No cider sessions, no waking up in the wrong tent – my grown-up Glasto still rocked

Earplugs. An eye mask. And a set of thermal underwear.

It’s hardly the typical Glastonbury packing list, and yet, that pretty much summed up my approach to the annual bacchanalia, which I have attended almost every year since the age of 16. And at 29, it’s safe to say some things have changed.

Don’t get me wrong, I was itching at the bit to flail my limbs around in a muddy field with my friends. But this year, I wanted to do so with a very different mindset – one that would have been completely foreign to me even just a few years ago.

Enter moderation, a phrase that is getting much more use among me and my friends as we near the end of our twenties. Maybe that makes us all sound boring. Or square. Or pathetic. Or all of the above. But whatever impression it gives, it’s one many of us are adopting in lieu of the hedonism that characterised our earlier Glastonbury years.

Back in the day, the festival was about nothing else but fun, a modus operandi that I often took to the extreme. Diet, health and general wellbeing all went completely out the window, and for those first few years, I would spend five days living off boxed wine, burgers, and chocolate-filled crepes, often with just a handful of hours of sleep across the entirety of it all. I was young. I didn’t care. I had the energy of a Duracell bunny and the stamina of an athlete.

So little did I seem to care about my wellbeing at Glastonbury, that one year I actually went in without a tent. Yes, really. My friend and I managed to get last-minute tickets for the Saturday. So we did what any other sensible 18-year-olds would, and got there as fast as possible, taking only ourselves and our phones.

It was only much later, somewhere around the stone circle at 5am, that it dawned on us we had no place to sleep. So we didn’t, and instead spent the early hours of the morning reclining in the grass, hoping it wouldn’t rain.

This was all a far cry from my preparations this time around. It’s not just that, in my late twenties, I lack the unrelenting zest of a teenager. It’s that the idea of giving every last ounce of energy I have to five days of festival-ing isn’t as appealing. Particularly not when you consider the brutal aftermath that is the post-Glastonbury recovery period.

Last year, I was unwell with a brutal throat infection for three weeks following the festival. I’d also managed to do something to my back because the inflatable mattress I’d brought had popped somewhere along the journey. And the memories of getting into my tent late at night, shivering furiously because I hadn’t packed enough layers, still haunt me.

And so this year, I decided to take fewer risks. I spent a considerable amount of time thinking about my sleeping situation (a new inflatable mattress, real pillow, better sleeping bag), what I’d eat and drink (I brought small sachets of green powder to drink with water in the morning: a superfood powder packed with minerals, greens and vitamins) and how much time I’d actually spend within the festival gates (no more than 48 hours).

I didn’t stay up into the small hours, or drink so much cider that I wound up falling asleep in the wrong tent only to be woken up by a very angry Scottish man (yes, this happened once). Instead, I gave myself a very sensible curfew, ensuring I was back at my tent while it was still dark (there’s something particularly grim about making the trek back to your campsite in the broad daylight) and managed to secure a solid sleep on both nights.

Maybe being so sensible does make me boring. But Glastonbury Festival is a place I love with all my heart – and while my priorities have naturally shifted since I first started going, I am determined to continue going in a way that works for me. If that means my curfew gets a little earlier each year, so be it.