Exploring the Festival

So... its day one at your first big festival, you have your camp all set up, now what to do?  Well, chances are you have a few hours before the first set of the day starts music wise, so what do you do to occupy your time until then?  I will provide two great options:

1. Patrol the campsite
2. Enter the fest and explore.

Number one.  "Patrolling the campsite"  This can be a very useful thing to do before the music in the festival begins to play.  When patrolling the campsite one may look to locate other groups of friends and their camping position relative to your spot.  Also when patrolling the campsite it is a good idea to locate the area of all the major shops and outlets.  Not only will this locate a place for you to purchase trinkets and other sorts of goodies, but it is likely the main source of all the food at a festival.  There will also likely be a general store in which to purchase forgotten items, as well as necesities such as ice and cigarettes.

After thoroughly patrolling the campsite, my next piece of advice would be to enter the festival.  Even though there is no music playing, the festival still has much to offer.  The time before any music starts playing is the best time to check out what the festival has to offer aside from music.  Explore things like the little shops, and "street performers" that the festival has hired to entertain you.  Oftentimes there are places to explore or people to listen too or check out that you may not have the time to explore later in the festival.  Also this is a great time to familiarize yourself with the festival grounds.  Festivals are usually very large, and it takes some time adjusting to the nature of the fest an locating where everything is at.  Now may be a good time to check out all the stages and plan out your music agenda for the day.  My last suggestion would be to scope out a "safe spot" inside the fest.  This is a secluded area inside of the festival that your whole group is aware of, and can meet up at if you were to get separated from the group.  This is a very helpful tip as many cell phone providers have poor service inside festivals.