The summer before last, I went to a music festival called Wayhome, outside of Toronto. I camped out with my cousin and her family's au pair, Katy, and we had so much fun! I've been looking through my pictures from the trip, and I thought I'd share some of my learnings and experiences. Here's a list of eight.

Comfort is Key

I was really concerned about leaving behind the comforts of home to camp out surrounded by thousands of people. Big crowds aren’t always my jam. But I find that in moments like Comic-Con and music festivals, when we’re all coming together to enjoy something, crowds can be really great! And then I get to go home and crash once it’s all done, having had an awesome, energized experience. That being said, it’s fun to try and bring some comforts along.

On our way out to Wayhome, we realized we had no chairs. Chairs are very important. We stopped in a Walmart in search of fold-up lawn chairs. They didn’t have any, but they did have these mega-comfy Adirondacks:

We played tetris to fit them into our car, but it was so so worth it when you could drag your chair into the shade to relax before the day of music got started. Also, I have since seen this exact chair everywhere I go. There’s two in front of the hotel here in Oberlin, and every time I see them I think about Wayhome. It’s a good memory.

Showers are also super important. The festival had giant trucks full of shower stalls that were surprisingly nice. The lines got way too long in the mornings and evenings, but if you found time around midday, you could rinse off the heat and dirt, and then let your wet hair keep you cool for the rest of the day. Before bed and upon waking up I just used baby wipes to try and keep cool and relatively sweat-free. I was always fairly chilly at night, but waking up in that tent the first morning felt like waking up inside an oven. Humidity is no joke.

One more recommendation is earplugs, or downloading some calming ocean sounds to play through your earbuds as you try and rest. If you plan on getting any sleep, and you’re a relatively light sleeper like me, these are a must. The music won’t stop until well into the morning. Once all the bands were closed up, a DJ would take the mainstage and you could hear the beat far out into the campgrounds. You need to protect against that. Also, occasionally the people in the tent next to you will be loudly arguing about who ate the last of the pasta salad at three in the morning.

BYOB (Bring Your Own Breakfast)

The festival grounds did not open until lunch time. The only options near our camp was a stall that sold first aid supplies, toilet paper, and Slim Jim-esque snack foods. There was also a pizza and funnel cake stand that seemed to be open 24 hours, but honestly, I just wanted some sort of light breakfast.

I get that it might not be the biggest moneymaker at a music festival. But as I was sober, I was waking up at a fairly normal hour and I wanted food! Next time, a cooler is a must.

Of course, it is possible to get creative. Once all of my must-see shows were done Saturday night, I waited in the rain in order to by a beavertail. I’d never had a beavertail before, and I wasn’t even planning on eating it right; right being warm and fresh out of the fryer. No, I saved that beavertail, and I ate it cold in the morning as a breakfast pastry. It was delicious.

Beware crowdsurfing.

I know it sounds fun. Honestly, crowdsurfing is a bucket list item of mine. But I have to warn you to watch out for crowdsurfers, and if you’re gonna be one of them, make sure no one drops you.

There were quite a few crowdsurfing incidents at Wayhome. When I’ve seen similar things happen at shows, security guards usually got right on it. At the festival, no one seemed to care. At the Modest Mouse show, they played “Float On” and it was like everyone just thought, well, if they say so! Suddenly there were people floating through the crowd over our heads.

It happened again during the Alt-J. No one was paying quite enough attention, lulled to distraction by the music and the lights onstage. A guy passed overhead and I grabbed onto his ankle. For whatever reason, the man who was supporting his entire upper body decided to launch him at me. My sixteen-year-old self could not catch a full-grown man, and he knocked into Maddie and onto the floor. While she tried to catch her bearings, I watched the man spring up into a sort of Spiderman crouch and scuttle away into the crowd, red in the face. Maddie was fine, which makes that probably the funniest thing that happened the whole weekend. She doesn’t quite agree with me, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to think about that entire experience without laughing.

Moral of the story, if you’re going to crowdsurf, or support crowdsurfing, please make sure you keep people safe.

Festival fashion can be practical!

I found that maybe the most important thing in my festival experience was finding a way to feel both cute and comfortable. I was living there for three days, going from campground to show to food, and it was hot and humid in the days but cool at night. Sometimes it was sunny, sometimes it was rainy.

My windbreaker was great. It folds up super small, so I could shove it into my ridiculously heavy-duty fanny pack. That’s right people. Fanny packs are back! They’re so convenient, and only added to any outfit I had going. My fanny pack can fit my phone, snacks, and a water bottle, and I freaking love it. People also carried backpacks around everywhere, and they never seemed to get in the way or create the roadblock you might expect in a mosh pit crowd, so that’s always a good option!

I brought flower crowns with me, because it seemed like the thing to do. But I never ended up wearing them. This is the era of sun protection! I am all about sunscreen and hats. I proudly repped my stepdad’s company baseball cap for the entirety of the festival. It covered up my humidity hair and kept me comfortable under the sun.

