The trick to enjoying a british style beach holiday is first to realise they are an altogether different affair than such a thing in warmer climates. I really enjoyed that Guardian article, very readable and great photos. Definitely worth the time to read. I wonder if these places will start to get more popular in the future. There's something uniquely authentic about them.

The water is cold, many of the beaches are pebbles instead of sand and the weather has a mind of it’s own. But for every downside, there is an upside, evolved over hundreds of years, you just have to see it through a different mindset. For instance, the unpredictability of said weather creates a sort of unspoken comeraderie between people, and there's often a special coziness to many of the places you'll find to eat hearty food as the winds and rain swirl outside.

There's a sort of minimun bravery that you have to have to start enjoying it, a sense of humour about when things go wrong. But once you do, you might just realise why some of these places are the best kept secret of many poets and writers from around the world. And when it's finally sunny and warm, the tougher parts of the holiday cause it to truely feel that much more glorious.

Oh to be beside the great british seaside, you feel connected to the land, the history and the people in a way you never could have imagined before. And the moderarely good fish and chips you eat while sitting on the peer looking out to sea, will be the best you've ever tasted.

Update: When I re-read the first draft of this post, it had this poorly written travel brochure sort of vibe, and that wasn't at all my intention, so I re-wrote it twice, but each time it ended up being even more travel brochurey. It's very odd, there’s something in the universe that’s causing this to happen, like some sort of giant magnet, I don't appear to have any control over it. Rather than fight it, I'm just adding this note. Somehow it feels like the british seaside thing to do.

In a classic Glastonbury move, the festival has all the old timers up in arms about how the festival is moving too far away from it's roots. This year South Korean K-pop boy band Seventeen is playing the Pyramid stage, the Friday afteroon spot.

I say this as a former cranky old timer that was complaining about how the festival was moving away from it's roots, only to discover that, actually, I hadn't truely understood what Glastonbury was all about. Yes sure it's about big rock bands, and you can enjoy it at that level, but the really cool thing about Glastonbury, the thing it's mind bendingly good at, is taking these bands that seem completely different, that would appear to be almost completely at odds with each other, and juxtaposing them in such an unnexpected way, that somehow it magically just works.

It's really difficult to explain in words. The festival is so enormous, with so many stages, so many genres and ambiences, that it quite literally feels magical, like walking across a simulacrum of the multiverse composed of the most incredible colidascope of colours, energies and people. You are constantly finding yourself in places you would never normally have gone to in your non-glasto RL, often with a glass of authentic west country pear cider in your hand, and absolutely friggin loving it.

Even the so called uncool bands seem to popup just at the right time, when you're recovering from some other concert, and you see and feel the energy of the festival flow through them, and you think to yourself, holy crap Glastonbury is amazing.

The magic of the ancient druids, mystical rituals from across the ages permeates everything like the cosmic background radiation, you see it eminating through the musicians, and you recognise it, because it's eminating through you too. You feel at one with yourself, the bands, your friends, all the people around you, as well as with the earth and entire universe.

And then it's 4am and you are deep in the magic forest, at some totally underground unannounced jungle rave thing, and the band you thought were uncool are there raving their tits off, with an assortment of people so crazily diverse you start to literally believe you are in a dream. But it's just Glasto.

Not even rain and mud can dampen the spirit, the rave continues with wellies and rain jackets, or in your tent.