Wonderfully Whimsical Wilderness: a review

Top left to bottom right: Some young musicians; Rodriguez; Relaxing in the hot tub; Les Pepones French Trapeze show; Fairy floss is more exciting than cricket; a feather in the crowd; The Wilderness lake; Masquerade Ball; Relaxing on the hill; Luke Sital-SIngh; So many things to do; Monique and Sam felting

The Wilderness Festival was not only the best festival we have ever been to, it is without doubt the best event.

Described as a ‘pastoral paradise of inspiration, entertainments and tranquility…a four-day feast of arcadian arts, communal encounters, dazzling discourse, restorative rituals, and after-dark escapades’….Wilderness not only lived up to this lofty description, it comfortably surpassed it.

Wilderness offers something for everyone…a sensational lineup of bands, a diverse array of theatre productions and interactive performances, a wide collection of arts and crafts, communal banqueting, cooking classes, talks and debates, wild archery, relaxing lake-side hot tubs, vintage cricket and croquet, French trapeze artists, late-night revelry featuring masquerade balls, and swing dancing performances…and a whole lot more, all set in the idyllic green fields of the Cotswolds. It is hard to imagine a more perfect location to complement the festival’s whimsical vibes.  

For us, a few personal highlights included the Jabberwocky woodland theatre production, the cricket match, felting (more on these later), and seeing the now legendary Rodriguez.

For those that don’t know his story, the Detroit-based singer songwriter released two albums in 1970 and 1971 respectively which flopped in the USA but somehow got huge in South Africa without him knowing. To cut a long story short, 20 odd years later after thinking he was dead, a few South Africans tracked him down and told him that he was bigger than Elvis, and that his music had been the soundtrack to a generation. Meanwhile, he had been living a life of relative poverty as a labourer. It’s an amazing story. He’s now 71, vision-impaired and incredibly frail. While we certainly can’t lay claim to being authentic die-hard fans, it was an incredible privilege to see him perform.