Unknown Festival 2013, What I know...Part 4 Boat Party Special

This post is exactly what it says in the title.

The review and the story continues, however this is to only look deep into what went on at the boat parties.

First of all you may be thinking, 'He went on more than one?' and yeah your right! Me and Dave were really fortunate to have spent a ridiculous amount on buying boat party tickets the day they all went on sale. In truth we actually missed one of them. This was the 'Welcome Boat Party 2' because we were given free tickets to 'Welcome Boat Party 1' which was earlier in the afternoon, and best of all, was in the beautiful sunshine.

If there's one main thing I learned from boat parties, its that the afternoon ones are best, because (usually) of the weather. Also make sure you bring enough money for drinks with you, I would say about £40-50 with you.

So this is the second part to 'Derpiness...At Sea'

So from experiencing being in the sea, it was time to experience it at sea. From going back to the tent to get ready, we managed to ask a rep how we got to the boat party. From telling us, we found that we were to get a coach into Rovinj main harbour, where we would set sail.

When arriving at the main harbour, there were many boats harboured up, but it was obvious to find out which was our boat part boat:

With a stage on the top, it wasn't hard to find it.

The setup was really good, as they were not allowed to play any music at the harbour, this was your time to exchange your money into 'Boat Party Cupon'...yes that's right, 'Cupon' not 'Coupon' nice engrish right there. 

It was also time to get your drinks in, and take a look around the beautiful surroundings:

Ironically the music properly started playing when we had got to a distance where we were not only far away from the port, but also passing the festival itself, which was fun to look at.

We can also take this time to say hello to our second photo bomber, whoever this girl is, I bid you hello! from all who see you on my post. For your consideration, you can see the main stage from this pic, which is the big greyish dome on the right. The two buildings that have dark grey roofs are the breakfast/restaurant areas.

So what music to expect on the welcome boat party? I personally was expecting some deep chill out house or something, turns out I was wrong, and what amazing and surprising music they played:

In case this video window is too small:

Welcome Boat Party 1 @ Unknown Festival 2013

This welcome boat party of classics continued. Now when being back home, I'm not the one to be listening to any of this music. But hearing it there, and at that time was right for the occasion.

Quick Note

Because Blogger has no way of embedding my other videos via URL, I have to derperly link the rest of the videos. Not what I had in mind, but you can blame Blogger's derpy video upload interface.

Welcome Boat Party 1 @ Unknown Festival 2013 Part 2

So as you can see there was not a sad or angry face in sight, and we were surrounded by beautiful landscapes.

Now whilst on this boat party, me and Dave did meet some great people, however I cannot remember any of their names. The only way I remember them was by their actions at the time I met them, or randomly remembering where they said they were from. For instance I met a tall chap from Manchester, who every time we saw him, he had two drinks in his hands...always. We also met a nice guy whom was talking to us about Hideout Festival too and I strangely remember his name, he was called Ben who was from Preston.

Your probably thinking to yourself, 'there's not a lot of derpiness here?' Yes that's true, as the derpiness at sea happened on the way back. When the boat start moving back to the harbour, things were still nice and chill, and in fact they kept rolling out the classics such as this beaut from Luther Vandross:

Welcome Boat Party @ Unknown Festival 2013 Part 3

Now following this lovely looking video, things got a little crazy. For my own safety I did not get my phone out to record what happened, although I kind of wish I had, just to show you all how mad the entire boat party went from then.

From my understanding, I assume to this day that whilst on the way back, the driver of the boat suddenly realised he was behind schedule to get the boat back to the harbour. This was because all of the sudden the boat seemed to have been put on full throttle, and to top it off the boat was driving against the current. So when all of us were drunkenly dancing on board, it began to get very bumpy for us all. Not to mention that everyone was spilling their drinks because of the bumpy waters. This eventually led to around 10-13 people to begin spontaneously fall over. It did take a while for me to fall over, because I was trying my hardest not to, alas I eventually fell over when a guy in front fell over, and then a girl next to me fell over, then down I went. 

The sensible people simply went off the dance floor and went downstairs to chill out. Us drunken 'still want to dance' people stayed up on the extreme slippery dance floor. All of us still on the floor made a large opening where some of us tried to do some slippery break dancing. This led to the first guy trying it, to fall over non-stop whilst up there (until we got back).
Dave tried and failed very quickly as he fell over with a girl in which led them both to slide and roll to the side of the boat. 
The top moment of this was when all of the sudden, some guy went into our man made circle and then successfully accomplished the 'worm' dance in which led us all to cheer him.
Then someone else tried and he simply fell straight to the floor, which made an outburst of laughter from everyone.

In the end, when we got back to the harbour, 

everybody simply began walking off,

except the guy who kept falling over.

I wasn't joking, he literally didn't stop falling over. Every time he attempted to get back up, he kept yelling "Where's me flip flop?! ,  Anyone seen me flip flop?!". So in fact it was *Fall "Where's me flip flop?!" *Fall, and it didn't stop until we got back. Since I sometimes show an odd sense of humour, I was in hysterics every time I kept hearing him yelling the question.

