This is our third time of going away in Jan, so we feel we know what is what. We used our power station for 230w power last time, but found it got in the way quite a lot in the front. This time I put it in our spacious storage area, plugged into the Anderson plug which draws power from the house battery, and with the power board plugged into one of the outlets and then brought into the living area through a small opening. This meant we had 230w power for the kitchen without the clutter. It worked well, with the house battery charging it up again each time we used power.

We also used the 120w power blanket to help with charging the house battery. We are not sure if it made much difference, we could do with a more powerful solar blanket for music festival weekends when we are not driving each day. The 200w panel on the roof will be enough when we are having one of our wandering holidays where we move location every day due to the DCDC charger providing power as well.

Enough of the electrics!

When we arrived there was nobody on the gate even though we arrived a bit after the 2.00 p.m. opening. Stephen went up later to pick up our festival wrist bands and programs. We set up the chairs and table, and even put out the awning for a while, until the wind picked up and made us worry. Still, it made a nice image.

We had evening meals booked in the dining room, so our first gig was to go there for 6.00 p.m. They check the names of people in the lineup, and must have had problems with that method because on Saturday night they made us lineup outside the dining room and we were given a little token to hand to the servers when collecting our meals. Both meals were pleasant, if not exactly memorable.

Then it was off to the first concert. It felt that as an audience it was taking us time to warm up to the music. That happens every time. By Saturday afternoon we are enthusiastic no matter what. There was a coffee van serving food, smoothies, and various coffees and hot chocolate. We had our keep cups with us and had hot chocolates to keep us going at the evening concerts.

Although there were a lot us old regulars at this festival, we also noticed a lot of younger people. Perhaps the tradition of having this type of smaller festival will live on as we age and drop out. We were able to catch up with friends, see Bernard Carney (curiously, he was a little distracted during the singalong, but his concert the next day was excellent, well up to his usual standard). Anyway, lovely to see him still performing.

It was cool overnight on Friday and Saturday, but as we were at concerts in the evenings and only came back to get ready for bed we didn’t have a problem with our unheated van. I showered in the van each morning, but only had a quick wash and used wet ones in the evenings. We still had to put extra water in the tank on Monday morning. Stephen showered each morning using the village facilities.

We had stopped in Byford at lunchtime for some last minute shopping and coffees. I had cooked a savoury slice and we had that each day at lunchtime, plus salad. We didn’t use the gas cooktop on this trip as the power station can run the microwave and I used that for heating up our evening meal on Sunday night. We had contacted Matt and he spent about an hour watching us have our tea and doing the washing up. It was the time after dinner and before bed for him, when nothing much else was happening, so we provided a bit of entertainment. From time to time he looked around to see what was happening in the house as well.

There are traditions for the Nanga Festival. There is a Blind Date concert where people sign up for groups and are helped by one of the professional acts to work up a song to present. These can be very funny, especially the one helped by The Tuckshop Ladies, a musical comedy duo that were very entertaining, one of the highlights actually. There is a musical presentation and this year it was Jane and the Rain, with another singer/pianist, Francesca Meehan, doing at tribute to Winnie the Pooh. The book is 100 years old on the 14th October, if you count the first publishing date. Jane and the Rain also did a very good concert segment.

Then, there is a raffle, with about 20 small prizes and one guitar. We didn’t win anything, but that’s when I particularly noticed how many young people there were at the festival. Before that they must have blended in too well with us old people.

There is a final concert on Sunday night which finishes at about 9.30 p.m., followed by packing up. We didn’t help much with that part, Stephen claims age and I claim ‘bad back’.

I didn’t book the Sunday evening meal because last year it was in the dining room and it felt a bit sad. But, this year they had it just outside the gym where the concerts are held, so we will probably book all three evening meals next year. It just feels more friendly and when the festival was actually held at Nanga that meal was always held in the concert venue. With Fairbridge, we just have to be a bit careful due to it being the gymnasium of the school and they are picky about their floor. However, we did have the traditional cheese and biccies in the gym, last year they were worried that we would spill food on the floor.

On Monday we weren’t ready to leave until about 11.00. We went down to Pinjarra to empty the toilet cassette, then drove to the Blue Wren cafe in Dwellingup. This has been a long tradition for many of us. It didn’t come up to it’s usual standard (toilets a bit messy and lacking toilet paper), waiting a long time for our meal (a shared steak burger) and they mixed up our drinks so that Stephen got a small chai latte and I had a large coffee. But we still enjoyed the atmosphere and put it down to them having a bad day.

Journalling at the Blue Wren Cafe