“Hello festival.” You will be able to say that greeting very often this weekend. Not least against the Hello Festival.
What started as Back to the 80’s in a local disco, grew into Retropop in the open air and now goes through life as Hello Festival† Saturday 11 June is the day. Only one day this year. But there is an extra podium: four in total. Europe, Dolly Dots, OMD, Al Mckay’s Earth Wind and Fire Experience and Bökkers, among others, will perform, as will Q-Music het Foute uur Live. As of today, the Hello Festival camping site is already open.
We chug in the iconic Volkswagen bus from the Grote Rietplas near Emmen to another festival on the Drenthe agenda for this weekend. Partying at the Hello Festival has made us want to take a refreshing dip. We do this in the city canals of Meppel. It’s there all weekend long canal festival Place. All old boats in the canals, plenty of music in the city and on the water and the Royal Netherlands Navy is coming with ships and a Road Show with an experience container. The City Swim is on Sunday 12 June, a swimming competition of about 1400 meters through the canals. New this year is the City Sup, on a supboard through the canals.
We leave the Volkswagen bus for what it is and leave the canals behind us. We board a Delorean, on our way to our next event. We have to go back in time for a day. We go back to Saturday 11 June. To the Omloop in Beilen. For the Vrij Uit Festival† This festival was actually already on the agenda for 2020, in the context of the cultural municipality. Now two years later, it is still celebrated with a lot of music, dance and other cultural expressions. For example, several choirs, orchestras and musicians from the region perform. There is Beilen aan Zee all day long.
So we end up at the water again. Before the next stopover we really want to keep our feet dry. It Two Turven High Festival so it seems to us. We grab the road map and arrive at Facet, the library in Emmen. Held for the first time in 2019, on Saturday 11 June it’s time for the second edition of this festival for babies, toddlers and preschoolers. There are various workshops, theater performances and information stalls in and around the Emmen center location.
After enjoying ourselves with Zip and Pip’s performance, we board a luxury coach. We put our feet up and rest to the maximum. We are on our way to Hoogeveen, for the Cascaderun† On Sunday 12 June, Hoogeveen will be flooded with runners. There are different distances and parts: the 5 miles (8.05 kilometers) and the 10 miles, children from almost all primary schools in Hoogeveen participate in the Unicefloop and there is also the GigaG Cascaderun for people with disabilities.
Completely exhausted and hallucinating from our exertion, we stroll back into the bus. That takes us to Annen. On Saturday 11 June and Sunday 12 June there it is Vocal Festival Annen† We get off the bus and immediately get on another bus. Part of the Vocal Festival is the Festival on Tour, on Sunday. You can then take a tour through the landscape of Aa en Hunze in a historic bus, while that bus drives past performances in special places. There are also workshops and many performances during the two-day festival.
Still recovering a bit from the Cascaderun, we’re off to the next event. We’ll keep taking it easy for a while and spot the Woolly Country Life Fair Geldings on agenda. On Saturday 11 June there will be a fair for people with a passion for wool on the Ruinen event site. You can taste wool – we don’t know if we should take that literally – smell and feel, and get advice about wool. If you really want to taste a bite of wool, we advise you to use one of the food trucks on the site.
Chewing on a piece of wool, we prepare for another sporting event this weekend. We are bleating towards Eelde for the Lemferdinge Open Minigolf Championship, the annual miniature golf tournament near Paterswolde. You can participate on Sunday 12 June both individually and as a team.
We hit our ball a little too hard and run after him. We end up all the way in Assen. We think it’s better to just stop hitting and move on to throwing. Throughout the weekend, the Dutch Open Darts place, in the De Bonte Wever. The final is on Sunday 12 June. The right time for us to end this grueling festival weekend. We cheer with the winner.