Camp Bestival really has something for everyone on offer from circus skills, science explorations, bushcraft and immersive theatre journeys through to amazing live acts and DJs, family raves, comedy, cocktails, award-winning street food, and flamboyant evening cabaret there was so much to explore!
For those who are very eager and fancy a relaxed start to the festivities the festival side opens up to everyone on Thursday morning giving you plenty of time to set up your tent unpack your bags and start checking out the huge festival site and even listen to some live music at Caravanserai for the evening! But the actual festival is from Friday to Sunday 3 days packed of music, joy, dancing, exploring and so much more!
Top Tip:
Bonus for those who arrive Thursday morning is the FREE tractor shuttle which takes all your equipment and luggage up the hill so you don’t have to take various trips with your trolley!
Sadly due to work commitments we didn’t arrive at Lulworth Castle until Friday late morning so we opted for the Camping Plus option which meant that we had a allocated camping pitch (5x7m) with plenty of space to build our 6 man tent (which was in reality a small 4 man tent) and a pop up 1 men tent to store all of our bags/trolley etc inside it. Camping Plus also has it’s own car park which is included in the ticket price.
Camping Plus was about a 10 minutes walk for us to the start of the festival side up a hill and alongside some hot showers plus some Portaloo toilets next to some larger environmentally friendly compost loos (just don’t look down) a double sink with mirrors plus a coffee stand and also a general store which stocks quite possibly everything you might have forgotten (it even has a bakery!). When you walk out of Camping Plus into the festival area there was small/large locker with mobile charging stations which you could rent for 24hrs (£12/£15 or the whole weekend (£28/£35) it comes with a universal plug socket and two USB ports to cater for all of your charging needs – just don’t forget your cabels!
Top Tip:
If you want to shower have one in the afternoon or late night to avoid the long queues in the morning!
Friday evening was probably our favourite night when it came to the line up for 2023. Mini Mumbler and myself made our way near the front of the castle stage to see Scouting for Girls who got the crowd going, followed by the amazing Ella Henderson who totally got a brand new fan in Mini Mumbler she did not stop dancing to her performance despite the little rain downpour we had.
Top Tip:
Camp Bestival has a brand new app which recently launched where you not only can favourite any live act or activity happening over the weekend and get send reminders you can also connect your Spotify Account so the week coming up to CB we where listening to all the great tunes to get into the festival mood!
After watching some great fire action by the Pembrokeshire Fire Spinners Mr. C took the kids to explore around the festival side and I stumbled upon the Secret Set at the HMS stage which was non other the brilliant DJ Jaguar Skills I never heard of him before but I loved dancing to his set before I headed off to see The Kooks who finished Friday evening with a fantastic performance! Before heading back to the tent I walked around Caravanserai and listened to some smaller bands on the 2 stages there it had such a chilled vibe to it!
We had a slow start in the morning and cereal breakfast and fresh coffee/hot chocolate for the kids outside our tent before walking down to the festival site with all the nerf guns & ammunition we could find. A total highlight for the kids was the Nerf Gun War which is organised every year by some avid festival goers, they met up at the Love Bot at 10am and over 400 children (and adults) joined in the fun of shooting each other for well over an hour.
The sun was shining and everyone was in a great mood all dressed up in this years “Animal Snap” theme. We enjoyed another electric set from DJ Jaguar Skills and then Gok Wan & Rob da Bank went onto the HMS stage and hyped up the crowd. This is where my 2 kids saw the hilarious Blue Coats which are described as ‘proper daft family fun where they put you at the centre of the action in an array of games leaving you and your little sailors three sheets to the wind with joy”. And they did just that my eldest manage to get a little trophy for the most serious starring competition Champion of the Day which he was super chuffed about!
Food wise there is SO much option we decided to save a few pennies and bring our own breakfast, snacks and drinks but we did have 1 meal a day and our favourite was the Mac ‘N’ Cheese with lots of toppings (£8 or £5 for a kids portion) but we also had the China Town Noodles (£16), Chips (£4) and some sweet Churros (£7) from the Churros Brothers. We stuck to a food budget so we didn’t try much more.