Another reason to get the afternoon boat parties?

When we finally got off, I was pretty tired and had drank a fair bit,

and best of all, it was only 4pm. I had the rest of the afternoon to

chill, and then I had the rest of the night to party.

20 Years of Kompakt Boat Party

This was the only evening boat party me and Dave went on. This was a great boat party but alas not as good as the other two, simply because of the great sunshine, and the idea of having more to do in your day.

I did manage to catch the sun going down in spectacular fashion:

This boat party lineup consisted of Michael Mayer & DJ Koze. However If I remember DJ Koze couldn't make it because of a family member sadly passing away the day before. This boat party (apart from the weather) was very different from the other parties. It was this party in particular that had a big German presence, which surprised me a little. I don't really know Michael Mayer, nor DJ Koze. I only know of Michael Mayer because he played at the Kazimier in Liverpool and was brilliant. If they are both German, or play a lot in Germany then that would probably be the reason. 

What was obviously uniquely special about this party then was that I got to meet a couple of cool German people. Predominantly whilst waiting to use the toilets. This one guy I spoke to, spoke brilliant English, in which I had to apologise by stating: 

"I'm sorry, and barely know any German. Your putting me to shame here, your English may even be better than mine pal." His response after laughing was "Well we learnt it in school so, everybody gets taught it." 

Which also made me confess that I was taught French in school, and knew and know very little of that too. 
The pair of us could have spoken about this for ages, but he was dying for a poo, and I was dying for a wee, so our bodies made us stop talking.

T.E.E.D & Waze & Odyssey Boat Party

I saved the best for last. This was most definitely, the best boat party I have ever been on to date.  

It started out in the usual fashion of boat parties (as at this point I was used to them), convert money, get a drink, chill out for a bit until the music comes on. I knew this was going to be a different boat party, as the boat was different. There wasn't much of a stage, just a big table and a large deck area, which was really great.

Partying in once again, beautiful surroundings. This scenery was about to get more beautiful though. I don't mean by the women on board when I say this, I mean the scenery got more beautiful. This was how it went for me:

I was chilling at the front of the boat, with a few people. Just having a nice rum and coke, and all of the sudden these girls from the top of the boat started screaming. I look up and think 'What the hell?'. At this point they're still screaming and jumping around. I first think 'Has TEED just came on or something?', but then one of the girls up top starts pointing ahead, so I ponder 'What the hell are they screaming about?' this was not a scream in terror by the way, it was a scream in excitement.
Then I thought 'Perhaps they've never been on a boat before and they're mega excited about it.'. They keep pointing, screaming and jumping around, and so curiosity gets the better of me, and I stand up and look ahead. There's not much to see to be honest, its very much like what you see in the picture above...Oh wait hang on...whats that...I finally see what they're yelling about. Of course no one at the front has a clue, so I was more excited to tell everyone. Im sure you can probably guess what it was...Giant sea penis' were swimming around in the sea. Hah, no it was indeed Dolphins.
This was the first time I had ever seen dolphins swimming around in the wild, which is apparently rare to see nowadays. So what was the best and most derpiest way of announcing to the people at the front that Dolphins were there? "Oh shit, Dolphins!", as to which everyone gets up and leans over rapidly.
It was very much like the scene in Titanic when they see dolphins. Now the dilemma I was having at this point, was deciding whether I wanted to capture this on camera. Of course I had been drinking, and it was bumpy. Whilst the Dolphins were putting on a beautiful natural performance of jumping around, I derperly attempt to carefully get my phone out to capture it. Of course when I finally decide to record it, they stop jumping and you can barely see them on my camera:

Just in case this video window is poo:

Trying To Spot Dolphins @ Unknown Festival 2013

So I was unlucky to capture it, but I do remember it vividly. My luck would soon change though (not with Dolphins I mean, just in general). So after the warm up guy Dom Chung played his set, wouldn't you know it he came over and sat by me and Dave which is where his mates were located. From briefly speaking to him and his mates and laughing at one of his very drunk mates who could barely walk, I was already thinking of how lucky we were just for meeting Mr Chung, it was really great.

Waze & Odyssey do their set which was uniquely genius, as was TEED's set. They were hitting all the expectations of the boat party, and eventually it led to them both playing alongside each other which was great to witness.

My luck got better as when you see how close I managed to rave to them:

So even at this point I was pathetically starstruck at how close I was. As the massive joint set went on, Me, Dave and the crowd were really loving it as you can see by all of these happy people:

There was actually a guy on the boat that I had met on the first boat party. This was the Manchester guy who always had two drinks in his hands every time I saw him...and guess what? He was stood right in the corner with two drinks in his hands whilst trying to dance. It was a funny sight.

Surely my time can't get any better? 

