Dot to Dot

Don't you have any plan for next weekend? That's impossible! We are lucky we have a long weeekend ahead of us, otherwise we wouldn't have time to make it to all of them! Those who wanted to take the opportunity of having a long weekend to rest... good luck with it! Bristol is helding at least 4 festivals the same weekend, each one having its own specific topic and style.

I am not going to list them all in this post. I will talk about just one of the festivals this time: 

Dot to Dot Festival

Dot to Dot will be happenening between 24-26th May in one different places each day: Manchester (Friday), Bristol (Saturday) and Nottingham (Sunday). 

As early as 1.30pm, bands will be playing in 15 different stages spread all over Bristol. O2 Academy, Start The Bus, Stag & Hounds, Thekla and The Lanes are some of the venues where you will be able to enjoy varied styles of music for a 20-pound ticket (+2 online booking fee). However, you will not need to buy a ticket for all venues. The website says tickets will be eligible at Thekla, O2 Academy, Trinity, Exchange, Fleece, Start the Bus and Lousiana, so as far as I understand concerts in Stag & Hounds and The Lanes are for free, and probably Brewdog and The Birdcage as well. Last concerts will start around 2am. 

(Click in the picture enlarge the image)

Bristol will also be hosting other music-related events during the day. Check the Facebook page for updates.

As rainy weather is not forecasted for next weekend, I believe it could be a very nice pub/concert crawling event for you and your friends. I hope you enjoy it!

Buy tickets here

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Note that under 18 will only have access to O2 Academy and Trinity Centre as well as to Dry The River, Benjamin Francis Leftwich, Lucy Roce and The 1975 concerts.  

Meat | Music | Mayhem

Although BBC does not forecast good weather for this coming weekend, it won't be short of plans. Apparently, the "original and true celebration of barbacue culture" arrives to Bristol. Grillstock Festival combines a two-day low & slow barbacue competition with international music artists, a barbacue academy, awesome festival craft beer bars, live entertainment, chilli-eating and hot-wing competitions, plus a vibrant mix of traders and exhibitors. 

Grillstock Festival 2013 will take place in the Amphitheatre (BS1 5LL) and rockabily, cajun, bluegrass, country and other south American rhythms will flood the environment.

In the BBQ competition, teams from all over the world will be competing against each other to decide who smokes joints of pork, lamb, beef and chicken the best. The Grand Champion will win the £1000 price.

Fans of authentic BBQ will be pleased to hear that there will be some  "smoky and juicy lunchtime treats" in St. Nicholas glass arcade.

The chilli-eating competition is one of the activities that drawns my attention. If you are mad enough to do this, you should get there early and sign up on the day. After filling a health questionnaire (!) where you will state you understood the side effects, you can join the competition. It will start of mild before scaling to the hottest chillis on the planet. The last person standing will take home a fantastic prize from a sponsor, which is not defined what will be. I guess the honour of being the winner would be enough for some of the contestants.

If chillis are too much for you, there are a hot-wing and rib eating competitions as well. It's all you can eat in 5-10 minutes! Contact them if you want to enter the competition in info@grillsock.co.uk.

INFORMATION
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• Dates: 11-12th May, 2013
• Location: Lloyds Amphitheatre, The Harbourside.
• Opening Hours: Saturday 11am-10pm // Sunday 11am-5pm
• Tickets: Weekend £15 // Saturday only £10 // Sunday only £7.5 // VIP £55
  Buy tickets HERE
• Website: http://grillstock.co.uk/bristol-festival

Flower Power

Leopard print is back. So are long mustaches, plaits and flowers in the head, extravagant second hand clothes, outrageous furry jackets, varied types of hats... At least, in Picton Street last weekend.

Picton Street hosted last 4th May a very colourful all-day-long party called Mayfest. The road was closed to the traffic and it was already crowded by the time we arrived there around midday. The party did not finish until 9 in the evening.

Beautiful market stalls with handmade stuff invaded the street. You could find all type of paintings, pottery, homemade muffins and other kind of food, second hand stuff, wooden furniture, jewellery, flowery crafts, protest T-shirts and many other things.

Apart from the stalls, there were also craft activities and maypole dancing for you to get fully involved with the festival.

Music was part of the party as well. This year there were two spots for the music: the main dome stage at the end of the road and an acoustic busking spot in front ot the Bristolian Café. In my opinion, the band "The Inexplicables" deserves a special mention in my blog. Nice and powerful voice over a beat-boxing base, along with other varied music instruments create a very original effect that surprises the audience.

At mid-afternoon, we found a free spot at the Bristolian Café and we had hot chocolate/coffee/tea, as the sun was not strong at that time. They have a very nice teacup design to avoid your hands of getting  burnt!!

Overall, a very warming atmosphere in the Mayfest and you can see in all pictures, the weather was superb. We couldn't ask for more!