A Prayer’ mixed with the ‘YMCA’… what’s not to love? Kids on shoulders are rocking out to ‘All About You’ and ‘Five Colours In Her Hair’ like it’s the early noughties all over again, and I’m here for it.

After Orbital’s Phil Hartnoll gave his first performance at the CBeebies Bedtime Story Tent (reading Doggy Dance Off), its time for the sonic sounds of gorgeous ambient rave from their decks in the Big Top. Spiraling soft lighting provides a backdrop to their dance party antics, and I can’t stress this enough – if you don’t like ‘Chime’, there’s something wrong with you. Go see a Doctor.

Rick Astley closes the main stage for Friday night, looking truly debonair in a coral coloured suit and his inimitable coiffured hair he struts out to a deafening cheer from the crowd. Honestly he looks like he’s just stepped right off the Hairspray musical stage into Weston Park.

A rousing carousel of his own hits and a few covers ensues, peppered with jokes and anecdotes about his time as a performer. “I’m 58, my knees are shot, my ankles are shot… Not really, I’m fit as a fiddle, drink me in! I don’t really dance as much anymore, I just stand here looking gorgeous. Camp Bestival, do you want to dance with me?” laughs Rick, as he salsas his way across the stage.

“There are people here young people, people whose mums and dads weren’t even born when these Songs were out” he giggles before dropping into 1988’s ‘Hold Me In Your Arms’. After thanking everyone in the entire festival; “…massive thank you to the staff and crew, the security, Brownies over there, Hot Dogs… Chunky Chips, let’s hear it for the Chunky Chips!” and a rendition of AC/DC’s ‘Highway To Hell’ which he plays on the drums, our anticipation is finally satiated with the reverse-rickroll, the one we’ve been waiting for – ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’. It’s a delight to see and hear this in person to be honest, iconic and nostalgic. I bought a t-shirt with it on too because I want to rickroll everyone in my daily life, forever.

The night is still young, so we take a stroll around to the truly beautiful Caravanserai, my spiritual home. Everyone is dancing or crammed into tiny caravans drinking fun cocktails, children are sleeping in trollies or dancing in bubble trails, Bestival at night is the most magical and hard to explain experience, the whimsy and carefree vibe is unmatched. Alas, the small ones will wake with the sun regardless of my wish to live in the night, so we mosey back to camp for bed.

SATURDAY

A morning of Soft Play (for the under 5’s) gives us the gift of post-breakfast energy burn, followed by a couple of goes on EarthBot’s slides, and then seeing Bluey (for real life!) in the CBeebies tent, complete with take-away colouring pages which proved very useful for downtime later on.

Mr. Maker has everyone drawing shapes in the sky with their fingers, and roaring along to his very questionable rendition of Old McDonald (no, Tigers are not traditionally farm-animals, unless you’re Joe Exotic I guess). Morning of the Misters continues with Mr. Tumble who is playing to an absolutely enormous crowd of shrieking children, but we are having a picnic lunch off to the side.

Having hastily chosen our movie only a couple of weeks ago and scrambled to put together outfits, we, the cast of Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, scamper over to LoveBot to enter the Fancy Dress Competition. This year’s fancy dress theme of ‘Time & Space’ of course meant that there were about 5 Delorean/Marty McFly teams in attendance, The Flintstones were pretty amazing too, but my vote would absolutely have gone to the Dune-themed family who had turned their festival trolley into the coolest disco sandworm ever. Unfortunately we came second, and the competition went on so long that the kids’ patience had run as dry as Arakis, but we all got rosettes so were pretty pleased with ourselves regardless.

In an effort to appease a tiny gromp, we take to the Carousel for some old-timey action and witness one child screaming (not with joy) their way around the at least 4 minute long ride. Not one to be offput by this, ours thoroughly enjoys herself and then asks to go on the Helter Skelter as well. Seeking a little shade and a sit down, we pop round to Josie’s Post Office, which is set up with colouring and craft tables – a perfect break, especially with the relaxing sounds of Joe Fleming at Caravanserai in the background.