Yeah It sure can:

Not only meeting Orlando, but I also was privileged to meet his whole team including the dancers. From this my response when meeting them all was: "Yeah Im actually your hired clubber, Im just here to rave it up...on minimum wage too!".

Although I only had the time so say that and to thank Orlando for a brilliant experience into his set and also meeting him, he was as you can imagine very occupied with his team trying to talk to him, and with everyone else practically on the boat.
From amazing luck in getting the chance to meeting Orlando, I was then determined to meet Waze & Odyssey. When finding one of them whom had just had glitter thrown on him, I gathered his attention by saying: 

"Excuse me my glittery DJ, I don't suppose I could get a picture with you could I?" 

From there I got talking to the big tall chap next to me, I am unsure which of Waze & Odyssey he is, but what a guy. I managed to speak to him a lot more than TEED, as Orlando was seeing to the rest of party people. I was truly blown away at how nice he was, as when it comes to my luck in meeting other DJ's, its only very very brief. A quick "Great set!" and thats it. They were both so great to talk to. I do remember letting them know that 'Bump 'N' Grind (Waze & Odyssey Mix) was the tune of the festival, and thanked them for making it.

This has been a very long post, I will admit. If you have read about 20% of it I thank you for reading. If more than 50%, well done!

If you have the read the whole thing, then my god I applaud you!

I will finish off with a lovely photo of the photographer of the

boat party. I thought he should have been included in the 

main picture so I took a picture of him.

End of part 4.

Unknown Festival 2013, What I know...Part 3

Previously on part 2:

Me and Dave were almost not allowed on the coach,

Me and 23 other men all peed against a tall bush,

I took lots of pictures of Italy,

We went past lots of pizza places,

I had to say 'Im on the Guest list' over 10 times,

Dave's luggage kept flipping over by itself, 

I used derpy Croatian,

and Dave broke my torch whilst setting up our tent in the dark...

So let's continue shall we? Here's a look at the aftermath of the derpiness and drama of setting up the tent:

The tent looks fine right? I was surprised like you are when I first looked at it in the morning...

In case your wondering, as to reference from the events from last night, I will answer some of them now:

That big rock in the bottom corner was NOT the rock the torch landed on, it was actually a rock behind the tree.

The 398 or 390 slab is behind the tent, which is why you can't see it.

All of our luggage was in between the two trees when we got there.

What you CAN'T see in this picture was that between to other trees close by, we actually had a line to dry our towels. We also had, complimentary, absolutely FREE...ants. Ants that seemed a lot bigger than ones I've ever seen. You also can't see the 1-2 trees that had coloured paper stapled to them to represent the camping zone.

When I woke up, it was actually fairly early, considering that we were exhausted from the other night, and considering we eventually went to sleep at around 1:30am. I woke up very tired to be honest, so why did I wake up? out of the following options what do you think woke me up? ....obviously before I tell you what actually woke me up...

A) Ants were in the tent

B) Dave was touching me

C) I needed the toilet really bad

D) The heat was unbearable  

E) There was a spider on my face

F) Someone told me to wake up

There's a lot of options for you to choose from, so which do you think? the truth is was that all of them happened...at once.

...No not really, that would have been funny for you to read and would probably be the most dramatic wake up for someone ever.

In fact it was D, I woke up sweating. If you smell your arm pit right now... go on do it, anyway it was worse than that. It was so bad as soon as I woke up I tiredly crawled out of my tent to get some air, and to unzip the vent at the back of my tent.

It was similar to the scene in Ace Ventura, when he is stuck in the elephant robot without ventilation.

After finally receiving oxygen from outside, I also received a fully injection of happiness and excitement...why? It was because it was then when I realised, its the first day of the holiday/festival. Why wouldn't you be excited for whats ahead? knowing that I had 2 possible welcome boat parties to go on in the afternoon/evening and apart from that, we had most of the day to explore and do whatever we wanted.

For those who know Dave the rave, he is difficult to wake up. I mean even the extreme heat inside the tent didn't wake him up. One time back in Creamfields 2010, I got one of our camping neighbours to wake him up, and turns out she punched him to wake him up...and it worked. This time however, a simple shout woke him, and I also pointed out how hot it was in the tent.

Breakfast Time

For 60 Kuna, you could get an all you can eat buffet breakfast at the Amarin resort restaurant. Something which I've never witnessed at any other festival.

More derpy croatian was used that morning. 'Dobro Jutro' was used to greet the staff, in which resulted in them looking surprised. There were some simple pleasures I enjoyed that morning. For instance, the orange juice you see there, was from concentrate, and it tasted really sugary which made it taste amazing. That pear, was chilled, really juicy and soft. The 'milk' bit in the 'Coko milk' spread was odd, but nice. It was this location where throughout the week, you would see people you saw the previous night that were really drunk, and you would see them looking and acting like zombies. 
It was always a nice atmosphere there. The breakfast space was all shared between the event organisers, local and british staff, festival goers such as myself, Dave Collins, The Dancing Misanthrope, Ethan Mounfield, and Ollie Bishop whom became a fan of the bacon and sausage..from what I saw anyway, to be far the bacon was nice.

