Post by Deleted on Jun 6, 2011 11:18:05 GMT
What is the magic ingredient of the Basingstoke Kite festival? THE place to see everyone smiling amongst kites in the sky!
Having given it a miss for a couple of years after attending and parking / camping in the car park, camping was allowed on the flying field about three or four years ago and I came back to it reluctantly, having heard good reports, and have not looked back since.
I can only, and this is just my opinion, put it down to the ‘melting pot’ effect of having everything going on in a relatively small space, at any given time everyone attending IS involved, in one way or another, with everyone else! Good organisation and communication is heard and heeded by all at the festival, audible, knowledgeable, well informed commentary throughout the day, the peripheral camping allocation is superb and I noticed this year more that most that the public intermingled and chatted with kitists camping and the invited fliers, the whole set up of the festival is made easily approachable and the familiarity is not threatening, but conducive to good PR for kiting. From my biased viewpoint as a Weekender it is all I want from a kite festival and could see nothing that could be bettered! Trade stands catered for all tastes, facilities were good, new amusements and sponsors, and back to back entertainment of one kind or another, be it a kite in the tree or fantastic arena displays by teams and individual fliers, all could be soaked up wherever you were, I could fly and monitor my kites at the edge of the organised events and not miss out on anything!
The weather always threatened to dampen down things on the Sunday after a blustery but sunny Saturday, but only a light shower mid afternoon didn’t hinder the festival much as we were all prepared for a predicted downpour which never arrived till 6.15pm when I was the last person off site again!
A fun filled weekend for me and many, I’m sure…..did anyone have a bad thing to say about Basingstoke KF? Thanks to EVERYONE concerned on putting on a good show, organisers, invited flyers and fellow weekend campers, who all flavoured the ‘melting pot’ that has once again left me with a very agreeable after taste, and I will be back for more, please!
Having given it a miss for a couple of years after attending and parking / camping in the car park, camping was allowed on the flying field about three or four years ago and I came back to it reluctantly, having heard good reports, and have not looked back since.
I can only, and this is just my opinion, put it down to the ‘melting pot’ effect of having everything going on in a relatively small space, at any given time everyone attending IS involved, in one way or another, with everyone else! Good organisation and communication is heard and heeded by all at the festival, audible, knowledgeable, well informed commentary throughout the day, the peripheral camping allocation is superb and I noticed this year more that most that the public intermingled and chatted with kitists camping and the invited fliers, the whole set up of the festival is made easily approachable and the familiarity is not threatening, but conducive to good PR for kiting. From my biased viewpoint as a Weekender it is all I want from a kite festival and could see nothing that could be bettered! Trade stands catered for all tastes, facilities were good, new amusements and sponsors, and back to back entertainment of one kind or another, be it a kite in the tree or fantastic arena displays by teams and individual fliers, all could be soaked up wherever you were, I could fly and monitor my kites at the edge of the organised events and not miss out on anything!
The weather always threatened to dampen down things on the Sunday after a blustery but sunny Saturday, but only a light shower mid afternoon didn’t hinder the festival much as we were all prepared for a predicted downpour which never arrived till 6.15pm when I was the last person off site again!
A fun filled weekend for me and many, I’m sure…..did anyone have a bad thing to say about Basingstoke KF? Thanks to EVERYONE concerned on putting on a good show, organisers, invited flyers and fellow weekend campers, who all flavoured the ‘melting pot’ that has once again left me with a very agreeable after taste, and I will be back for more, please!