Castlepalooza 2012

The Gnome

More or less my plan too, shame Mmoths is on so early but it'll be grand!

cat_rant

Totally just found out that Scroubious Pip is headlining on Friday night! \0/ good times! Better get my tent pitched quick snap!

Also I have two tickets for sale spare if anyone is looking for some.

PM me

KR

Cat_rant

bricky06

dont suppose they have somewhere to charge a phone that'll be used as a camera? anyone that has been before ever seen a spare socket?

subway

They have charge stations, but its usually an hour or two queue by the time saturday evening / sunday morning rolls around. Its in th courtyard area.

Saruwatari

Literally just won a pair of tickets to this, time for some crazy late preparation!!!

Never been before either, but can't effin' wait to see Plaid... :pac:

VinylJunkie

Can't wait for this now, hopefully the weather holds out. Really looking forward to Dogs, seen the a few times they are excellent.

catch--22

bricky06 wrote: »

dont suppose they have somewhere to charge a phone that'll be used as a camera? anyone that has been before ever seen a spare socket?

Pop into the castle and you should find a spare socket somewhere!

iamstop

VinylJunkie wrote: »

Can't wait for this now, hopefully the weather holds out. Really looking forward to Dogs, seen the a few times they are excellent.

Romarr from boards is in them.

Here is my Castlepalooza mix:
http://www.mixcloud.com/iamstop/passion-of-the-crates-castling-02aug2012/

Saruwatari

Just to confirm, if me and a mate get a Bus Eireann bus to Tullamore High St., the gig site's within walking distance yeah?

Berty

FREE TICKETS!

I have 2 Camping Tickets for Castlepalooza in my hands. I do NOT want them. Camping in the Moat Site blah blah blah. If you want them you have to collect them from me in Newport (North Tipp)or Limerick!

PM ME. First come first served.

This is on my facebook page as well so if somebody takes them on that then I'll just ask a mod to remove this.

litup

Beer Baron wrote: »

FREE TICKETS!

I have 2 Camping Tickets for Castlepalooza in my hands. I do NOT want them. Camping in the Moat Site blah blah blah. If you want them you have to collect them from me in Newport or Tipperary!

PM ME. First come first served.

This is on my facebook page as well so if somebody takes them on that then I'll just ask a mod to remove this.

I have my tickets so don't need these, but fair play to you, nice thing to do.

Dr.Winston O'Boogie

What's the searching situation? Comprehensive? Gonna buy beer there but considering bringing my own spirits.

Dr.Winston O'Boogie

What's the searching situation? Comprehensive? Gonna buy beer there but considering bringing my own spirits.

Berty

litup wrote: »

I have my tickets so don't need these, but fair play to you, nice thing to do.

Thanks but I tried to give them away on the Erdinger Ireland Facebook page. http://www.facebook.com/ErdingerIreland

Couldn't give them away because somebody never bothered to reply even though they won. :rolleyes:

ceegee

They kept the 10er parking charge quiet on their site

Theyre searching bags on the way in but not patting you down

finno

Any updates on weather,camping,parking etc. Heading down tomorrow so any updates be great

Mantel

finno wrote: »

Any updates on weather,camping,parking etc. Heading down tomorrow so any updates be great

Weather has been decent for most of the day, sun for the last few hours. We had some showers earlier but they haven't lasted very long. Still, bring some weather gear just in case No idea about parking/camping.

ShriekingSheet

Yeah, it's been grand. Rain this morning seems to have fecked off. Most of the site and all of the stages are gravel, as opposed to grass, so very few really mucky spots to worry about.

Windings, last days of 1984, Dogs, Mmoths, Solar Bears, Ghost Poet and Charlatans today/tonight. Looking forward to it.

iamstop

Great fest. Knackered. Talk more later. x

Seanachai

Does anybody know who the group were with the DJ , guitarist and female vocalist on Saturday night?.