When walking back to our tent, there was one thing everyone seemed to be doing in the campsite, can you guess what it was?

Bare in mind that we were looking around a lot as this was the first time we had properly seen the campsite areas as we arrived in the night. We saw a lot of people queuing, for the showers. This was a regular morning start for practically everyone. At the campsite toilets, they have 2 hot showers on the inside for men and the same for women. I will have you know the queue was a lot bigger for the women. Anyway there was also an outdoor cold shower, which obviously had no queues. 
There was one time where I actually had the chance to use one of the hot showers in the morning, as I had found one that no one was using, however when you see it, you can understand why I did not use it too:

For most mornings I can confirm that I mainly used the cold showers (sometimes the clothes cleaning station. Sounds weird right? however it had a hot tap and was large enough to submerge half of yourself in nice warm water.). The cold showers brought me a new definition of cold, it was almost like it was chilled just to be cold. However, if there was any hungover, dirty, hot or tired feeling in me, they would soon disappear with the cold shower.

   
 This was my method for drying off. I had a towel, but mainly used that for the beach and the pool. So from getting freshened up, and the adequate lotion on, what better to do then head to the pool/beach area? This was one of our routes we would take from our tent location:

Derpiness...at Sea?

Yeah you read that correct. Me and Dave were derpy in the sea and at sea. Here's the first part:

We arrive at the pool area/beach. We see this beautiful pool area, and its really chill and hot. Im sure I have a picture of it somewhere let me look...Oh yeah here it is:

What you can't really see is what the sea was like when we got down to the beach. First day, and of course me and Dave are wanting to swim in the sea, however the sea is rough. Some people are swimming in it, but not a lot. The sea looked like this:

Just to clarify, the photo of the pool area was taken on another day. The weather was like the photo above...in the morning it was anyway.

So without any thought and with an instant impulse me and dave made a run for it into the sea, as you do. From doing this we failed to realise just how strong the current and the waves actually were, as for me personally, I was taking a battering by the waves. I knew Dave was incurring the same as I kept hearing what I thought was Solid Snake growling behind me. We were only in the shallow area as well, which must have looked pathetic for the pair of us. When trying to stand up, notice how I typed 'trying' as you couldn't as all the rocks were really slippy.

What took us a mere couple of seconds to get into the sea, it must have taken us around 3 minutes just to try and get out, and get out without looking like you were desperately trying.

After this experience in the sea, we were later told by some nice people that there were actually sea urchins in the sea... Our experience could have been worse.

We did take a break from the sea, as we had to dry off and head to our first boat party, which is our second part of derpiness at sea and also a special part 4 of the review, which will be just about mine and Dave's experience at the boat parties.

P.S For the next post, You may be seeing MORE than just pictures...

Unknown Festival 2013, What I know...Part 2

So you've read up to where myself and Dave Collins had just oddly ran/quick walked with all of our luggage, to the coach area where we were going to simply get on the festival coach to go to Croatia, but even this was confusing...for us.

By the way if you are reading this and your wondering what the hell I'm talking about, do note that this is part 2 of my review of my time in Croatia at Unknown festival...So I would advise you to read part 1 to fully understand what the devil is going on.

The end of part 1 saw the picture of the photo bomb guy, with our coach in the background, that me and Dave were assuming we were getting on. Here's how it went...

We joined a fairly large queue from practically everyone on the flight to get on the coach. As the first coach leaves, me and Dave have our transfers checked. As I am typing this right now, I am looking at my transfer ticket....and the first bit of confusion for us was that on our transfer e-ticket, it simply says:

 '8th September 17:45 - 20:15, Trieste TO 

UNKNOWN FESTIVAL (2 people)'

So when finally greeting the coach driver to assist with our luggage, he asks us with poor english:

Driver

"Amarin? Valdaliso? Villas Rubin?"

Me

"Erm, Unknown Festival...Camping"

Driver

"No no, no coach"

As odd as this sounded to me and Dave, Im sure it sounds pretty odd to you, I turn around and ask the rep what was going on, he then tells me that the camping is at Amarin.

Me

"Amarin! Amarin!"

Driver

"okay, okay."

As we got on board and waited for everyone else to be checked, the rep comes on board to greet us all. The rep then goes on to tell us that the coach ride would be around an hour and a half, and there was only to be one pit stop for the toilet, and so anyone wanting to go now, should do so. 

At this point approximately 23 of us men get off the coach, run across the road and strangely align our selves along side this tall bush, where we all simultaneously pee. What we didn't know was that this was the main road in which all vehicles come in and out of the airport, and so various cars and vans were driving past us as we were doing the business, which I could not help but laugh at the same time. Once we had done that, we finally set off, and I was immensely looking forward to the coach journey, knowing that I was to see various bits of Italy and Slovenia and of course, Croatia.