On the main stage, The Amy Winehouse Band are giving us all the hits in the sunshine – though it is bringing back memories for me, of seeing Amy Winehouse at Bestival in 2008, a few years before her death. At that show, she rocked up 80 minutes late and stumbled her way badly through what was left of the set – getting absolutely slated for it in the press. She might not be here today, but it feels like I’m hearing what it should have been like – bittersweet.

Hak Baker brings us a soulful set full of feel-good songs “I see a lot of smiles that’s good, I need that today”, before Gok Wan (who does his own intro “He’s six foot and gorgeous, iiiiiit’s GOK WAN!”) brings his bouncy fun DJ set to the arena. We defect early in search of food, today’s choices include pie, roasted duck fries, and pasta Bolognese with garlic bread.

The Darkness kindly ask if we, the parents would like a censored set from them “…the next song has quite a few expletives, do you want the dirty or clean version? I can swap some of the words, one beginning with C becomes coconut, which has three syllables rather than the original word… so, dirty or clean?” to which everyone obviously screams “Dirty”. It’s an absolute firecracker of a show, with Justin’s undefeatable rock-and-roll frontman sensibilities and the bands’ undeniable energy. I wouldn’t call myself a fan, but it’s hard to deny they have star quality and the songs are unquestionably singable – especially when accompanied by Justin doing a headstand on the drum riser and clapping along with, er, his feet.

Eardrum bursting ‘I Believe In A Thing Called Love’ is the anthem of the evening, every Dad in the arena is rocking out – and, asking an entire crowd of kids to yell Motherfxker is just funny, I don’t care who you are.

Jake Shears (of Scissor Sisters fame) dances across the stage with wild abandon in a blue velour tracksuit, accompanied by drag queen Snow White Trash on the saxophone, for a super fun set. It’s an absolute party on stage, and we too are capering about to the classics ‘Take Your Mama’ and ‘I Don’t Feel Like Dancin’.

In the Big Top, Junior Jungle fresh off the back of hosting the Fancy Dress comp, have kids up on stage with them, throwing an absolutely insane house party, followed by Besti in-house antics from veterans The Cuban Brothers. “This song is about bastards… it’s about the Tory party” Miguelito minces no words and the tent erupts in laughter, before we are treated to their heady mix of hip hop, soul and funk along with some breakdancing and a lot of lewd discourse. I sadly have to love and leave them to run to tonight’s headline act.

Paloma Faith hits the main stage in a cacophony of red, looking like she’d skinned Elmo for fashion, every bit the starlet we expect. ‘Bad Woman’ is “…dedicated to all the girls in the audience. No more ‘boys will be boys’, boys need to act right so we have space to be naughty. I sing this every night to my little girl to remind her to take up space”.

After fighting with her furry red coat and accidentally pulling off one of her grinch-coded gloves, Paloma jokes “I just find drunk people a bit boring” about song ‘Stone Cold Sober’ while she pauses to remove some of her glove from her gob “I’ve got fur in my mouth”.

Telling us “The new album is about my breakup with my kids dad… and about feeling better but guilty and ashamed and bad. So I wrote this song and had a word with myself a bit, for people who will relate to this song – this is for all the single parents out there.” Paloma brings us a little of the new alongside the old. ‘Only Love Can Hurt Like This’ is gorgeously sensual, and cements the Hackney pop Princess’ position at the top of the Camp Bestival bill.

SUNDAY

Sunday morning feels restful, even here. There’s a lazy quality to the sunshine today as we head over to Woodland Tribe, listening to the Indian Drummers and relishing the slight breeze alongside the waters edge at the Park Pool.

There’s a bit of a queue for Woodland tribe, but once in, the kids are completely fascinated by the chance to hammer nails into bits of wood, paint anything they want to, and just generally being allowed to do things they normally wouldn’t. A sprawling wooden hodge-podge between two Tardis-like doors, kids everywhere are engaged in the very serious business of BUILDING. Building what is anyone’s guess at this point, but I do like that someone has chosen to spend their time making a suspicious looking wooden cat.

Elsewhere in Spinney Hollow Craft Village there is basket weaving and sword making, around the corner from Art Town, Textile World and African Drumming. There’s not enough time in the weekend to get to all the activities on offer here, and to be fair quite a few of them are aimed at older children than ours, but you’ll never be bored.