Seanachai

Does anybody know what the name is of the group who played the main stage of Castlepalooza on Saturday night?. There was a fella on decks , a guitarist with a red headband and a female vocalist. Thanks.

cat_rant

Hi Guys,

I have sent an official written complaint to the info@castlepalooza mail address about the event management at this festival. It was disgraceful.

The charge for parking was not justified. Many vehicles were stranded in the mud. The Moat camping site was unsuitable among many other issues I had. I was sad to have spent money on something that should have been a very enjoyable weekend that was ruined by poor event management and aggressive staff.

The Gnome

Hey cat,

Could you provide more details? While agree with the parking issue I say we'd no problems in the moat campsite and personally I found the staff very helpful in any interactions I had with them.

JazzyJ

Can't say I'd any problems at all. Was in the Castle campsite - everything was fine there. Security were fine as well and none of our group encountered any aggression.

The unadvertised car parking fee would be my only complaint.

It was muddy in the car park alright, but I don't think that there much they could do about the weather. They'd 2 tractors and a couple of 4x4s towing people out who'd got stuck when I was leaving on Monday at around 11:30, and there wasn't much of a wait on them. If you planned your route out and kept the speed up it was alright to get out of - just need to give the car a good scrubbing afterwards!

We'd a ball!

cat_rant

Hi The Gnome,

I will say that some of the staff were indeed lovely. And I am willing to see other opinions on this, there were a few though that I dealt with that were awful.

email complaint below...



I would like to make a complaint in relation to a few issues that really affected my ability to enjoy this festival.

a) The Website confirmed that sign posts would be placed along the route once you turned off from the M6 motorway. We struggled to locate the venue with only 2 sign posts being seen on the actual road outside the main gate. given that security of valuables is difficult at events we left our satnav at home. Trusting in faith to the promised directions of the event management team.

b) Upon arrival we had a very negative reaction from the gate staff who were not wearing high vis or id that visibly marked them as event staff.
We were charged €10 parking. This charge was not mentioned anywhere on social media sites or the event website. As there are no atm's on site at this festival we had planned out our finances and had withdrawn money in advance to last us through the weekend. Given that many of the attendee's use social media it is disgraceful that this charge was not published anywhere. The initial aggressive attitude we face on arrival left a very nastyt taste in our mouths and set a tone to our weekend which should have been a very enjoyable experience.

I am aware of the reason for a parking charge from your side as I was advised by a member of security that the field originally designated for parking became flooded and you rented a field from a farmer. I am disgusted that this charge was placed on to the customer. I honestly believe that this should have been looked at in relation to your profit margin. Did you even consider subsiding the cost or splitting it 50 - 50?
To compound this issue us the fact that the car park was very poorly managed. The ground was so churned up by Sunday mid morning that when we departed 3 cars were stuck in the quagmire.

I am aware that the the keys for the mini digger / tractor had left site the night before with a member of the team and they were trying to get in contact with him. I witnessed a gentleman so overwrought loosing his temper as he had been waiting two hours at that point for assistance out of the mud.

Arguably if this was managed properly someone would have been sent down to a local DIY store for some sheets of MDF ( which would cost about €50) to be placed over the effected area and assist in drivers getting out of the poorly drained field. I firmly believe that charging for parking in this circumstance are shocking and really unacceptable.

C) On my arrival to the check in desk. I asked for a brochure / pamplet or time table to plan my weekend by as I would not have mobile web access in that area. The staff had none and could not advise me on where to obtain this information. I managed to find a brochure randomly discarded at a food vendor's stall at 12am - which I asked politely could I use. Again I find the lack of organised imparting of information to your customers unacceptable.

D) The check in desk was quite high which meant a small person like myself had difficulty communicating with the staff and getting my band on my writst. This really should have been considered and perhaps a platform of some kind used. Only for my ability to balance with my arm raised above my head on tip toes did I manage to get my band attached. I view this as a health and safety risk.

