Drugged-up pond life spoilt V

Imagine my delight to be invited along with my wife to the festival by my 20-year-old son. Who says kids don't want to associate with their parents on the social scene? Not us, we thought - pretty cool, liberal minded, game for a laugh, that's us.

Well, how wrong can you be? Fortunately we live within walking distance of Weston Park. Feeling pretty smug, we nipped over, only to find ourselves at the wrong end of the park.

A brisk three-mile hike followed through a morass of festival goers weighted down like a line of refugees from a war zone. They had tents, rucksacks, bags of all sizes; someone was pushing an armchair.

The common component appeared to be beer - cans and cans and cans of the stuff. On shoulders, on stretchers and wheelbarrows.

As the day and the relentless rain progressed, I can honestly say I have never seen so many young people so blasted in all my life. It wasn't just the beer I saw. Drugs were being smoked, snorted, dealt out and randomly offered for open sale.

Now, sorry to be a square but I fail to see the enjoyment of getting so out of your head you can't control either your legs, your mouth or your bodily functions. I saw numerous people lying in their own private oblivion in the mud and the rain while everyone else laughed and stepped over them.

After witnessing the odd sporadic fight, men and more regretfully women relieving themselves in full view of anyone who happened to be passing, and the shock of being mugged by a vendor for £10 for two third-rate burgers, we joined the throng to check out the band on the main stage.

And then it started. Paper cups full of urine began arcing across the crowd every minute or so. It was then that we realised we weren't so hip after all and beat a retreat. And my son, well he loved it; just ignore the pond life, he advised.

To be fair there were tens of thousands of true live music fans there having a ball and the bands we chose to see were great. There were, however, several thousand idiots.

David Breakwell, Weston Under Lizard, Shropshire.