Glastonbury 2011

Everything from decadent performance art to corporate headline acts was up for grabs and the weather was as diverse as the line-up.

Eager early arrivals waited in four-hour-long queues two days before kick-off as sporadic rain storms dampened excited spirits fearing a weekend away in a swamp.

Yet in true English tradition, the downpours turned into an almost unbearable heat wave come Sunday and that raised a few complaints.

In Glastonbury's case complaining is something reserved for the weather alone since there is no contender globally that comes anywhere near bettering the feel-good experience, with friendly smiles and hellos from random passers-by despite all and sundry looking and smelling like Stig of the Dump.

Even Denmark's Roskilde festival, which like Glasto pulls in acts of the calibre of Prince, is much smaller in scale and concept with fewer non-music events and too many guitar-based acts.

Glastonbury certainly felt more crowded this year, despite the mud's most obvious drawback of preventing anyone from sitting down.

With clashes galore it was an occasional challenge getting from A to B and seizing a decent enough vantage point for some of the more sought-after acts, although a spot on top of the furthermost hill for Paul Simon in Sunday's sun was memorable in itself.

Politics seems to be returning to the festival with a vengeance.

Art Uncut protesters gate-crashed U2's set with a 20- foot inflatable with the words "U pay your tax 2?" daubed on its side in reference to a decision to move the band's headquarters to Holland where there is a minimal tax on royalties.

Caroline Lucas and Tony Benn also attended to give eloquent awareness talks and War on Want was a big presence with ads projected on the main stage big screens between acts carrying powerful messages supporting the Palestine struggle and workers' rights.

When all else fails then wandering aimlessly about always succeeds.

It's all very well for the mainstream media to bang on - correctly -about how great Beyonce was but where would Glastonbury be without the thousands of artists who reconfigure some of Worthy Farm's most discreet and distant fields into interactive theme parks of the pre-apocalyptic, post-apocalyptic and just plain apocalyptic kind?

The Shangri La field remains the most popular, with its year-on-year rolling story line based on a futuristic dystopia theme kitted out like a junkyard, with Blade Runner inspired alleys to wander through.

There's also the Block 9 field, dominated by an utterly jaw-dropping 50ft crumbling council block converted into a nightclub, with a life-sized London tube train smashing through a third-floor window.

The midnight show in the Arcadia field feels like an open-air arena with a gigantic mechanical spider in its centre.

At the witching hour, there's a 60-minute performance with pyrotechnics firing from the robotic arachnid's legs, a beacon at its head firing Tesla coils, tightrope walkers, a Victorian-dressed lady playing a violin and trapeze artists.

Hugely entertaining for those lucky enough to stumble across it.

Just before you think it can't get any better engines are revved and the headlights of two monster trucks snap on from behind the crowd, driven by steampunk burlesque dancers firing flame throwers to an instrumental version of The Prodigy's Invaders Must Die.

Security frantically bore a gap in the audience wide enough for the trucks mounted with cannon to plough right through the middle, threatening to crush anyone who dared to stay in their way.

And there's a plethora of other themed fields filled with stylised bars, cabaret entertainers and clubs to literally keep you entertained all night long.

By day there's plenty to keep busy.

There's face painting and a kids field for families with young children, comedy from acts as funny and surreal as Kevin Eldon and Buddhist meditation - the latter very in tune with the Glastonbury spirit.

Next year festival lovers will be forced to compromise with something lesser in ambition.

A bit of a downer that, as is returning home and there's not a cheery hello or a Stig of the Dump to be found.

Shame.