If an alien spaceship happened to be orbiting the earth and passing over the southern half of England on a certain July weekend, they may be somewhat perplexed as to the bizarre gathering of vehicles and their owners at Santa Pod Raceway in Northampton. In fact any human let alone alien life form would find this meeting of car enthusiasts strange. Why should it be that twenty thousand owners of VW manufactured vehicles would want to gather in one spot at one time? Well there is only one way to find out, and that is to go.

Upon arrival at Santa Pod at 9:00am on Friday morning the entry que was all ready half a mile down the road, suggesting that this year was going to be a busy one.

The first thing you notice while winding your way slowly along in the que towards the main gate is the various little puddles of oil and water that litter the tarmac with increasing regularity. Like a trail of breadcrumbs that culminate in the scene of a vehicle at the side of the road with it's oil clad owner and an engine in a million bits spread out on the grass verge. As you slowly pass by the vague sense of guilt grips and you almost want to turn around and go and help the poor sole by the roadside. Your guilt quickly evaporates as you realise that there are half a dozen vehicles in the same situation all along the road, and you couldn't possibly help them all. It's only ten passed nine and the sun is already so hot that it's getting increasingly difficult to hang onto the red hot steering wheel.

Then begins another unusual trait of the Bug Jam weekend. One of my fellow passengers decides that it is rather hot and cracks open a can of beer. Closely followed by the second of my passengers. Now in any other place, at 9:10am on a Friday morning, given the choice between a bottle of cold water and a can of warm sun heated beer, you would immediately dismissed the beer, as firstly it's warm and secondly there is no way you are going to start drinking at this time of the morning. However, in the parallel universe that is Bug Jam in it's twentieth year, you don't even consider the water and start necking cans of beer before the sun gets a chance to heat them up any more.

Now approaching the main gate with tickets ready, you spy the dreaded search teams and glass bottle hunters. Groups of men dressed in florescent security jackets who's soul purpose is to find your secretly stashed bottle of Jack Daniels you've got stored in a custom made metal casket, camouflaged and welded to the back axle. There's no way they'll spot it there, and despite your newly developed thirst for alcohol at 9:00am on a Friday morning, there is no way on god's earth that you've got the stomach to neck a 1.5 litre bottle of Jack Daniels while sitting on the gate, rather than pouring it away.

Making it through the check point with your contraband safe, you edge your way across the site toward 'Club Camping'. Another check point looms. "We're in Camping field B" I say to the guard. The emphatic reply comes back, "That means Fuck All! Don't take any notice of that, it's all bollocks. What club are you with?"
I'm playing an old black and white war movie in my head, where the British good guys are trying to escape through German lines. "Papers please…!"



Once through the Gestapo lines we found our way to our club camping plot right next to one of the dance tents. Mmmm…. No need to drain the battery in the van listening to the stereo over the weekend, not that we would be able to hear it being right next to the dance tent. Out comes the club tent, gazebo, assorted chairs, bar BQ's and other contraptions, and we set about putting up the club tent. This proved amusing as the ground was so hard, that trying to get a peg in the ground was like trying to push a turd through a colander, while at the same time avoiding the Grand Canyon sized cracks that riddle the ground. After an hour or so of what amounted to erecting tents on concrete, we sat back with yet more beer and fired up the Bar B Q. Another quirk of the Bug Jam experience it the undeniable fact that everything you eat must be incinerated on a bar B Q. Preferably cooked to the consistency of charcoal on the outside and raw on the inside. In the normal world, this would be a recipe for a definite bout of food poisoning, but in the parallel universe that is Bug Jam, the amount of alcohol consumed over the weekend is enough to kill an elephant let alone a little stomach bug.



So with your factor 100 sun cream (emulsion) slapped in more places than you knew you had places, you venture out around the site to soak up the atmosphere and view the many weird and wonderful vehicles that fill the entire place to the rafters and blast up and down the drag strip all day long. Watching the amazing power of the VW's on the drag strip between bouts of browsing the many trade stands throughout the afternoon and consuming more ice creams, milkshakes and cans of beer than is otherwise advised, there is a realisation that you are not going to get a shower for three days and you develop a close relationship with a packet of baby wipes.

Friday night comes with the blessed break from the burning sun and the entertainment passes in an alcoholic haze, before your body tells you enough is enough and your bed is calling.
Being rudely awakened in the morning by the sauna that you are now sleeping in, due to the rise of the sun, it 5:30am and your bladder is about to explode. Being hung over and venturing into a portaloo that has been frequented by several thousand drunk people the previous night must be what the Americans use as torture at Guantanamo Bay. The only thing missing is the orange jump suits.
After cooking breakfast on yet another bar B Q which consisted of sausages, burgers and fried egg, (Yes you can cook fried egg on a bar B Q, with the aid of the bottom cut off of one of the previous night's beer cans and the egg cracked into it and placed on the bar B Q.) we lazed about in the sun before watching some more drag racing. Then at about 2:00pm in the afternoon the finger of God struck the microclimate that is Santa Pod Raceway. Like some biblical scene the sky became as black as sat cloth and there came a great flood. The ark (in this case one of the giant marquee's) took in refugees two by two to shelter from the storm. The fair weather and concrete like ground of the previous day had encouraged many to tie down their tents and gazebos with as much effort as you would put into knitting a duffle coat in the Bahamas. Thus after an hour the site was scattered with folded ripped and broken tent and all manner of shelters reminiscent of an earthquake disaster scene. But the Bug Jam spirit prevailed and within an hour the sun had return to dry the 20 thousand sleeping bags, tents, and clothes that now hung from anything that was more than an inch off the ground, and another round of Bar B Q's and alcohol consumption resumed as we were treated to a great sunset.



The Saturday evenings entertainment was a strange mix of banging dance, 80's cheese, interspersed with the odd power cut here and there. The dance tent finally silenced at about 1:00am signalled the chance to sleep, with was then rudely interrupted ten minutes later by someone blasting their car stereo till about 4:00am.

Sunday morning revealed a whole host of show cars, from buses and beetles to Porsches and even a Schwimmer. An excellent display of some great cars and many vehicles debuting for the first time. It never ceases to amaze how many hours and how much effort people put into their vehicles. Amazing tricks of mechanics and blinding paintwork filled the main arena for the masses to druel over.
As the afternoon progressed the masses began to leave the site, or rather attempt to leave the site by sitting in their cars in a que of traffic that doesn't move for six hours. Being Bug Jam veterans we don't even bother packing up our tents and junk until at least 5:30pm, instead favouring flying kites, talking crap and lying in the sun until the que disappears and we can just drive straight out.

Another year comes to a close and we head home in need of a sheep dip. Why do we do it? Because we can..! Keep on dubbing..