Greetings, Bad Ass Babes! Welcome to the first installment in a series of Ultimate Guides for Ladies (and Gentlemen) who love to party. Read Part 2 here. And be sure to follow that up with a big, refreshing gulp of Part 3 here.

Have you fallen in love with Festival Life yet?

The rush of making new, beautiful friends who adore the exact same obscure artist as you;

that spark of attraction on the dance floor;

the way the bass makes your shoulders shake in that certain way. . .

It's a special kind of glorious we revel in again and again because we feel the build up of that particular type of magik. For the serious Festie Lifer, that's a feeling worth any price.

Right?

Sometimes, the cost can be more than we bargain for, adding up far beyond early bird ticket price and gas money. . .

Maybe you know the feeling:

that ache that starts behind your eyes, the scratch at the back of your throat.

The ringing in your ears that doesn't stop like it should when the music does.

The rising fear in your gut when you realize you don't know where the f&%# your Buddies are.

The stiffness in your neck when you wake up on the ground covered in dust. Or mud. Or something worse. For the third night in a row.

And then you realize the line for the showers is three hours long and rustling in whispers about “running out of water” . . .

Ouch.

My name is Stirling. I've rocked out on speaker blocks and festival stages across three continents, and I've learned a lot along the way. I LOVE to have a good time, just like a lot of good friends of mine, and we've been doing so for years.

Woven throughout the rainbow tapestry of many years of Epic Fun Time Adventures are the fraying, faded threads of uncomfortable moments, scary situations, and utterly stupid mistakes. Mistakes bad enough that we all hope no one else has to make them. Ever. Again.

That's why I've decided to mine the depths of the treasure trove of trial and error that we've all learned and earned from.

And I am here now to pass this hard won knowledge on to you, so the next generation of Festie Besties can be ferociously whatever they want to be while staying safe and healthy.

3 Ultimate Festival Must Haves for Ladies (and Everyone Else)

EAR PLUGS

Because what is the point of going to a Music Festival if you’re not doing your best to be up at the front of the crowd, grinding against the Funktion-One laden speaker stack, feeling the bass vibrating your skeleton and completely melting your face off . . .

I mean, that is why you bought those tickets, right?

Right.

So let’s imagine that you also hope to be enjoying such symphonic masterpieces, or their equivalent, any particular number of years into the future…

Now let’s do some basic Math and add every sound based act you will see at every music event you will attend for the foreseeable future of your existence; multiply that by the total number of decibels driving against your eardrums with each heavy drop, and what have we got?

Serious hearing damage potential.

Ever wonder why those screechy, arcade squealing high end sounds are so annoyingly, ear piercing high on so many EDM (Electronic Dance Music) tracks?

It’s because the bass case who is dropping the track hasn’t been able to hear that octave since the late 1990’s, due to entirely blasting out their ear drums, and refilling that space in their cranium with scar tissue.

((If you do not wonder this often, you may have already scarred your hearing internals, and we’ll say this part a bit louder for your sake: SAVE WHAT’S LEFT))

Wear earplugs, mate, and give your Middle Aged self something to thank you for.

Seriously. They are small, fit in your pocket, and do not inhibit your ability to hear the music, or your friends conversation, while still providing your delicate hearing apparatus enough of a cushion that you'll be able to hear the whispers of your spent youth well into old-age.

Fair warning: earplug pairs have a high festival mortality rate (as in they can be easy to lose), so while you can go super epic scale and rock something like the Decibullz Custom Molded earplugs and they might just fit you well enough they won’t ever fall out, I would advise against the foam ones…

I’ve never managed to keep a pair of the cheap foam ones intact, and find that tiny waded up pieces of paper towel or napkin work better than the standard construction site foam bullet fair.

PEE FUNNEL

This one is for each of you who has felt the horrors of the deep chemical blue splash back on your unwitting ass in those fleeting first morning moments when the port-o’s have yet to unleash the stalactite poo monsters of Day Two…

For yee who have attempted and been traumatized by the free-form late-night pee-in-a-bottle turned tent drenching mission failure....

For she who has felt the twinge of jealousy as her male amigo turns away and lets loose the water works where he stands without baring his booty to the entire drunken campground world….

For those of you who born with (or recently acquiring) a Vagina, we offer you ….

The Pee Funnel!!! Claim it and aim it. Need we say more?

Though I am personally quite adept at peeing directly into wide mouth bottles (I'm sure you wanted to know that, now didn't you?), it is a skill hard earned through wetness and only necessary because I did not encounter the epic ingenuity that is the Pee Funnel until many years into my festival career. And back in those early days, they were mostly plastic cups JB welded to clear plastic hose. . .

But no longer! We have entered a new era, ladies, a glorious era of molded and modeled silicone in the color of your choice! As long as most of you choose pink. . .

ELECTROLYTE POWDER

When actively exposing oneself to extremes including, but not limited to;

the raw natural elements;
sleep deprivation;
intense physical exertion on the dance floor and the hikes between them;
all other things that make you sweat;
under-eating;
and dehydration;
as well as those potential extra-curricular substance activities that over-use the internal brain juices;
and all the other hyper glamorous activities that festival life entails. . .

It is SUPER IMPORTANT to be sure to stack your electrolyte intake.

This is one of those decisions that makes the difference between The Having Fun-Times, Migraines, and Literal Death.

(seriously, Hyponatremia can = DEATH, look it up)

We sweat out our sodium along with many other brain ingredients vital to a Balanced Blast Fest. Restock them often, and all will be well!

Dump a stack into your hydration pack, offer some to your Buddy System comrades (because you ARE using the Buddy System, RRRRIIIGGHHHTTT????!?), and carry extra in case you stumble across a wayward Festie Goer whose Thought Computer seems to be more on The Brain Drain than up to processing speed.

Electrolytes Save Lives.

The Most Important Thing for your health if you want to last all weekend (and beyond, into Mon-daily Life) is to consume mega amounts of fresh water and electrolytes.

I personally also want to live a long, healthy life, unencumbered by cancer, etc., so I make sure to avoid electrolyte powders (or anything, at all, ever) that is sweetened with Aspartame (aka Aspartic Acid) or Sodium Benzoate.

Seriously.

Just don’t eat that shit.

Which is why I think the fact that these Electrolyte Drink Tablets come in tablet form is rad, and convenient, especially if you believe that sharing is caring, like I do, because offering to pour obscure powders into your new friend’s drink might not be starting off on the right foot.

Depending on the friend.

If the white powder associations and assumptions don't bother you, check out these Electrolyte Replacement Capsules

Having a kick-ass amazing memory making time is important. And the best way to do that is by taking the necessary steps to stay safe, happy, healthy, and alive!