I assigned myself a task whilst on this coach journey, and that was to find and capture the beauty's of the landscapes. Although I learned that this was quite difficult to do when on a coach.

 It was a shame that the sun was to go so quickly. When on the coach with everyone from the flight, it was surprising that everyone was not in high spirits and singing and already partying when on the coach. Before I went I had this thought that everyone would be getting to know each other and partying and singing all the way there, a coach drivers nightmare to be honest. We were all fairly quiet to be fair, and this was predominantly due to the flight and the early morning wake up's everyone had done I think.

Okay so this is Trieste from afar, and what I can tell you is that this was not what I thought Trieste was going to look like. I mean do you ever do that? right before you go to somewhere new, you kind of imagine what the place is to look like, but when you actually see it, it's completely different to how you imagined. I mean I actually thought Trieste was going to be small. I would never of imagined it to be so large harbour and industrial looking. Still impressive though.

Whilst on this journey I remember listening to my iPod, to Richie Hawtin's DE9 Fragments set in Copenhagen, and I remember thinking how far I've travelled in one day. From that me and Dave met a nice couple that were across the aisle from us, whom were from L.A. Turns out that they had been travelling for 24 hours...and this really shut me up. I was stating to them of how tired I was from travelling and that It was crazy to think how far I had travelled in one day, and then they come out with that statement, thats true commitment to the dance scene right there.

You know how everyone says 'It was better if you were there to see it for yourself'? this was very true as for some reason, when looking on the coach, the big windows were giving off an effect as if you were viewing everything outside in widescreen. 

Our time in Italy was actually very short, 45 minutes I think. Before we knew it we were already in Slovenia. Now if someone was to ask me:

"Hey, you've been to Slovenia, what's it like?"

My review of the place would probably be inaccurate, but from my point of view, when going through it, there were some lovely looking hill landscapes and woodland. There was also a few houses around, some derelict and some abandoned during construction.

I couldn't help but feel there was sense of repetitiveness when on the road. You know when in old cartoons they use the same background that keeps repeating when the characters are in a chase? where the same things in the background keep going past? well that's practically what Slovenia was like for me. Everytime we would go past a roadside business/building it would have big sign saying 'PIZZA' and every corner you went around, there would be pit-stop places where there would be big signs outside saying 'PIZZA'. Almost everywhere you looked, pizza was the only word/food being advertised to travellers. there were no other signs Ill have you know, just 'PIZZA', thats it. There was a time where I thought we were just going round in circles, as a lot of the buildings had similar architecture, so they all looked exactly the same.

So this was my failed attempt to capture the official sign stating 'Welcome to Croatia'. I can confirm there was a small cheer as we passed this sign.

So as you can probably guess, apart from the things to see and the small conversations me and Dave were having, there was not much derpiness to report, but don't you worry there's more... not really from us though.

You may notice that in the last pictures you saw, it was getting dark, and from when we were in Croatia, it went dark pretty quickly so we didn't see as much of Croatia as I had hoped. We actually arrived in pitch black, but I was very excited at this point when finally arriving.

Derpiness & Drama...When 'checking in'.

So when arriving, the information pack stated us to collect our festival wristband, then our accommodation wristband, which were in two different stages. Whilst getting these wristbands, the info pack also stated us to collect our cashless card thing.

Myself and Dave get off the coach and we both rush over to the check-in. When we get served by this Croatian girl, Dave presents his ticket, and then I state: 

Me

"I'm on the guest list, I don't have a ticket."

Croat Girl

"Erm, guest list? ... what guest list?"

Me

"Yeah, I did online promotions for this festival, and I was put on the guest list as part of payment, my name is James Chang."

Croat Girl

"Erm...I don't know, let me go get someone."

From here, me and Dave had to wait another 15 minutes until we were eventually seen to by another Croatian girl.

Croat Girl 2

"You on guest list?"

Me

"Yeah, under the name James Chang. My online team leader was Pasquale Chiavetta of Sound Channel if that helps."

Croat Girl 2

"Erm...We have no guest list. Go to next tent."

So as we were told, we went to the next tent where they were giving out the festival wristbands. When we got served it turned out that in this tent, all the staff were english. I stated my case, again and:

*After repeating myself*

English girl

"Okay...*typing on ipad* yeah your here, cool."

In that instant I finally receive my wristband and we are then told to go to the next stage which is the cashless payment card. Bare in mind that me and Dave are still lugging around all of our luggage, which is taking it's toll with Dave, as at this point his wheelie hand luggage had a dodgy wheel which kept making the case flip over.

There was no real derpiness to report when obtaining our cashless card. What was good for me was I was able to test out Croatian, which at this point was derpy Croatian. Phrases such as 'Dobro Vecer' and 'Hvala' was used.

After getting the card we were then in need of getting our accommodation wristband. This meant me and Dave had to further lug around our luggage down a tarmac hill and join another small queue at the accommodation tent.