E) We had an issue with some lost items on Friday night and immediately on discovery and search of our own possessions we made our way to the Lost and found desk. Which was not manned by event staff and had no signage to indicate when it was manned or who to contact. Using our own initiative we found a member of security who was very helpful. In fact I can honestly say that Security in general were the most helpful professional and informative people I dealt with onsite. I feel though that the event management team should really consider how this event was handled and what ownership was in place, from a customer point of view it was very lackadaisical and ineffective.

F) The Moat camping site, was literally as wet as a moat. The drainage in that field was abysmal, I am an experience camper and using my own personal experience I managed to prevent permanent damage to my property. However I firmly believe that this location was entirely unsuitable for the purpose used and the entrance was a serious trip hazard by the Saturday afternoon. I did not see much hey spread in this area after the initial instance.

There was no where near enough porta-cabins in that field for the number of occupants. There should have been a minimum of a second bank down the far end if not a third in the middle.

G) Having purchased two tickets one as a birthday gift for a friend and one for myself to attend with her, I am very disappointed with the event. I do not feel that I received my money's worth in relation to the facilities provided. And although you might argue that the live music performances made up for my discomfort. This is not the case as there were many delays for stage readiness which meant that some performers where 1.5 - 2 hours late getting on stage and having to apologies to the audience for the wait even though they equally were left waiting due to your inefficiencies.


To say that I am utterly disappointed and angry to have parted with a considerable amount of money to attend this event is putting it mildly.

The Gnome

I'd actually have to agree with you on a lot of those points cat. Our group were quite lucky as we manage to get a spot uphill in the moat but when leaving we saw a few flooded tents alright. Let us know if you hear anything back from the organisers.

We were speaking with some of the vendors onsite on Monday and there was a lot of complaint on their part due to poor organisation, particularly a lack of power for their equipment.

cat_rant

Thanks for your reply The Gnome, I will feedback any reply I get.

I want to say that I am not generally a winger - but I felt strongly enough to want to complain.

I won't say that it was a complete waste of time - I did have some good fun. The Trad Irish music tent was great craic. The midnight mass with all the lads dressed up as priest from Father Ted was fantastic.

cat_rant

Hi Guys here is the reply from the events team.......



Thanks for sending the email through & its something we can look at as a reference when planning next years event.
Answers to your comments are below.
Thanks.
Castlepalooza team

a. There were numerous signs put up on Friday morning from all roads leading to Tullamore. These were A1 directional signs.
b. This was on our website under 'Info' & then 'parking'. There was always going to be a charge & that's why it was on the website. The only change was we moved fields which were owned by the same farmer.
MDF would not work as it gets worse than grass when wet. If a field gets as much water as we got on the weekend there's nothing you can do. We got 3 tractors in on Sunday to help every person out.
c. We don't have to give out a brochure but do anyway, there were freely available outside the castle entrance & all acts were on boards outside each stage too.
d. Apologies about that, we will have something better next year.
e. I just think you were unlucky here as it was manned all weekend & most people got their stuff back in good time.
f. The moat campsite was our new campsite. When it rains, fields get wet & again no event manager can change a wet field. We had above the legal amount of toilets in that field & even more within the main arena. These were all approved in advance by the authorities.
g. Bands run over their set, its a normal thing to happen at any festival & when one runs over they all do. Again there's nothing anyone can do about this except plug a band out of power in the middle of their last song which is not
something we would do to any band. It would ruin it for everyone if that happened.

Hopefully you can understand our answers. Were sorry you didn't have a good time but hope that you do come back again someday to see the changes we will put into place.

nxbyveromdwjpg

cat_rant wrote: »

D) The check in desk was quite high which meant a small person like myself had difficulty communicating with the staff and getting my band on my writst. This really should have been considered and perhaps a platform of some kind used. Only for my ability to balance with my arm raised above my head on tip toes did I manage to get my band attached. I view this as a health and safety risk.

Getting on your tippy toes for 3 seconds while holding an arm out is a health and safety hazard? My god..

Maybe festivals aren't for you.

nxbyveromdwjpg

Had a great weekend I must say, found hassle was minimal.

Up there with Body & Soul, not quite as perfect but a decent weekend all the same.