WOMAD @ Rivermead 2006 -- any Urbanites going?

[rich!]

Call me old-fashioned, but I go to festies mainly for the music.

yeah, but one thing about WOMAD is ... it doesn't matter ... you're just going to see really good stuff...

 

[moose]

Hmmm.... distinctly underwhelming line-up.
Seems that where Whitby Musicport goes, WOMAD follows. The pendulum's swinging back towards Wickerman...

 

[William of Walworth]

Hmmm.... distinctly underwhelming line-up.
Seems that where Whitby Musicport goes, WOMAD follows. The pendulum's swinging back towards Wickerman...

Wickerman instead of WOMAD?

 

[William of Walworth]

Can't do Wickerman, it clashes with Ashton Court (weekend of Sat 22/Sun 23 July), with WOMAD a week later.

I don't think the WOMAD lineup is so bad at all! And it's only the first round after all -- plenty more always get added as the Festival approaches.

Scarily pricey tickets on sale from TODAY (Wednesday 15th March)

WEEKEND TICKET: £110
(includes free camping from Friday - Monday am)

BOOK EARLY AND SAVE!! A limited number of Weekend tickets are at a special ‘Early Bird’ price of £100. These will be sold on a 'first come, first served’ basis from 15 March.

Please note : Weekend tickets give access to the campsite from 8am on FRIDAY 28 July through to Monday 31 July. If you wish to camp or enter the arena on THURSDAY 27 July, please order an 'Early Entry Thursday' ticket (see below).

EARLY ENTRY THURSDAY TICKET : £10 per person
Gives entry to campsite from 8am (and Festival Arena from 2pm) on THURSDAY 27 July. Valid ONLY in conjunction with a Weekend ticket (not Day tickets). Applies to all holders of Standard, Concession and Disabled Weekend tickets. Does not apply to children aged 13 and under.

DAY TICKETS (no camping) :
Friday Day Ticket £35
Saturday Day Ticket £55
Sunday Day Ticket £45

We're biting the price bullet and going, because we like the WOMAD site vibe better than the mooses do I think, and whatever the lineup, there'll be plenty of acts that are good, whatever happens

 

[moose]

Wickerman instead of WOMAD?

Yup - decision made. I've seen 90% of the acts listed so far in the last 6 months, and the tickets are extremely expensive in a year when I want lots of spare cash to spend at the Volkswagen museum Scotland here we come - we'll be meeting up with a certain Yorkshire based festie-going couple (she of the beach-ball dyed hair) too

 

[William of Walworth]

Well, enjoy Scotland

And give us a report, because I have just booked 2 WOMAD tickets now, at a scarily huge price ... maybe we'll need to rethink our schedule next year!!

By July it'll all seem worth it though ...

 

[wiskey]

well our provisional oxfam approval arrived today in the post.

tbh i'm gonna go to womad to do oxfam to further my festival career, the music will be fine but i havent even looked at the lineup. i went a few years ago and had a good time but if i wasnt working i might not bother again (certainly not at that price). perhaps if i had kids i might feel differently.

 

[moonsi til]

Tis very pricey...but Im going, tickets already here

 

[William of Walworth]

Ours conveniently arrived on a Saturday -- a couple of weeks or so ago.

 

[aylee]

My ticket's sorted .... there are about 7 of us going. Let's just hope for some rather better weather than the last two years .... rather than .

 

[JTG]

well our provisional oxfam approval arrived today in the post.

ditto

 

[rich!]

Ours conveniently arrived on a Saturday -- a couple of weeks or so ago.

Did you get the "Thursday admission" ones?

(goes back to stroking festival tickets ... so shiny...)

 

[Stig]

Did you get the "Thursday admission" ones?

(goes back to stroking festival tickets ... so shiny...)

Of course!

 

[souljacker]

Thought I'd bump this because it was mentioned on another thread. So I checked the line up for Sunday (most likely day for me) and Coldcut and Norman Jay are playing!

Nice!

 

[rich!]

Did you get the "Thursday admission" ones?

(goes back to stroking festival tickets ... so shiny...)

of course, now I've offered to trade my Thursday ticket for getting my stuff transported down there and getting my tent set up

 

[William of Walworth]

Thought I'd bump this because it was mentioned on another thread. So I checked the line up for Sunday (most likely day for me) and Coldcut and Norman Jay are playing!

Nice!

If those acts are in the Rivermead Centre, where several of the WOMAD dance acts happen, the queues (of festie attenders) to get in can get monstrous after about 8:30. One in one out after a certain point.

See you at a beer tent earlier in the day though, you should get your local's ticket soon!

 

[William of Walworth]

Check the expanded lineup on the WOMAD site now though, several acts were fairly recently added. Thomas Mapfumo and Angelique Kidjo are both excellent and I'm really looking forward to them ....

 

[david dissadent]

World music is not traditionaly my thing but I have bought tickets to womad this year to broaden my horizons.


And the fact Im 20 minutes walk from rivermead.

 

[Dougal]

Well I'm looking forward to this, my first Womad in a long long time. Lets hope the weather stays good.

 

[William of Walworth]

Well I'm looking forward to this, my first Womad in a long long time. Lets hope the weather stays good.