  

After a small amount of waiting we are to be served by Croatian staff again. Communication went like this:

Croat Girl 3

"Hello, how long you stay here?"

Me

"Till Sunday 15th."

Croat Girl 3

"And you have your own tent?"

Me

"Yeah I do."

Croat Girl 3

"Okay, can I have your ticket reference number?"

Me

"Erm I don't have one, I'm on the guest list."

Croat Girl 3

"Guest list?"

Me

*sigh*"Yeah, I did online promotions, and I'm on the guest list."

Croat Girl 3

"You have no ticket?"

Me

"No, I wasn't given one."

Croat Girl 3

"Hang on let me ask someone."

10 minutes later...

Croat Girl 4

"You say you on guest list?"

Me

"Yeah thats right, under the name James Chang."

Croat Girl 4

"Which guest list?"

Me

"There's more than one? I don't know, the online team guest list perhaps?"

Croat Girl 4

"And you have no ticket?"

Me

"...No. I wasn't given one."

Croat Girl 4

"Hang on, I go get someone."

During this interval where back then I was waiting to be seen, again, I shall take this moment to confirm this is 90% accurate to how this went for me. Only some of the wordings may be incorrect. Why do I remember this so clearly? because it was annoying. 

Dave was just literally waiting around with me. Bare in mind we had already gained our festival wristband anyway to prove that we had gained entry into the festival.

At this point I am waiting around for more than 15 minutes as the other Croatian girls serve other people waiting in the queue. Whilst I am waiting I am greeted by a girl whom is also waiting around. I obviously had no idea who she was, but she was slurring her words when asking me these random questions:

Queue Girl

"From Leedsssss? you from Leedssss?" 

Me

"Nope, are you?"

Queue Girl

"Yeaaaaaah, Mark, Mark...dya know Mark?"

Me

"Mark? nope, who's Mark?"

Queue Girl

"Ah, everrrryone knows Mark, he runs it, runs it mate"

After this statement she suddenly turned around to chat to someone else about this Mark guy. After a further waiting of approximately 10 minutes, a Croatian guy comes to speak to me instead.

Croat Guy

"You say you on guest list?'

Me

"Yeah thats right, under the name James Chang"

Croat Guy

"Oh, we have no guest lists here...hang on a moment."

The Croat guy then begins to look on his laptop. From my perspective, it looks like he was on Facebook. He then begins ringing someone at the same time. After some browsing on his laptop the Croat guy then puts his laptop away, and hangs up the phone.

The man then gets on a scooter and then drives away...I assumed to this point he was going back to the first checkin. I am then told by one of the Croat girl to wait alongside the tent, where there are two other guys waiting to be checked in.

It is here where I learn that the two guys waiting with me and Dave are no ordinary festival goers, they are also apart of the online promotions team. It was here where I met Ollie Bishop, and Ethan Mounfield (which for the majority of the festival, I was calling Ethan, Matthew because I forgot his name, and thought it was Matthew.). 

From feeling stressed, and annoyed I felt a sense of ease and calm, just by simply knowing that I was not the only one having really bad trouble checking in. We begin chatting about ourselves, joking about the Croatian staff and also complimenting there efforts made us all feel better about the situation.

The Croat guy returns from his journey with his scooter, our knight in shining armour returns to then give one of the Croat girls a piece of paper. The Croat Girl then asks us for our names, and it was right there, where we were finally given our On-Site wristbands.

The girl also gave us other bits of paper confirmation and information. She also goes to tell me and Dave that were in Green camping zone, marked area 398.

So, were walking down one of the camping road lanes, Dave's luggage is still tipping over by itself, were both pretty exhausted, and we have yet to setup our tent, and also find our allocated space. 

Green camping area right? there should be signs for it surely, wrong. Instead there were A4 pieces of coloured paper stapled to trees, which weren't exactly lit up either, and so we had to rely on my torch to see whereabouts we were. 

How do we find 398? turns out that this was marked on a concrete slab on random areas of the grass which we had to find in the area.

As you can imagine, this proved a difficult task, as it was in the dark, and what was typical for us, was that we kept finding areas such as 399 and 397, it was driving us mad, eventually we found what was either 398 or 390, but at this point we had given up.

So after all of that, it was time to face our next task, which was to setup our tent...in the dark. 

We begin by moving our luggage to an appropriate place. Dave rests my torch on top of his suitcase so we can get a wide shine of light on our area. Once getting the tent laid out, this next part went like this:

The tent was a little too close to the luggage, 

so I ask Dave to move his suitcase.

He grabs it by the handle,

and yanks on the handle to swing it out of the way...

*Konk, Thud*

What was on top of the suitcase?

My torch... It falls and lands on a rock,

the light goes out, we can't see.

*Facepalm*

I remembered this moment, as it was like I saw it in slow motion.

There was nothing I could have done, it was already too late.

