Festival time again

Have you ever pulled the wool over a nun’s eyes?
I had a once in a lifetime opportunity to do it when I was 16.
My parents lived on the other side of the world. A three-day plane journey with stopovers in Copenhagen and Singapore. A two-week delay on letters – even the flimsy blue airmail ones.
My sisters and I were at a convent boarding school in Matlock. Miserable most of the time, we were homesick for our old lives in Manchester, travel sick whenever we went abroad, and desperate for friends who might invite you to stay for the short school holidays in between.
It was a small school by any standards. Academically challenged, the nuns were survivors in a hostile world. The 1960s weren’t kind to nuns more at home with the Ireland of the Magdalene laundries than the revolutions of the swinging sixties in England. They were half-heartedly repressive, often cruel and occasionally unexpectedly kind.
As pupils we survived with black humour and a certain amount of fantasy. Letters, especially from boys, were a lifeline.
Cockroaches in the bread and marge, constant gnawing hunger, rationed baths and hair washes, mass, benediction, night prayers, confiscated underwear, infrequent laundry collections. Hormones, period pains and body odour. It’s hard to believe that parents paid for this style of neglect. No Ofsted inspections. Our joke was that the legend ‘recognised by the Department of Education’ on the sign referred to an inspector passing by and saying ‘that’s a dreadful school’.
To our amazement we were told we could take part in the Bronze Duke of Edinburgh award scheme. The level of freedom and initiative this opportunity suggested was against all the previous practice and management of the school.
My best friend in Lower 6 was a doctor’s daughter from Derby. Her father became a papal knight, which gives you some idea of the calibre of Catholic family she came from.
We chose folk music as our special interest and skill. Ironically our favourite performance song was Peter Paul and Mary’s ‘Leaving on a jet plane’.
We discovered that the Bath Festival was to be held in June 1970. The line up was a dream for anyone into American rock music – most definitely not a folk line up. This was a year after Woodstock. There was no understanding or experience of what a music festival might be, even for those of us desperate to go.
We told the nuns it was essential for our Duke of Edinburgh award. We were given an extra long weekend off school. My parents’ were never asked for permission, though my friend’s must have given theirs. Her older sister, a former pupil, lived outside Bath. We must have got tickets from somewhere. We travelled by train. Her brother in law attempted to drive us to the site, but had to leave us to walk the last eight miles along a solid traffic jam. I don’t remember having money. We certainly didn’t have food, water, a tent, sleeping bags. Websites tell me there were 150,000 there. One of the first people I met on the road was my boyfriend from Manchester. We then met with an old school friend. She was a smoker, which came in useful later. It rained in true festival style and plastic sheets were handed out. She welded them together with her cigarette to form a shelter for us.
The line up was incredible. Jefferson Airplane,The Byrds, Country Joe, Pink Floyd, Its a Beautiful Day, Canned Heat, Frank Zappa, Led Zeppelin, Santana, Dr John, Fairport Convention and more.
I have no recollection of the toilets.
I had a Nigerian blanket with a hole in the centre that I wore as a poncho. I still have it.
On the final morning we were down in front of the stage as the dawn came up listening to the Byrds – that’s Byrds with a Y.
There were no screens or other stages – I know I must have seen everyone on the line up. I didn't sleep and I didn't leave the site.
We hitched back to her sister’s house, had cold baths and got the train back to Matlock.
The nuns told us they had seen footage on the television news.
There were never any repercussions. We never completed our bronze award.
Sometimes I think “Did it really happen’?
I found my ticket in an old box of mementoes a couple of weeks ago, and i still have a flyer.

This is the festival that inspired Michael Eavis to set up the Glastonbury Festival.