The Henna Girls' Guide to Festival Season Part 1: Sasquatch! Music Festival
By: Krysteen Lomonaco ~
4/9/2015
As summer approaches, so does our busiest season of the year! We love doing henna at our studios in Seattle, and get to attend the best festivals the Pacific Northwest has to offer. We’ve decided to share with you our secrets for “surviving” any festivals you’ll be planning on going to this summer.
One of the biggest festivals we attend is the Sasquatch! Music Festival, that takes place over Memorial Day weekend at the Gorge. The Gorge is a beast of a venue, and entails dealing with weather, dust, and roughing it with a MILLION other people. Here are some tips from our experiences:
- Over prepare – who knows what you’ll run into at the gorge so make sure you pack for weather conditions like rough wind, rain, and dust storms.
- Stay warm – at these festivals, its pretty common to bring your best festival wear. It’s almost like a fashion show! Although this is fun, it gets chilly at night so make sure you bring pants and a sweater into the venue for after sunset.
- Be clean! – Not everyone finds paying to stand in line for an hour and having a 5-minute lukewarm shower very attractive, but neither is having greasy hair and dust in places you wouldn’t ever want dust to be. Pack some shower wipes, feminine wipes, and dry shampoo. If you have the funds you can buy a camp shower like this Coleman Sun Shower.
- Have a light – Bring a headlamp or compact flashlight for those late night porta-potty runs and for finding your way back to your campsite! Bring one that can hang or stand-alone for more convenience.
- Keep your phone juiced – If your phone is everything to you, bring a battery or solar powered phone charger and back up batteries, this comes in handy and prevents pushing your way through a charging station at the gorge. Here's a list of portable phone charging options.
TP is one of life’s greatest gifts – Bring a roll of toilet paper in your backpack and carry it with you everywhere you go! The only bathroom option here is a porta potty, and toilet paper usually runs out early in the day so BYOTP!- Stay dry – Pack a light water-proof jacket and pre-treat your all white converse high tops, backpacks, and everything you own for that matter! Rust-oleum Neverwet is the eighth wonder of the world, watch some YouTube videos, seriously, you’ll buy this stuff by the gallon afterwards.
- Protect yourself – with the extreme and often changing weather conditions, make sure to protect your skin with lots of sunscreen and Chapstick. Bring extra hair ties as well; help a girl out without having to sacrifice your only hair tie.
- Food for thought – camping can mean having to eat a ton of bananas and PB&Js, but that’s not necessarily the only way to eat. If you plan on bringing perishable items plan your meals so that nothing goes bad, and pack some dry ice, or an alternativein your cooler. You can find dry ice at Fred Meyer or Winco foods. Dry ice keeps your foods at a safe temperature for a longer period than regular ice.
- When in doubt, ask your neighbor – Festivalgoers are usually in the spirit of community. If you forget something, don’t hesitate to ask around. And make sure to keep the good karma flowing!
The best piece of advice we could give you is get some henna! Getting henna at a festival is a memorable and unique experience, so don’t miss out! We’ll see you at the Gorge!
Krysteen