I just watched, it happened, I face palmed.

As I'm pacing back and forth, whilst resuming to move our luggage, Dave then attempts to fix the torch, which takes him a few minutes. It was here where Dave told me that by variously smacking the bulb area would eventually make it turn on.

So we actually arrived on time, which was 8:15pm.

We actually finished everything, checking in, setting up camp at 12:20am. 

Our initial idea was to go for a drink once we got setup, however we didn't realise It was going to take so long. So what we simply did, was went for a walk, and it was great. It was the best part of the day, and we found this sign area (below), which is what I will finish on.

End of Part 2.

Unknown Festival 2013, What I know...Part 1

This was actually in early September, and so you may be wondering to yourself:

"Why have you taken this long to review this?"

Well, if you live in the UK, you may notice how the weather has finally started changing into wintery weather, and so now is a good time to reflect on our summer as it is a thing of the past. It's never a nice time to see the summer go away for another year, that is, if you don't like autumn/winter. I don't really like these seasons, as the UK only ever sees the same type of weather throughout, which is the weather you see when Frodo and Sam are in Mordor in the Lord of the Rings.

This may sound like a bit of an exaggeration, and to be honest I would say it is short of realism, a more better use of words to describe autumn/winter weather for you would be; dark, cloudy, rain, grim, dead/dying plants, rain, gloomy, no sunshine, rain, miserable, depressing, rain, cold, windy, rain, dull and finally rain.

The only place I have seen that looks nice in Autumn is New York, am I right people?

So now you know (if you didn't know already) what the weather is like now and soon in the UK, now to tell you about the adventures and the lovely weather that occurred in Croatia... I could go on and go into detail about the miserableness of the British weather, however I don't want to sound old.

I still wear the Unknown festival wristband today, and it can get annoying sometimes though, such as when your making a coffee in the morning and whilst your stirring you find the end of the wristband is swimming around in your mug as you stir. Other than that I can't complain, for whatever I'm doing, I'm always reminded of this glorious festival...which actually I haven't stated to you yet...which by the way, this festival was absolutely brilliant, and the best festival I've been to, to date. It's time for the main event of this post, strap yourselves in...or on.

Derpiness & Drama...before we left.

So as you may have guessed, it was not just me heading to Unknown festival, I was to also to be accompanied by Dave Collins, and so the original plan I had in mind was for Dave to drive to mine, and then we would finish packing, grab something to eat and then simply get an early night, ready for our departure.

This did not happen.

What actually happened was that we didn't really pay attention to the weight and dimension restrictions that Ryanair imposed, which by the way, was our first time at flying with them. So in a derpy manor, we packed all of our things (something I personally should have done earlier but didn't), and found that our main luggage was around 5-7Kg above the limit. This was due to us deciding to bring our tent, in which Mr Collins then stated the idea of buying one when we get there, so we reduce our luggage weight, as the festival had this service available. I email them a request to get one for the next day, in which 3 minutes later I had a reply stating that they had sold out. 

The solution to this dilemma was that we found that my hand luggage was 7Kg under, and so was Dave's, and so we had to cram all of our clothes and other minor things into our hand luggage and we were hard at work trying to get the weight correct for around 3 hours. In fact this took so long, we went on a break half way through to get something to eat. So the first trip of the holiday was to McDonalds. Eventually when we got back to continue derping around with the luggage, we finished up at around 1:30am, and we were due to get back up at 8:00am...the derpiness doesn't end there.

Derpiness & Drama... When We Left.

Departure day, everyone's favourite day. Knowing that there is holiday ahead of you, and that you are leaving your troubles behind. Departure day is also a very important day, because it's all about remembering all necessary paperwork in order to even get onto the flight. So from not having my usual good lengthly hours of sleep, getting up and going was surprisingly smooth. Derpiness began when arriving at Birmingham Airport. 

We had a long stay 1 car parking space reservation, and so like most people that don't know what they're doing, we looked for signs for long stay 1. We found it and when speaking through the intercom at the entrance they said to go to the Drop & Go car park.

Once there, we noticed signs stating this area of the car park was for dropping people off only, max stay 15 minutes. So we asked the intercom person again if were in the right car park, which they then told us to go back the way we came, to the long stay 1 area. So we went back and simply drove in and eventually after around 10 minutes, found a space for my car. Whilst getting a transfer bus to the terminal, I was re-reading my printed reservation, and then I discovered a small print paragraph on the bottom stating:

"Leave your car with one of our courteous and professional drivers in the Drop and Go car park adjacent to terminal. The NCP Official Valet Drop Off point is located on the right as you enter the Drop & Go Car Park, immediately behind the Novotel."

This was not where my car was parked.

At this point not only was I stressed out, but we were also running short of time. Now when remembering back to that time, I remember I wasn't actually calm about our departure, as I was worrying about all the 'what if' situations, such as what if our luggage is out again? what if Im going to get a fine for my car? what if we take so long checking in we miss our flight? what if I've forgotten something? ...those types of what if situations.

