I started doing this diary in June, it's quite new. If you haven't been following have a look at the Cast of Characters which gives a quick low down on the essential day to day characters who are mentioned here...it will make more sense if you do.

Needless to say I didn't make it to the wave dance this morning. I got up to the site in time to see most of the open stage slot, which went on for hours with a break for lunch. It was actually more entertaining than some of the official performances. Several groups of women performed pieces they had learnt in the workshops. Each of the workshops were only a few hours long and some of the groups weren't even scheduled to perform but were just called out by the workshop leaders to come and do their stuff. So there was a lot of making it up on the spot going on and women holding the words up on big sheets for the singers. And someone had persuaded Sharon to sing, which was an unexpected bonus, she sings like an angel but gets ever so nervous about performing in front of a large group.... round the fire she's fine but get an "audience" together and she normally runs a mile. I didn't actually count the samba band but there was so many of them that the audience looked rather depleted when they all got up to perform and I wasn't sure I ought to have stayed seated at the front, my ears were ringing after they had stopped, but they certainly made a fantastic great big noise. There were a few more who needed to perform outside but the rain, which had started a few hours earlier showed no intention of stopping so the camp was officially closed with varioous things done in a circle.

This was followed by a lot of drifting around and long goodbyes and loading up of vehicles and transporting of things around the place. The piano which had got stuck on the way in needed to be pulled out again since the fields were a lots wetter and muddier than they had been then so I was hanging around waiting to do that. Somehow the word got around that they were making beans and chips in the cafe. The lunch that day was supposidly the last meal of the camp so this was really a bonus and there were a lot of eager looking women hanging around the kitchen door. Eventually the chips were had and Camilla Cancantata, she of the big trailer and small van, were ready to leave. It hadn't been a particularly difficult job to hitch and unhitch this trailer the last time but then it wasn't lashing with rain that day. Somehow the mechanism which jacks the trailer up and down had ceased to function. There was much resorting to alternatives, including have a bunch of women lift the trailer to eventually using the jack from the landrover to jack it up high enough to take the mechanism apart and put it back together again. Luckily Clare was there at this point as poor Camilla was by then beginning to forget how the thing worked at all but in the end we did get it towed down the lane and swapped onto the van.

I came home after that and let the dogs out and let the horses into the orchard to have a good feed. The raeburn had gone out and there was no-one else home at that point so I set about relighting it. That's when I realised that the riddler was no longer functioning. I removed a load of coal by hand and pokered a lot of it through but there was still way too much in there and it was rather reluctant to really get going. I was sitting with it when the others came home, I don't know how long I had been there but I realised then that it was getting dark. Lorna came out to help me unload the car and put the horses back in just as it started doing an especially heavy rain burst. Horses were fairly reluctant but did go in without tooo much bother. I then was able to get the wet clothes of and get into a really ridiculously hot bath and then eat something. At some point during the camp Heather (I think it was Heather.... or someone) asked if I would put together a story on the camp, or festival even, for the local newspaper and now they have just phoned to give me some quotes etc. This has to be in by 12.00pm tomorrow and bearing in mind the time I get up I will need to do this tonight. Nobody seems to know how long this item needs to be which is a major difficulty but something has to be produced, so I'd better go and do that.

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