It’s hard describing in mere words what makes Bonnaroo the unique and beautiful experience for the mind, body, and soul that it is. Yes, in past years, it has been one of the only festivals where you can catch Sir Paul McCartney and immediately watch The XX afterwards or watch Pretty Lights hit the stage when the moon is out, and leave the stage when the sun up.
However, music only makes up one part of Bonnaroo, and while the festival’s repeatedly sublime line-ups are what bring in hundreds of thousands to the Manchester, TN farm in the second week of June every, true Bonnaroovians know that the music is only a small part of what makes this festival so great.
In short, Bonnaroo is dancing your butt off at 2 a.m. with thousands of happy, beautiful strangers, finding yourself underneath one of those rainbow gym parachutes from when you were a kid, meeting the Gingerbread man at 3 a.m., walking around in circles trying to find one of the stages/tents so confusingly named This/That/Other/Which/What and having a smile on your face the whole ordeal, 4 a.m.(if not later), walks back to your campsite, and waking up in time to do it all again the next day. Oh, and tons of high-fives.
Not even that paragraph does it justice, because the Bonnaroo experience cannot be translated into words. Pictures may help, but it’ll never be the same as just going. One part of Bonnaroo that I didn’t touch upon was the campsites. The campsites can be just as much of a party as the party inside Centeroo, but even when it’s not, there is still a certain beauty to it. This was the first year I brought my camera to the farm, and I’d like to share a very small part of my Bonnaroo 2015 experience with those experience the Roo-blues and those who still haven’t had their first experience.