Camp Bestival ensures that no festival goer will be dehydrated so they put up some water taps all over the festival in both the arenas and the campsites which is free! But there was also the option to get a day stamp or a weekend wristband for unlimited refill of fresh and cool water from Frank Water you just had to bring your own bottle. There was also a Refill Plus option – which included sparkling water and refreshing cordial;
Top Tip:
The Woman’s Institution Tea Tent serves fresh bacon rolls in the morning and sandwiches/cakes all day long for very reasonable prices.
We spend the morning hiding in the tent playing Dobble waiting for the rain & wind to stop but the kids had a session booked at the Woodland Tribe Big Build so we brave the wet outsides. Thankfully the rain cleared off by lunchtime and we could enjoy some more things like Horrible Histories in the Big Top, Junior Mumbler went off to build a tall Lego Tower with the Brickies, climbing around the Love-Bot & spending some times with their friends making bubbles. It was also my friends son’s 15th birthday on Sunday and our eldest turned 13 the following day so we all enjoyed a proper good homemade cake from the W.I Tent!
Top Tip:
If you have a birthday happening whilst at Camp Bestival the ladies from the Woman’s Institute Tea Tent can wizz you up a deliciously yummy homemade birthday cake starting from £15 if you order it the day before!
By the early evening we all where pretty knackered so we decided to pack up camp and head home which meant we did miss Craig David and the pretty awesome looking firework and light show but for us it was the right decision.
Top Tip:
We decided to use the Charity Concierge Festival Taxis we had to queue for 20 minutes at the ‘Taxi stop’ and got taken to our pitch where we loaded up all our tent equipment and luggage and got driven all the way up to our car it was definitely worth the £35 not having to do the trip over 3 hills twice with our trolley and all the money goes to charity! This service also runs on the other days.
For our very first family festival we couldn’t have chosen a better festival then Camp Bestival at Lulworth Castle the location was great for us with only a 35min drive home plus the stunning backdrop of the jurassic coast and Lulworth castle makes it that little bit more magical. Although what felt like all the seasons combined weather wise we had a super busy weekend but one of the best ones and we cannot wait to do it all again (next year). We felt like we barely scratched the surface and didn’t even explore half of what was on offer. The Kids favourite was the Nerf War, hammering at the woodlands tribe area, spending some time with new friends and watching Scouting for Girls, Ella Henderson and having fun with the Blue Coats. Mr. loved the Cuban Brothers and some of the smaller acts and I thought Jaguar Skills and The Kooks where absolutely brilliant!
I thought the new App for your phone was brilliant but sadly the poor signal at the festival side meant it didn’t load properly so next time I would rather spend the £10 for the lanyard with the program instead of relying on my phone signal and the lanyard makes a great memorabilia to remember this fantastic weekend by! We also loved exchanging our refill cups (£2) with some cool printed Camp Bestival on Sunday.
Prices for Food & Drinks & Fairground Rides where pretty steep but we did try to stick to a budget of £300 for the weekend but we ended up spending close to £400). You are allowed to bring your own drinks & food with you inside the festival if you are camping (but no glass is allowed so decanter it to a plastic bottle) so we brought 2 cool boxes filled with frozen capri sun (which also doubled up as ice blocks) frozen milk, beer and soft drinks as well as plenty of snacks and I let the kids pack their very own pick n mix (1 bag a day) at home which I labelled with their name/day in a bag to bring along! To make it even more fun you could put all sorts of sweets in a sectioned off plastic box and label it Tuck shop for them to choose their own sweets every morning.
If you missed out on this year, the smaller sister festival Camp Bestival Shropshire takes place in Weston Park from 17. – 20. August and there are still a few weekend or day tickets available to buy here.
As I hope you can tell, we absolutely loved our weekend at Camp Bestival in Dorset and we can’t wait until next year (26th-28th July 2024). Super early bird tickets go on sale this Friday 26th August 2022 at 10am and are frozen at this year’s prices. You can click here to find out more & buy your tickets.
At Mumbler we are incredibly grateful to have been gifted our tickets to attend Camp Bestival, however even if we had paid full price, we would have still considered this to be great value for money for a weekend jam-packed with entertainment for the whole family.
