New Forest Folk Festival 2026

[Mark J Salt]

Agree with Nick, the holding field, although a neccesity to keep the queue off the main road, needs to be addressed as the 2-3 hour wait is spoiling what is essentially one of the finest festivals in the land. The problem (as I see it) is the pitching up, there seems no urgency, yes its all very polite and nice but when you have that number of vans and tents to get in it needs to be far more millitary, one after the other and kept moving. Between the holding field and actually getting pitched we were stopped 3 times to ask if we were camping with anyone else or with a group, most festivals tell you to meet up off site and arrive in convoy, at one stop the first question to us was simply "campervan", I was very tempted to reply "NO its a Bo-ing 747" but I bit my lip, then the van in front was sent the wrong way and had to be re-directed, at that point even the steward was starting to admit defeat, it cant be good for their morale listening to the moans. Once on the field we were stopped a final time to ask if we were wanting to camp with anyone else or with a group, by which time I'd had enough and put my foot down, once in the field we picked our own pitch (as did all the people around us) as there wasn't a steward in sight. fortunately safe gaps were left between but it could have gone horribly wrong, some even took enough space for 2 vans. Once the camping fields open there should be a non stop stream of vans with a Sargeant Major directing, Hope next year is better for those attending, we however are having a year off as the lineup didn't really do it for us, good selection of artistes, but not enough to our taste for the 500 mile round trip, hopefully back in 2028, with picnic lunch and lots of cold drinks in the fridge just in case.

[Andy]

Just so there's no doubt: the festival Q&A and the information leaflet about it and the email sent out all say that the gates open at 9:00am but the camping fields don't open until noon. Some people do conflate the two, but they are different. Currently the license for the festival camping runs from noon on Wednesday to noon on Monday, so unless that license is changed, queueing will continue for people arriving before noon and those after noon will be queueing behind the early arrivals. The Police won't let us send early arrivals around the block, fyi. I agree that the holding field is not the right solution.


A number of factors exacerbated the situation on Wednesday morning, including a fatal traffic accident on the A36 first delaying, then releasing, a high number of festivalgoers, causing us to have a massive bump in numbers at one point.

But that's no excuse. We recognise that the holding field is a temporary measure whose time has hopefully come to an end. We're working to get a better system in place for next year.

My apologies for the inconvenience caused. We're working on it.

[Mark J Salt]

Begs the question, why open at 9.00. I think it happens at most festivals if you say 7.00 people arrive at 6.00 to be at the front of the queue for a better pitch but with new forest non of the pitches are better or worse and non are too far away from the arena, why not open at 12.00 knowing people will get there at 11.00. I'm sure there has been much discussion and learning over the years and of course there will be the unexpected on the day problems to deal with but it just seems that  by telling people they can arrive at 9.00 it is compounding the problem.

[Andy]

Begs the question, why open at 9.00. I think it happens at most festivals if you say 7.00 people arrive at 6.00 to be at the front of the queue for a better pitch but with new forest non of the pitches are better or worse and non are too far away from the arena, why not open at 12.00 knowing people will get there at 11.00. I'm sure there has been much discussion and learning over the years and of course there will be the unexpected on the day problems to deal with but it just seems that  by telling people they can arrive at 9.00 it is compounding the problem.

I agree.