Anyway check in was remarkably easy, as we had already checked in online, and thankfully I can confirm that our luggage was spot on accurate. Upon finishing check in, there was a lot of relief released from within me.

The next stage, like at all airports was the security, which was also surprisingly easy and quick, which further helped me calm down. The strange thing about our pre-departure was that it wasn't very long, at all. We had time to pee, time to randomly browse alcohol, and electronics for approximately 20 minutes, and then we were already able to move to our gate. Boarding was also pretty quick, as Ryanair staff, for some reason, seemed to be in a rush, not sure why. We seemed to have experienced what the military may go through when boarding planes, it was something like:

"Move straight down to the middle of the plane,

 go go, straight down, sit down and make sure

your hand luggage is not in the way, hurry,

sit down in any available seat, and put your

seat belts on, quick...MOVE IT PRIVATE! GOD DAM

IT MOVE YOUR ASS AND PARK IT, PRONTO!"

Okay so the last bit was fictional, 

but they may as well have said it.

Now since I was 5 months old, I have been on planes. I can't really count how many times I've been on flights, but believe it or not, Im not 100% comfortable with flying. Long flights actually, are better for me for some reason, but I feel that short euro flights are bumpy, which is something I don't really like. I am actually fine with flying apart from the following:

Turbulence (Rough ones)

The feeling as the pilot decreases acceleration just after take off (know what I mean? I don't know If I've explained it well)

Side wind (during the flight, and when landing)

Thankfully there was no side wind to report, nor bad turbulence. So all in all the flight was good. Once landing in Trieste in Italy, I couldn't help but notice how much warmer it was, even in the late afternoon...this put a smile on my face. 

If your reading this and your wondering 'Why is he in Italy? I thought he was going to Croatia?' please have a read of my previous post, as this will detail our travel itinerary.

So without the use of your imagination, you have seen a picture of our plane, and now, a satisfied Dave Collins:

 As much as I was just wanting to chill out in the sun at this point, especially after the morning derpiness, we had to go in, and go inside and to security, and by security I mean 'The look at your passport and receive a nod of the head by an Italian guard area'.

I find that the security was more easier getting into Italy than getting into The Warehouse Project in Manchester. Anyway we began the glorious stage of having to wait for your main luggage to come through the conveyer belt via magical portal, and I was hoping (almost like everyone else) that our luggage was to come out first. Im sure Im not the only one that hopes this when at that stage. 

I mean you've just landed, and your holiday has officially begun, so why wait around for your luggage? You just want to go grab it yourself and get out there, but alas we all must wait.

To be fair, our luggage was pretty quick, we only had to wait approximately 5 minutes. 

At this stage as you are reading this, you may think that there has not been a lot of derpy events since the morning, but Im afraid more derpiness follows. So as we have our luggage, and we have to wait for our coach transfer. Our flight ticket stated that we landed at around 4:20pm, and our coach transfer was at 5:45pm. So whilst we waited, we thought of indulging in Italian food.

So I decided to have this, which was called a 'Contadino'. I still don't know what was in it, I believe it had melted cheese, some sort of ham, and something else. I can also confirm this was obtained using derpy Italian. The next derpiness, was by me...and it was a colossal derp by me. The conversation went like this: (as we were eating our contadino, waiting around...)

*Chewing sounds* 

Dave

"Hey Chang, when is our coach again?"

Me

"Erm, at 17:45"

Dave

"Wait wait, hold on...Chang, were in Italy."

Me

"Yeah...I know, duh."

Dave

"As in, were not in the UK anymore?"

Me

"Well obviously"

Dave

"So...what dya think this means?"

Me

"What are you on about Dave!"

Dave

"Time difference?"

Me

"Oh shit!"

I can tell you, there was a mad rush then, as the time in fact,

was actually 17:35pm.

This really was an annoying rush, as I did that motion where you want to run, but your lugging all your stuff, so you have to do that odd looking run/walk, whilst sweaty faced, and not being able to wipe it because your hands are full. Then to make matter worse, for me, there was no escalator going down, only one going up (to where we were). 

So I then had to proceed in oddly rushing down the stairs whilst having the main luggage swinging around taking most of my weight with it. Im just glad there was no one walking up, as my luggage would have rammed them back down the stairs.

We rushed outside, to see a gathering of young people surrounding some coaches, this was our destination. 

 So as you can see, my main luggage was a big squashie bag, which mainly contained the tent, the air beds and all the liquids we had. May I also point out, that I was wearing jeans whilst oddly rushing around in warm weather, so this was a tad unpleasant. 

Ladies and Gentleman this is the end of Part 1.

I don't know how many part there are to be, probably

3, maybe 4.

I will now leave you with the last picture of this post, which was supposed to be showing you all the coach we were riding on, instead its an excellent photo bomb from some guy, well done sir, whomever you are.

End of Part 1.