New Path

[Deleted]

They Could do with a new avenue From The Red Entrance with a more direct route to nearest main arena entrance

[olirow]

This is possibly a further contender for an 'unnecessarily negative post' but I am not sure I understand what the problem is? The walk from car to tent took around 5 minutes (a bit close to Molly's Bar tbh, but my choice and sleep is for wimps, right?) and then another 5 minutes from tent to arena. I am not sure it would be possible for it to be more direct.

[deserttraveller]

You raised an interesting point.

THere used to be a direct route from Red to the arena but they swapped festival camping with family camping which meant family campers having to lug all their gear to the arena and then take a left. They now have a direct route, lit, to family camping.
They have re instated security towers and added Manor lane to Robin Road creating 3 fast access paths across festival camping.
The swap co in cided with the move of Molly's also means the noise from Molly's goes over festival camping and is away from Malmesbury, I bet they had complaints when it was facing the town.

Quite a neat solution to several issues and yes it is now a slightly longer walk from red to arena, but short compared to the walk from Purple gate.

[Purpledawn]

Yeah, the trek from Purple Gate must be horrendous. The route was fine from the car-park in my opinion, but we arrived at 7:15 am and were some of the first in the queue, which meant we were able to walk straight across the grass. I would argue that there were not enough walkways over what the festival organisers know to be potentially muddy areas. My daughter was in park and camp and had to come home on Sunday because the pushchair couldn't cope with the mud and grass bunging up the front wheels. She is an experienced camper and has a buggy bike trailer but the youngest is only 10 months old and the trailer is designed for a toddler, hence leaving it at home this year.  Oh well, at least he will be a toddler next year and hopefully it'll be a dry, mud free festival so moan over from me.

[deserttraveller]

I wonder about P&C exit. They must have had to heavily wood chip it Sunday, a muddy hill down to a short bit of trackway and a small muddy hill to climb to get back to the main car park. What fun.

[Purpledawn]

I didn't see any sign of wood chipping anywhere up there nor on the steep exit road on Sunday afternoon when my daughter left P & C at around 2pm. The walkways up there were very muddy until reaching the short strips of plastic walkways, but these strangely petered out until you came to the metal walkways towards Molly's.

[sc]

When we left P&C on Monday morning (about 8:15am), all was fine except for one small patch of mud in the valley of a small hill as you left P&C. There was a small patch, maybe 20 feet of mud, where the wheels span and the car wanted to dance, but after that it was all either plastic matting, solid farm track, wood chip or solid ground and grass. I was surprised there wasn't anything on the one patch of mud, but it was only that, one patch of mud.

I think WOMAD staff and the ground itself handled the weather extremely well, it is an outdoor festival in the west of England after all

[calndel]

the red gate has moved over the years and it use to be closer to the mansion, when it was then the path use to lead also to the arena

as the site has changed to so have the path ways and to be honest their routes don't make much sense

[Purpledawn]

The pathways don't make sense to me either. I don't think people really know where the designated areas are in the camping field and tend to set up where they have previously or because they don't want to trudge any further. so why so many pathways? Anyway, Womad do a brill job under difficult circumstances but I do think the plastic walkways could have been extended in some areas.

[fourgomad]

Ok - from a first-timer.....

I arrived early & so didn't have far from car to red gate - I was aiming to camp near "posh loos" so headed that way - I followed the path left then right as the long grass across the more direct route makes it tough to drag a trolley - it still took less than 5 mins to walk it.

Later I had to meet a friend at the shuttle drop & so walked (hiked!!) from Molly's bar straight up meadow road to purple, then right to shuttle drop .... it was at this point I was especially pleased I'd chosen red as I'd noted how flat the site is, not realising the "dip" you get through the meadow - we then walked back through meadow camp & climbed up through park & camp to my car in red (to drop excess luggage) - so pretty much walked the lot! & I can say that the layout was fine (not knowing any different) - a group of friends (16 kids between them) chose purple to be near family camping & then had to get all their gear up & down hill ! & they all camped the back of beyond!!!

When leaving they hired a trolley but having only one trolley point - in red, was silly, it would've made more sense to have 2 trolley points one in red for Cart to camp & one in purple for families wanting to hire for the weekend...

I too was a bit confused by the short patch of plastic walkway, but don't know if more would've made any difference in the mud.

But again, not knowing any different - it was all fine to me!

[deserttraveller]

All told not too bad, Womad learned the hard way in 2007!

My car wizzed and spat mud on the short hill Sc described, I have since discovered how to switch off traction control- page 79 of the manual!

I had  a car in 2008 at not so Beautiful Days, the prats parked the cars on close cut stubble despite forecast for heavy rain, they were towed 1/4 mile one by one through liquid mud!

[bloohair]

Purple gate has always been a long trek to festival camping. I get turfed off the bus at the garden centre then drag my trolley across purple parking, down the hill and up the other side.

It's heavy and tough work but I only have to do it once. And sometimes get help from fellow Womadders like Cal, DT or Paul.
Thank you guys 😘