My hope is for the good weather to last til Summer Solstice (I have a pre Solstice festival starting this coming Friday), then, after the 22nd June, it can turn shite for a while .... hopefully recovering by mid/late July

 

[William of Walworth]

Bump as someone tried to start a new thread, and it's only a fortnight til WONDERFUL WOMAD TIME!!

 

[William of Walworth]

WOMAD-goers may very well need to know this. There are train strikes being planned for this coming Friday (21st) but most importantly, WOMAD people, for the period running from midday on the following Thursday (27th) to midday on the Saturday (29th)

The strike MAY end up getting called off, but in terms of getting to WOMAD, I'd say plan to get there EARLY -- I'm now going to aim to catch a train leaving London around 10:30, and will check on stuff about pre-noon trains ...

I'm not sure if someones already posted this, but a 48 hour train strike has been set for- yes, you guessed it! Thursday 27th of July through to the 29th, from noon.

They may call it off, (they sometimes do this) but if you are planning to go by train (like me), make sure you have some back up plans just in case. I think the strike starts at noon, but I'm not sure what the services will be like before then.

Here's the link:

http://www.networkrail.co.uk/aspx/3429.aspx

 

[wiskey]

Bump as someone tried to start a new thread,

goodness how dare they!

 

[wiskey]

The strike MAY end up getting called off, but in terms of getting to WOMAD, I'd say plan to get there EARLY ...

great we're going wednesday

just got back from the glade and ready to do it all again after some food, sleep and washing.

 

[William of Walworth]

goodness how dare they!

It was to help THEM --- all the useful info was on this one and they didn't know ... they didn't mind either ...

 

[William of Walworth]

Latest update (today's) to the BBC 4 week prospect looks fairly positive for WOMAD -week -- not as hot and mostly fine ...

Monday 24th July to Sunday 30th July

“Summer sunshine with some thundery showers”

There'll be more warm, summer weather to come but most of us can also expect some rain with the southeast of England likely to see further thundery showers. Overall rainfall totals are likely to be close to the seasonal norm.
Most places will have average amounts of sunshine. The longest spells of which will be across the west.

Mainly , mainly ( )

 

[William of Walworth]

This'll also be elsewhere on Urban, but the train strikes that were in prospect for this Friday (21st) and particularly for Thursday 27th to Saturday 29th July (see my post above) have now been suspended

Network Rail announcement

Not on the RMT (Union) site yet, but I'm sure this is accurate information.

 

[hiccup]

My Mum told me she was going the other day, just for a day. Quite tempted to accompany her. Never been to Womad.

 

[William of Walworth]

My Mum told me she was going the other day, just for a day. Quite tempted to accompany her. Never been to Womad.

Try it man!!!! I should think there'll still be day tickets. See you and your mum at the beer tent!!!!

 

[William of Walworth]

There's a site map now added to the official WOMAD site showing a few significant changes ...

Map link (WARNING : Horrible PDF .... Yuk ... )

The main stage has moved over from the left hand corner of the site to the right hand corner, and the main beer tent moved a bit closer to where the main stage was.

A large corner of the main campsite now seems to be occupied by the fairground and the 'Little Big Top', plus some other things, but I also think the general campsite has been expanded outwards ....

It's not obvious from the map, but 5co77ie over at eFestivals thinks the parking arrangements have been significantly changed, and the campervan area moved. Can't really help with details on that as I'll be coming by train and walking from Reading station (less than a week away!! -- hope the weather holds ... ).

Ther was a recent (misleading) suggestion in the Reading Evening Post that the orgamnisers had applied (recently) to expand the capacity of the festival to 41,000.

This alarmingly large number seems to have been corrected/clarified by WOMAD though :

Hi there,

We’d like to clarify the situation on this year's WOMAD Rivermead festival capacity following the article in the Reading Evening Post last week, as posted above.

Firstly, there will not be 41,500 people on site at this year’s festival.

This figure relates to our licence application that gives us a maximum overall capacity, including all staff, traders, volunteers, artists, ticket-buyers and children. It also allows for any future growth in coming years.

This figure does not reflect how many tickets we will be selling in 2006.

For the past few years we have been selling 15,000 Weekend tickets and up to 4,000 Day tickets for each day of the festival. This means there has been a maximum of 19,000 ticket-buyers on site at all times.

This year we have access to additional camping space and are therefore selling an additional 2,000 Weekend tickets. With this in mind, and also as a response to last year's feedback, we have introduced a whole new arena with additional stages and have significantly increased both toilet and shower facilities.

We hope this helps to clarify the situation and please be assured that we would not attempt to squeeze in more people without this additional space and facilities to accommodate them.

This is also why we still have Weekend tickets left!

All the best,

The WOMAD Festival Team

I did notice that the original REP story said they were applying for a 4 am late licence for one of the 'public bars' (beer tents? or more likely the one in the Rivermead Centre?) -- I see that WOMAD's statement (about the capacity) does not deny this!

But Caversham and District Residents Association and another neighbouring one are formally objecting.

Hearing (on numbers, and late licence) today, Friday. I spose we'll know the outcome soon enough