There were some considerable changes made to the site this year and almost without exception these proved to be major improvements. The new “Flagtopia” lounging area on the hillside overlooking The Park and the relocated tipis, allowed for the most spectacular views across the site and I made the most of the sunshine on Thursday to capture some of these. The Park itself has matured into a mini-festival all of its own with several excellent new environments and I spent a wonderful evening exploring these after the assorted Thursday night message board meetings. In fact there seemed to be loads more going on into the small hours all over the site this year.

Trash City showed that it had enormous potential last year despite being almost completely submerged in mud. But the Mad Max style installations in its new location of what used to be the Tipi Field were simply mind blowing. Shangri-La also proved to be so much better than the rather tired and formulaic Lost Vagueness it replaced. These areas did still get rather overcrowded late at night but the hours I spent there outside of peak times were among the most enjoyable and eye opening I’ve ever had at Glastonbury.

The fact that the weather was so much less inclement this year also made life an awful lot easier for the walkabout performers who make many areas of Glastonbury so colourful and special and for the first time at the festival I’ve had a real opportunity to use a decent camera in order to hopefully capture some of these.