Thursday

The bags are packed, batteries charged, smart cards cleared down, t-shirts designed(Thanks Alice) and printed, Panama brought out from the cupboard ready for it's annual outing, time to hit the road and head for Cambridge.
The weather's a bit overcast, but it's not raining and that's the main thing. The roads are relatively quiet and all seems as it should be, that is until I reach Trumpington. I normally stop off at the Coach And Horses for a pub lunch, but it's all change.
It's now a grill and wok bar. I'm in two minds. I stop instead at the Tally Ho! and have a quick one with new Fatea crew member Phil.
We decide that maybe an as much as you can eat buffet is the order of the day so we head off across the road for a Chinese.
A decent lunch later and it's back out into the hurly burly. The sun is starting to break through, things are definitely shaping up for a Cambridge Folk Festival weekend and it's still only Thursday.
On the way in I bump into festival stalwart Peter Buckley Hill, chew the fat a bit and it's like I've never been away.
A quick scan around the site shows that all the regular stalls are here. Proper Records have already got people queing to buy cds from the artists that are playing and quite a few that aren't.
The media liaison caravan seems to have acquired a dartboard to give misguided journos with an ill spent youth something to do whilst waiting for the music to kick in.
Rumours are  circulating that there may be a comp to find out which of the UK folk press is the best darts player. The FATEA crew could well be on the lookout for a ringer. Assuming we can find another fat guy with a panama hat.
This year I've been fortunate enough to be put up by a friend and getting to and from the site is going to be a breeze.
There's nothing to do now apart from aim for the double top and wait for the rest of the FATEA crew to arrive from the various parts of the country.
Slowly but surely the crew assemble, it's getting closer to the start. There's enough time to catch up with friends that I haven't seen since last year.
Then it's almost six, time to head off to the Radio Two stage and catch the first band of the festival, The Family Mahone.
There's a definite theme to the songs English drinking songs, Scottish drinking songs, Irish Drinking songs. This is a band that's up and at you and in your face, just stopping short of buying you a drink and offering to be your best mate.
I'd been concerned that the Family Mahone were Mark Radcliff's vanity band, but that fear was quickly alaid.
The Family Mahone are a highly competent combo that are exclusive devoted to good times, a good time for audience and band in that order. Well it looks like that order until you consider that the band had special holders on their mic stands for their beer, which was constantly topped up during the course of the set. The audience had to make do with holding theirs as well getting their own.
It might be impolite to point out that Show Of Hands gave their fans a cider last year. The Family Mahone didn't seem to know.

Continued