White On

Getting up things were decidedly gloomy out of the window, so as we set off laden down with jumpers I considered Louise's choice of shorts a bit rash. As always, I was splendidly wrong, and melted all over the place. For a change, we ventured into the marquee over Main Stage 1 rather than limiting ourselves to the viewing area, having found a marvellous toilet in close proximity. Now toilets, as a wheelie, are the bane of my life, whether I want them to be or not. Last year we made the marvellous discovery of a brick built accessible toilet in the park. In fact, it was the happiest we'd been at a Folk Festival since the day Louise had flirted two autographed Great Big Sea albums out of their tour manager. Other than the brick built toilet, which is a bit of a trek if you are trying to have a swift pee between acts, there are various portaloos about the site. Now I know its possible to find an accessible portaloo, I've not only seen one but also peed in one with my own bladder. But it appeared that they have not yet made it to Cambridge. Out of the three we came across, two were useable. One where a genius of bad design had obviously disliked disabled people enough to have the door opening inwards, thus serving the dual purpose of not allowing some wheelchair users to shut the door, and people who were able to close the door be unable to open it again. Still there were lots of them about, and the stewards were as usual extraordinarily helpful.

We camped out by the marquee for Main Stage 1 to see Eliza Carthy, and Corey Harris and the 5x5. We assumed our customary position; me parked on the edges and her leaning against my legs. And this usually is a fantastic position in which to watch some quality live music, if she's in a good mood I can even usually rest my newspaper on her head. However, the customary friendliness did depart somewhat at this point in the festival, with lots of people appearing to climb over us rather than disturb the nice non disabled people standing behind us. Sour grapes? Who knows, in any case half way through Corey Harris we pottered off to the toilet and to collect some beer to re pitch our camp in the passage leading to the crip enclosure at Main Stage 1. Eliza Carthy was great. She manages to avoid coming across as too cutesy, a common flaw of young female folk musicians. She does a bit of talking and a good range of music, placing her own spin on more traditional pieces, a quality I particularly enjoy. She also always appears to be having a good time, a certain mark of a good gig for me.

John McCusker and friends were probably the best group, who aren't in fact a group, who I'd not seen before this festival. As John himself said, 'these aren't my friends, my friends are all footballers and accountants and that wouldn't make for such a good gig'. However, this lot may not have even liked each other but their musical talents were without comparison. Dancing took place despite the heat and his new CD has now pride of place in my collection - go and buy it. Superb. Every minute.

This particular Folk Festival will be remembered as the one where we got to see Tarras three times, once on Saturday and twice on Sunday. There's something fantastic about Tarras, they are of course all gorgeous, their music is some of the best I'd ever heard and I personally enjoyed the fact they did this gig football team style with 20 to 30 of their closest friends. They did a few songs from their last album 'Rising' and a fair number of new songs, as usual in a variety of styles and arrangements with a typical Tarras theme running through. Its hard to identify what this is, but it is something to say about their enthusiasm and talent that made us see them three times.

From our privileged seats in the enclosure, we were able to see Heaton and Rotheray prepare for their set. Never a huge Beautiful South fan, I wasn't sure what to expect, and what happened was that for the second time that day socks were blown off. Pared down to just two vocalists and a guitar the songs were absolutely stunning. My favourite moment of the whole festival occurred during this set; that from the corner of my eye I could see a young man, dressed as a Cypress Hill fan sing along to 'One Last Love Song' to his girlfriend. I felt warm and fuzzy and slightly evil for banishing my partner from the serious women's bonding session the festival has become. Somehow for me this is what Cambridge Folk Festival is all about, lots of different people treating each other with massive amounts of respect, listening to lots of different types of music.

Perhaps four days is too long for a festival, by the end of the H and R set we were pooped. Martyn Bennett's Hardland beckoned, and we shrugged, offered to buy the album and got set to go home. Blazin' Fiddles appeared on stage as we were about to go. They inhabited the stage as a line of violins, reminiscent of a school orchestra. Until they started playing. We stayed for 'just one more'. Blazin' Fiddles were magnificent, they played with much joy and enthusiasm and as a lost Scot myself their piece entitled 'Midge Factory', brought a smirk to my mouth and a slightly pained expression to the rest of my face. Inspiration for the piece taken as it was from Iain M Banks 'Wasp Factory', and an ode to the midge, Scotland's least popular export.