Glampfest 2018

Glampfest 2018

Regular readers of the Blog will know that one of our favourite purchases for Absinthe is our Glawning and this weekend we’ve been to the second Glampfest, a festival organised by the Glawning company. It’s held in Kirkby Malzeard, close to the towns of Ripon and Masham in North Yorkshire, on the Ivy Bank House campsite run by Sam Raw.

It had been a busy week, but we’d still managed to clean and polish Absinthe and the Dbeilt trailer, and we’d got most of the packing done before Friday morning. Alison had dropped Boz off at her Mum’s on Thursday night, so we could get away at a reasonable time on Friday morning.

It’s only a couple of hours for us to Kirkby Malzeard, although we took a slightly longer than necessary route to avoid Pateley Bridge and its very steep hills.

We’d opted to camp in the VIP area, with electric hook up and loads of space and we took our time setting up.

It’s always great to catch up with James, Sarah and Miriam from Glawning and to meet new Glawning owners at these events. The fantastic hot sunny weather helps of course.

The Festival includes all the food you need for the weekend, with Fish and Chips on Friday, Breakfast each morning, Picnic and Hog Roast on Saturday and Brunch on Sunday. There was also a mobile Indian Takeaway, a Coffee van and Ice Cream available. Throw in a village pub, a shop, plus a fish and chip shop and you’ve got everything you need for a great weekend.

We had a walk into Kirkby Malzeard on Friday night for a couple of beers at the Queen’s Head and received a warm welcome from Rocky, the Landlord. I’d love to live in a small village like this; maybe one day…

It was chilly in the evenings so it was nice to sit in the Glawning and still be able to hear the entertainment.

We loved the two sets by DJ Rory Hoy – hopefully he’ll be there again next year, and the Barr Lane Band were ace too, as were Josh and Zac, two very talented young singer-songwriters who currently attend a Performing Arts school.

Here’s a video of an impromptu performance:

The weather was glorious all weekend and we spent quite a long time sitting outside our Glawning in the sunshine. On Saturday we were joined by some of our family and it was great to be able to wander around with the kids on such a lovely day. They really enjoyed the ice cream van and the activities provided – Glampfest is an extremely family friendly event.

There’s a competition to find the best dressed Glawning and there were some fantastic entries this year – here’s a selection of some of the great set-ups on show.

All profits from the event were being donated to the Candlelighters Charity and we’d given a few prizes for the raffle. We even managed to win a couple of things (a cake tin full of goodies from Betty’s of Harrogate and a bottle of red wine). There was a quiz on Saturday night and, of course, the bar was doing good trade at very reasonable prices. The beer was from the Rudgate Brewery, and very nice it was too.

This drone video, shot by one of the Glawning Owners, gives a great impression of a great time had by all:

Here’s James winning the sack race:

On Sunday, we popped back down to the pub for the Sunday Carvery but we’d missed it and I had to make do with a Parmo – not a great hardship for this Teesside Smoggy.

We’d booked a few extra days on site, so on Sunday night we helped James, Sam and few others, to reduce the surplus beer lake left over from the bar. Tough work, but someone has to do it…

Monday was a day for some exercise so we set off to walk along the country roads to Masham. It’s about 5 miles but the roads were quite busy and we were glad when we got there. We grabbed some lunch in one of the cafes before heading to Theakstons Brewery for a beer, where they very kindly let me pull my own pint.

We had a much nicer walk back, by turning off the road and heading through Hackfall Woods. It added a bit to the distance but made up for it with the scenery and we even saw a pair of stoats chasing each other through the riverside undergrowth.

Obviously, we had to pop back into the Queen’s Head on the way back for a beer before settling down at the Glawning for our last night.

Tuesday was packing up day but we could take our time and probably packed the trailer the best it’s ever been. The drive home was uneventful and rounded off a pefect weekend.

Things We’ve Learned:

May is a glorious month

Those 5m Glawnings are huge

Not everyone fancies a Parmo

Steve and Giselle’s van is still one of the best (no, Martin, you can’t buy a Splitty)

North Yorkshire gives me goosebumps on a sunny weekend

Glawning Owners are extremely tidy and considerate campers. There was almost no litter on site after everyone had left. It had all been bagged and put in the bins provided – so much so that Sam had to take drastic measures to fit it all in:

There’s a full set of photos here, including some I’ve liberated from other Glawning Owners (if I’ve used one of yours, then please accept my thanks – if you’re not happy with them being published just let me know and I’ll delete them):

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