Dear mummy, we’ve just been to one of the hottest family festivals on the south coast. It’s called Funk The Family and is held at Hove Park in Brighton. We’ve been a couple of times before but this one was by far the hottest ever – in every sense of the word. We’ve managed to cram the festival into a quick 3 minute video, so in order to get a real feel for Funk the Family watch it below 🙂

The site looked beautiful in the bright sunshine, all the festival flags glistened and people’s faces sparkled. My mummy made an effort to get into the festival spirit too by adoring her face with glitter and paint.

People around the site had dressed up as mythical creatures which was this years theme. However it was a bit too hot for unicorn onesies. I’m sure if it had been cooler we would have seen a lot more people wearing costumes. Instead festival goers wore headdresses and wings, tutus and wigs.

After being stuck in an air-conditioned car for nearly 2 hours due to traffic, it seemed that everyone was heading to Brighton to enjoy the heat wave, when we disembarked from the car we were hit by a wall of heat. You know that feeling when you get off a plane in a hot country? That. My mummy’s make-up was going to melt but we were determined to have a good time, even though only mad dogs and Englishmen would be out in the midday sun.

The bag searches took a little longer than pervious years due to the sad events that the UK has been experiencing these past couple of months but thankfully all festival goers had checked the weather reports and festival updates and had brought plenty of water, sunscreen and shades.

As we were running late we headed to the Story Tent to see my hero Abie Longstaff, author of my favourite Kitty Lacey books. I was also treated to the last book in her series to complete my collection and had it signed by the author herself, something that I will cherish.

Outside the tents Chinese dragons, unicorns on stilts paraded around the site. We went in search for shade but unfortunately everyone had the same idea and hid from the sun under the tree line perimeter of the site, which meant that they weren’t in the large grassy area in from the main stage have picnics like last year. There were another couple of ornings dotted around the site, but the circus tent (Cirque Du Funk) was boiling and unfortunately too hot to sit in for any amount of time, so we didn’t watch any circus shows this year sadly. However we had great fun watching kids at the Circus Project learn tricks.

Thankfully, my mummy had the foresight to bring a UV tent for the family which meant we could all sit together in the shade and see the main stage. As it was Father’s Day we even left daddy dozing underneath it while sweet waves of music flooded the site. We headed to the bar area and there was plenty of tap water handed out to make sure everyone was hydrated. The toilets were clean and we never had to queue as there was so many of them dotted around the site which was good. The site also appeared litter-free but I think that was mainly due to festival goers being responsible and taking their litter home with them.

Occasionally the odd street performer and parade would pass by our tent and we would chase after them and watch the dancing. The colours of the costumes were vivid in the sunshine and nearly as bright as the smiles. Even though it was so hot the cheer on people’s faces never thundered. At lunchtime we enjoyed a stone baked pizza from one of the many street food vendors and ice-cold drinks. The queues weren’t as long as expected so thankfully my daddy didn’t build up too much of a sweat being hunter gatherer. It was a shame you couldn’t bring a picnic in, as some of the food was quite expensive, however we were glad to see some fruit was on offer.

Mid afternoon we found shade over by the baby area (Hartbeeps Music Sensory) and headed to the Amazing Art Cart where I enjoyed eating my fresh watermelon and making a paper crown. I also made a keepsake from the festival which you can see on our video of the day.

We wandered back to our UV tent past the multitude of food outlets and fashion stalls, my mummy even treated herself to a new top from The Little Bohemians, which is a company that upcycles and gives clothes a new least of life by embellishing them with festival fringing and pom poms.

The most popular stand had to be the balloon man who always seemed to have people queuing for inflatable animals. He did a stirling job making children smile and handing out balloons. I picked up a Giraffe, who after a week is still going strong!

The atmosphere was magical and everyone seemed to be having a good time and letting their hair down. Adults and children were dancing barefoot on the grass and kids were taking advantage of the free hula hoop lessons and circus performance tricks and acrobatics.

We wandered over to an old-fashioned caravan to have our silly photos taken at Lucy’s Vintage Caravan Photo Booth and I was let loose in the massive dressing up box, my mummy and I had great fun striking a pose for pictures for the fridge.

I enjoyed candy floss from Candy Queens and participated in children’s yoga at the Tree of Life Yoga area which was very relaxing. We ducked inside the Big Beach Tropicana tent for a quick boogie during Baby Loves Disco which was a combination of soft play and a kids disco, they even had a mummies dance-off and competitions which was hilarious.

But the main highlight for us was the afternoon music at Funk the Family. It was epic this year and we really enjoyed listening to Jazzie B from Soul 2 Soul spin the decks while we sheltered under our UV canopy. The House Gospel Choir stole the show however with a standup performance which had everyone running down to the main stage and dance around.

Overall it was another great event from the Funk the Family team, which seem to be going from strength to strength each year regardless of what the weather throws at them. We had fun reporting live from the event and playing around with Instastories. We can’t wait to continue on our festival journey this summer so keep your eyes peeled on our instagram to see where we are heading next!

Love Bella x

Disclaimer: We were invited down to Funk the Family in order to conduct our review. All photos and opinions are our own.

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