Rather than sneakers or heels, I stuck to what my brother likes to call my “Jesus sandals.” I hadn’t really worn sandals before. I had this thing where I always thought they made my toes look too long? But being at Wayhome, sandals were the comfiest choice, and I didn’t have to worry about them getting dirty or about how much my feet were sweating.

Sandals and baseball caps were super convenient, and have become must-have accessories in my everyday life.

Food trucks are so fun!

Festival food was pretty expensive. That’s just how it goes. But all of it was served out of food trucks, and there was pretty good variety! A lot of the food trucks boasted healthy, organic options. There were sandwiches, and fancy home-made ice cream sandwiches. There were shockingly good fish tacos, which I got at least once a day.

There was also poutine, which I didn’t get the chance to try, but seemed to deal effectively with the potential hangovers a lot of people were facing. There were desert trucks, including fresh made beaver tails, and shaved ice or softserve to get you through the hot day. There was always pizza available, which we didn’t actually buy until leaving the grounds. It was a long line of cars to wait in, and the meal made the time go faster.

It’s easy to forget to eat when you’re having so much fun, when you’ve got something you want to go to on the hour every hour. But it’s good to take a moment to pause and eat. You need good food to fuel your way from concert to concert! Besides, Wayhome offered cool exhibits and stalls to explore too, if you wanted to take a break to eat but didn’t want to stop experiencing art.

Hydration is important.

This is a lesson I’ve learned as a general rule, but it especially came out at Wayhome. I was happy to see lines forming at the free hydration stations. It meant waiting, but it also meant that people were recognizing the importance of staying hydrated and healthy! I know there were plenty of other drink options, but water is always important, especially when you’re dancing out in the sun all day long.

There was always free Vitamin Water available on the way in and out of the campgrounds. I think I sampled every flavor by the time the weekend was done with, and it was much appreciated!

I started carrying a water bottle everywhere. I’ve noticed that this is a trend here at Oberlin, and it became a hip thing to do at my highschool too. You can invest in a Nalgene, or any other type of bottle, decorate it with stickers and take it with you everywhere! Hydration is healthy!!!

You can check out all sorts of music!

The headliners varied over a wide range of genres. They would close out the night on the main stage, where you could watch from atop the hill, or run down and join the crowd in front of the stage. This is the same stage where earlier in the day Maddie and I had gotten up close for Modest Mouse, and followed the sound of “We Are the Champions” to what turned out to be a politically-charged rap show. I have since come to appreciate Run the Jewels, and it’s now super fun to be able to say I saw them live.

There were two smaller stages, one under a tent. That was wear baby powder man struck, during the final chorus of “Shut up and Dance.” From there you could run to see Vance Joy on the closest stage, or Brandon Flowers a little further off.

There were silent discos to attend every few hours, and a small stage hidden through a thicket of trees all lit up with fairy lights, where cool indie bands like Timber Timbre played into the early hours of the morning. (All the credit for that discovery goes to Maddie. In fact, all the credit for this music festival adventure goes to Maddie. I was not nearly hip enough to plan such a journey myself. I like to think now that I’ve had such a fun music festival experience, I might be!)

People are so great!!!

I was really worried about spending three days surrounded by people. I was also in Canada, so I didn’t have cell phone coverage or wifi and was thus surrounded by thousands of people I didn’t know with no way to contact some that I did. Of course, I had Maddie and Katy and the comfort of our tent, but it was still a little nerve wracking. It ended up being so much fun! I like to look back on memories from Wayhome, all the people I looked at and thought, People are so cool. Look at us all here, being cool.

Look at them all!!!

I don’t know if it’s because they’re high, or because they’re exhausted, or because there’s good music everywhere to keep you pumped, but people get excited and then they tend to do whatever the hell they want. It is a culture of acceptance, all existing in one place, without air conditioning, without breakfast, with one goal: good music!

Of course there were moments when I just wanted everyone to shut up and go to sleep, but it’s not like you go to a concert with the goal of dancing all alone. It’s about the energy of you, the band, and the people all bouncing around to the music with you. It’s about dancing and focusing on the music and the way you feel. And a music festival would not be a music festival without the people to make it loud and crowded and fun. Literally everyone who’s spent three days camping and jumping around at concerts is a mess, but everyone is also exhilarated and happy and out in nature and filled with music. It’s a brilliant kind of mess.

In between shows, some organize games of frisbee on the fields along the campgrounds. Some sit and read, moving every time the shade does. Some sleep, some never seem to leave the festival grounds.

Some pack their backpacks with giant baby powder bottles so they can shake them in time to the beat of their favorite song, thereby covering everyone in the crowd in something that cannot easily be dusted off their clothes or sandals. (I tried. It was hopeless. Baby powder was part of every outfit for the rest of the festival ¯\_(ツ)_/¯)

One final note:

You're gonna need a way to find your friends in the crowd. I saw a girl brandishing a plastic lawn flamingo at the Modest Mouse concert, and it was actually kinda amazing. The lead singer was wearing a flamingo-patterned shirt and it matched perfectly. There were also large cutout faces bobbing above the crowds, giant stuffed animals that looked like they’d been won at a county fair, and my personal favorite:

^^^It was true.