Soggy Tents > Fun In The Sun

#LADS Holidays. The worst idea on earth.

Callum Thornhill

Over the next couple of weeks the majority of my friends will be embarking on holidays full of "beer, birds and beaches" to put it simply. Kavos and Zante will be "graced" with the company of my party loving nearest and dearest, alongside probably hundreds of thousands of others.

Yes, they love to go nightclubbing, however for me this would be a living hell. The idea of being in a minging club with watered down drink really doesn't appeal to me. The resident DJ playing his latest "megamix" to the masses, nah, no thanks, not for me.

I'd honestly much rather trade a week in the sun for five days of slumming it in a tent at a music festival. On the surface, the tent sounds far grimmer, and it probably is. But it is more my scene by far. After many years of eyeing up festival line ups and having my mouth water I was finally able to afford to go last year to Leeds Festival.

Yes it rained on and off at the festival, but you half expect that when you buy a ticket. English summer and all that. If I went to a foreign land for some fun in the sun and it rained I'd be livid. May as well have stayed in bonny old England!

So I worked and saved for months and eventually had enough to get the ticket, but in the weeks coming up to the festival I had second thoughts and genuinely considered not going. Was it the thought of no toilets, or having no idea who I was camping with? Who knows, but I'm so glad that I went in the end.

Five days of living like scum, three and a half days of music, and a week of recovering afterwards. Would I change any of it? No. Why though? Because I know that everyday I'm getting up to sit amongst some excellent company before going to see the biggest and best bands around.

This year I'm working at Deer Shed Festival and quite honestly I can't wait. I shall be running their social media pages and get access to all areas. I really hope I bump into Honeyblood or Dan Croll. That'd make my festival!

So when I stop by at friend's houses and their mothers ask if I'm joining their son on holiday and I say no it opens a whole new conversation about why. Usually they end up fully agreeing with me on how foreign excursions to get drunk are a ridiculous idea.

Next year I will probably go to T in the Park after years of saying "next year" - but until then I will be back to Yorkshire to lend my company to Leeds Festival. Not my friends' idea of fun, as Kavos/Zante isn't mine, but we still tolerate each other's interests. It's a funny old world.