Dalefest Part 1

A couple summers ago we heard of this two day camping and live bands event called Dalefest. They weren't big bands but they were local ones you've probably heard of if you were into local metal music. This had originally been a trip my mom and her best friend Debbie were planning on going too. As we heard more and more about it we became interested. So the trip turned into a group effort. Our group consisted of my mom, Debbie, Bridget(Debbie's friend), my sister Courtney, her boyfriend Dalton, our cousin Jacob, Nich(my friend), and I. We loaded up two cars for this trip which was roughly an hour and a half away in Imlay city. Debbie and Bridget went in another car and on their own trip there, so it was just us in the cars tailing each other. Jacob was driving the second car and I was leading the way from the first. It had got so frustrating just getting there due to the fact that every time we started maintaining a speed, Jacob and nich would severely fall back. This happened the entire trip so I was so thankful when we had finally reached the place.

As we were pulling in we were curious to the kind of place we had brought ourselves into. The house on the property was kind of ran down and the actual field where we would be camping at had a stage, Porta potties, and a sort of concessions shed. I made a comment that this feels more of an off the main road kind of crazy biker rally, just by the feel and visuals this place had along with its operators. We decided to stay and play it out and began carrying all of our tents, coolers, bags across their entire property to the field. We got set up before barely anyone had even shown up, I had a feeling we were going to be "that family" the one who is just completely out of place and had the wrong idea of what we had come too. As everyone started arriving we had gotten more comfortable and didn't feel out of place. Most people started drinking and we're how you'd say partaking in the consumption of illegal substances. Since we were minors we had to be careful with drinking even though it was going to be fine, since we were supervised and no one was driving. The band's had finally gotten on stage late in the afternoon and we just hung out by our tents and started drinking and listening to the music. A few of us had vodka mixed in gatorade, while Jacob and Nich went full force on the beer. Jacob drank as almost if it had been a race and within a matter of hours was drunk and completely sitting back in his chair. Nich on the other hand had drank slower and gradually got more drunk as the night unfolded. He started getting really into the music which made us all start cracking up. This music was so far off of what Nich normally listens too, it was just funny watching him get into it.

As the evening slowly approached and headed into the night, both Jacob and Nich had gone to bed to sleep off the alcohol. By this point there were a ton of people around, along with an abundance of drugs. There was so much that people literally walked around offering them. The place we had come across was really quite strange. I'll say without saying, a few of us did actually try something that night and it did make for a crazy unforgettable night. I had brought a couple high powered laser printers and made a laser show on the trees behind the stage for all the drunk and people tripping to watch along with the music. Many people had wandered over after a band had finished their set, and before the next band had gotten their equipment set up for their performance. By the time it had gotten into the late hours of the night, most of our group had gotten too drunk so they had gone to bed and mom was off with her friends. Which left Dalton and I sitting at our table, a couple members of bands that played that day had come over to comment on the lasers and talk about the shows. Most came by for the big tub of butter pretzels my mom had brought, they left a taste in your mouth that just made you crave a few more. The singer from a band called "From Blue to Grey" sat down with us and had an actual deep and meaningful conversation with us. All three of us were drunk to say the least but we actually had it maintained enough to carry out the night. 


Dalton and I were finally thinking of going to bed after Bridget had stumbled over to our table with her guitar. She sat down and just started strumming fast and repeatedly, it sounded awful and quickly started ruining the night. She wandered off after a bit, hopefully realizing no one wanted her there playing as much as she did. She came back a few minutes later yelling nonsense at us which got the staffs attention. They told her she was going to have to leave if she kept it up, she then got up and charged away in my direction. I at the time was trying to pack up a few things for the night because I was so done with her already. I was holding a candle which had been sitting on the table the entire night and she rammed into me and got the hot wax all over me. I was already pissed at her for just being around but that definitely sealed it. I got what I could off and just changed and went to bed. I just didn't want to deal with her for the rest of the night.



Thanks for reading (yeah, part one is ridiculously long but didn't want to break up day one)