Sziget Music Festival will kick off in 11 days and as I am utterly excited about the week full of music, art and nice people from literally all around the world, I decided to make a tour of the island to see how are the preparations going. As this question was endlessly popping up in my head: “How does the island look like before Sziget?”
Weather report for Sziget
I visited the Hajógyári (Óbudai) island, which is the Sziget festival location since the first edition in 1993 on Saturday 25th July 2015. The weather was not really in favor of the best ever photography, so please excuse the quality. The good news is that the weather forecast for the festival duration is promising temperatures ranging from 25 – 34 degrees with a thunderstorm on Friday (Aug 14). So do not forget to pack your sunscreen, stylish hats, sunglasses and swimming suits. It looks like we will need them!
Festival venue before Sziget
I always visited the Island of Freedom only as a pedestrian, so this has been my premiere o drive to the island. You could say from the amount of metal fences surrounding the inner festival premises that the works to prepare everything have already started. The festival countdown at that day was 16 days!
When Sziget starts, there would not be so many fences. For the time being, they are used to protect the preparations and they are already guarded by security. Once the festival kicks off, the island would be entirely dedicated to it.
It seems that the very first thing that has been placed were the ToiToi toilets and various containers, which I believe would be the FestiPay top-up points. Thanks to their positioning, I was able to locate myself on the map of the festival as believe me, it just looks different than when you are there and the festival is in its full beauty.
And here are the pictures of the festival venue before Sziget with descriptions:
This is the road leading to the bridge across the Danube river that is notoriously known as the access road to the Sziget festival
There used to be a VIP entrance on the left (accessible with Mastercard Paypass card too!!) to access Sziget in 2014
The bridge that gets you to the festival. Although now the traffic light indicates red, it is always green during Sziget, as it turns into a pedestrian zone
The bridge contruction is every year bearing Sziget signs and greetings in multiple languages. Guess, this is not something that would be put up so early before Sziget
No sign so far that in 16 days, there will be the biggest cultural event of Central and Eastern Europe taking place
I really love this bridge, the construction just reminds me that there are good things awaiting me when I enter the Sziget festival
This is one of the roads where you can during the festival get a taxi to the city of Budapest, if you go to the left, the real festival starts
The whole inner island area is fenced now, the white sign on the pole is indicating, where is the public transport bus stop. Do not get mistaken, the bus does not run during the festival (how cool would that be).
We are not the only ones driving on the island. Guess, before Sziget tourism is very popular or these are the festival builders
First signs that there is something happening. Such a big festival needs a lot of tubes, metal and other construction pieces. So far it all looks like a dismantled Czech game Merkur
These are the different pieces of construction that one day would be a stage (I assume)
Turning to the left and getting to the heart of the Sziget island
This is where the Apero camping (the French campsite) will be one day – at least I hope that I depicted it well based on the map
Here we go to the main festival road connecting the north and the south of the Sziget festival. This road to my memory is endless and very crowded. Now, we are kind of alone here – it is just before Sziget, I know…
This little container has been alongside with many of its brothers placed as one of the first things on the island
The main festival road before Sziget is wet and empty
The second thing is the mobile toilets – allocation to correct spot is work in progress
Very bad picture – my apologies – but this is the moment, when we met a truck!
I am not sure what happens to all those caravans, but this is probably where the Caravan Camping at Sziget is located. You can see more containers on the left
Before Sziget tourism – we were not the only ones taking a glance at the preparations
I have the feeling that the trees on the main road are much higher than last year. Anyway, this road will still serve cars even during the festival
Already last year, I was wondering, when will the construction of this building be finished. The answer is, not yet. It also seems it burned down a bit on the side
I am not able to recall what was the purpose of this building during Sziget 2014. Any better memories? Tell me in the comments
More toilets at the back and a car approaching on the main road of the Sziget island
This was the woow moment when I realized that this will be the main stage. Soon
More toilets, this time it is the real flushing ones. I believe they will be well tested by the festival builders before Sziget starts 🙂
This container looks a bit lonely. Not for a long time
Another look on something that would soon be a main stage of Sziget festival
Close look at what constitutes a main stage. Nice Budapest hills make up the scenery at the back
This looks almost idylic. Sorry for taking so many toilet pictures, but there was not much else to make a picture of
There are new stones on the access road, where soon will be thousands of people dancing and having fun! Bring it on, Sziget!
If you are able to identify a bit more about the location of these pictures, feel free to comment under the post. If you are coming to the festival and do not have the ticket yet (or I just persuaded you with those blurry pics that it is worth it), make sure to buy them before midnight of July 31 as they are still cheaper!
I am planning to cover the whole festival with my blog posts and interesting facts, so follow me either on Facebook or on Instagram, if you do not want to miss out any line that I will write about the festival. I am also planning to post more related articles including the Ultimate Sziget 2015 guide before Sziget starts, so keep tuned and btw thanks for sharing!
[author] [author_image timthumb=’on’]http://i59.tinypic.com/mtxvr4.jpg[/author_image] [author_info]Katechka is a freelancer, blogger, cat lover, debater and huge Sziget fan. In her life, she has been to more than 20 music festivals and since she lives now in Hungary, she decided to cover the Sziget festival 2015.[/author_info] [/author]
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[…] I was surprised that building Sziget festival is going so fast! Compare with my previous post Before Sziget to see how the works […]