With the sun up and getting hotter, I wish I’d brought my swimmies with me – but I have things to do and don’t fancy a dip in the old undercrackers. Maybe next time! Instead we head over to Navigation Town to catch an amazing aerial hoop artist, and then a hat juggling performance, with a cheeky mojito in hand from the cocktail bar next door. These are truly the moments I cherish here, sitting in the sunshine watching something that puts the unmistakable expression of sheer awe on tiny faces.

Each performer even had their own stamp for the kids to collect in their passports following the show, which is such a lovely touch. We hang out a little to join in with Nick the Piano Man doing a singalong, and then some Open Mic sign-ups, where a tiny girl called Lotta belted out Taylor Swift’s ‘Our Song’ with the confidence of a main stage artist.

We also watched a contact-juggler doing crystal ball tricks that even the Goblin King would have been proud of, before making our way over to the main stage for Ellie Sax. Dressed head to toe in shiny metallic sparkles, Ellie gives us classic club tunes with a side of saxophone, that you just didn’t know you needed but absolutely do. I LOVE this set, it is such a highlight – and Ellie running down the front barrier high-fiving kids is exactly the kind of wholesome star-struck experience you want them to have. We dance the kids down to the front on our shoulders and have a good old boogie. Ellie finishes up with Klingande’s Jubel, in the sunshine – perfect.

Craig Charles gives a funky, chilled DJ set – “This is how we roll… we play funk and we play soul” and I enjoy his Come Together/Crazy In Love mashup, but it does feel like a bit of a comedown after the raucous Ellie Sax. Level 42 are another outlier if you ask me, they’re good don’t get me wrong, but it’s a thin crowd down at the front, and we take the opportunity to get food and have a sit down.

Sara Cox is plagued by sound issues at the beginning of her set, but spins classics such as ‘Like A Prayer’ with stage dancers who are doing the most, followed by Britney’s ‘Baby One More Time’ and LMFAO’s ‘Sexy and I know It’. It is possibly some of the worst mixing of all time but she’s very fun and everyone loves her so, that’s that.

Luckily Faithless are up next, this time as a full band supporting Sister Bliss’s epic DJ skills, and it is clear from the gargantuan riser filled with an array of different decks, that she means business. No time is wasted in getting to the big guns, ‘Salva Mea’ and ‘Insomnia’ hit as hard as ever and are made even more robust with the addition of the big band accompaniment. Joy Division’s ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ given the Faithless treatment is one of my absolute favourites, but seeing Maxi Jazz in the matrix (well, on screens) is going to bring a tear to any old clubber’s eye.

“Camp Bestival, WE COME 1” shouts Bliss “Thank you for being with us on this incredible journey… if you make enough noise, we might have one more for you!” before dropping Dido’s ‘Thank You’ mixed up with some heavy drum and bass to end, replete with lasers and huge smoke bursts. It’s a stellar show, but what comes next is somewhat unexpected. There are no fireworks, there is no ending. No Rob da Bank and Josie coming on stage to say goodbye to everyone and thank them for coming – something that has been done at every Bestival and Camp Bestival forever.

The waiting crowd showed me that my disappointment was mirrored. We saw the fireworks of Dorset a few weeks ago, if this isn’t the kicker feeling of least-favourite-child, I don’t know what is. I felt in my bones that something was untoward – and to be proved completely right, a few days following the festival it was announced that Camp Bestival Shropshire would be “Taking a break next year”.

Whatever the reason, the way this one ended does not fill me with hope for a return. Though the push since has been “Come to Dorset instead”, it just isn’t that simple. We are a five hour journey from Dorset, our friends would be almost 8 hours away with young children in the car (and that’s without factoring the extra cost of travel). Shropshire was so perfectly primed for catching all those outside the Southern circle and I’m truly gutted to have to tell my kid that it just doesn’t exist next year, as after 3 – she’s already as much a Bestival native as I am.

I don’t want to end this review on a sour note though, because we’ve once again had an absolutely incredible time at this little festival. Camp Bestival is a lesson in love, in families taking time out to focus on each other. In parents being able to give their kids magic, in kids being able to see their parents be silly and free. The dancing, singing, hugging, the unmetered joy – something so rare, but so abundant here.

I am crossing everything for 2026, because in this ridiculous world, we all need to be more Bestival.