Pukkelpop Forum Forum

to_be_simple · Organisator Geregistreerd op: 06 Nov 2010 Berichten: 315

Heb ik efkes geript van het oorpspronkelijke forum, Bartdude heeft dit gepost in English Board. Alleen beschikbaar in Engels, feel free to translate Razz

What about transport ?

Festival is located in Kiewiet, wich is a small town near Hasselt. There's a station in Kiewiet though, and from Brussels you won't have to step out and take another train.
During the festival (15-19/8 ), your festival ticket is like a return ticket between Hasselt-Kiewiet station and every other city in the country. So if you just go to the festival you won't need to buy any other train ticket. Don't forget to keep your ticket with you until you come back ! A festival wristband doesn't give you a free ride !
Kiewiet station is quite close to the festival (500m-1km).
If you come by plane and arrive at Zaventem (Brussels airport), you can take the train from there to brussels city and then to Hasselt.
More information about Timetables or prices on the Belgian railroad company website

Other thing : There are 3 main stations in Brussels (Brussels South, Brussels Central and Brussels North). Eurostar arrives in Brussels South, but trains from Airport arrive at North first.
Train to Hasselt-Kiewit "starts" from South, then passes central and North and then heads to Hasselt. My advice is to take the train at Brussels South and to avoid the crowd stepping in in Central or North.

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Is Hasselt nearby Kiewit ?

Hasselt is not too far, but if you plan to go make some shopping to Hasselt, you'd better take the bus. Busses are very easy to use in Hasselt and there's a bus stop really close to the festival site that brings you directly into Hasselt city. If you Want to walk, expect about 20min to get there.

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What about camping ?

Camping is located just in front of the festival site, on the other side of the road. It's accessible for anyone having a ticket (one day or combi-ticket)
The best time to arrive is...the sooner ! It's definitley better to arrive on 15th, and as close as possible from noon.
Anyway, camping (as the whole festival) is very well organized and filled from front to back, limitating free spots between the tents, and so permitting people arriving a bit late not to be condemned to place their tents "where they find place".
On the camping, you can't make fire (except camping gaz) and can't bring glass bottles.
There are chemical toilets (not always very clean), showers (opened 'til midnight), and several points where you can get water (drinking water).

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And if I don't want/like camping ?

I've picked up some links to hotel websites on this forum. Here are they :

-Radison SAS Hasselt
-Holiday Inn Hasselt
-A cheaper one (Unfortunately only in Dutch...)

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I also want to stay in a hotel in Brussels before/after Pukkelpop

Then check this link (Thx to Grimey for this)

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Are there shops nearby ?

There's no real shop close to the festival. There's a shop in the camping where you can buy milk, orange juice, snacks (snickers, twix,...), kellogs, or stuff like condoms or tampax.
People living in the neigborhood also sells things. You can get fresh drinks (beer, softs), hot drinks (coffee, tea, soup,...), cold food (sandwishes, snacks, ...), or hot food (spaghetti bolognese, eggs and bacon, hamburgers, ...) depending on wich "shop" you go. Prices are of course higher than in real shops, but
still much more cheaper than on the festival/camping site. You can expect to get 24 beer cans for 20/25 euro, and 1.5l fresh water for 1.5/2 euro. Meals such as spaghetti cost about 6/8 euro.

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Which food can I get on the festival, and how much does it cost ?

On the festival you can get classic festival food : hamburgers, hot dogs,fries, pizza, pasta's, sandwishes, fruits... There are also veggie (indian) shops. Some shops offers speciality too, like pancakes for example... or Poffertjes (try it !)
The prices are "normal" for a festival. expect 3 euro for a pack of fries or an hamburger or 4 euro for a part of pizza.
You'll have to buy food tickets before to buy food (there are drink tickets aswell). There are several ticket shops all over the festival site. My advice is to buy tickets when you see there's no waiting line and not to wait to be hungry or thirsty (cause there's a chance many people will be hungry at the same time...), that way you'll avoid wasting time.

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What about beer and other drinks ?

On the festival site, beer is Maes beer. You can also get soft drinks as Coke, Diet Coke, Fanta, Sprite or water.
To get drinks, as to get food, you'll have to buy tickets.
The price is quite normal for a festival. Based on the prices last year and the prices on other festivals this year, expect about 2 euro for 1 drink (25 cl).
Someone told me there's a tent with special Belgian Beers. It seems to be located on the right of the skate stage... well you'll see Wink

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And what about Drugs ?

As I speak of personnal experience, I can only speak about weed. In Belgium, weed is forbidden (altough the different drug policies are really not clear!), but as long as you don't smoke too evidently in the streets (and even if it's not really a problem to do it), you'll probably won't be bothered.
On the festival site, there a a lot of people smoking, and there's no problem to enter festival site with weed, they don't search for that.
Coming from abroad, you maybe don't want to take weed with you. Buying on the camping is not impossible, but may ask a bit of patience and perseverance. You can expect to find weed at about 5-6 euro/gram, but the quality can be very variable.
The best way to get some good pot is surely to buy it in Holland, but it presents some risks when coming back to Belgium, especially with the train.
If you really want to anyway, the best place is then Maastricht, you can reach by two ways :

-Train : Hasselt => Liege => Maastricht. I did it once from Pukkelpop, it took me about 5 hours because of bad synchonized schedules (had to wait 40 minutes each time I change trains). Check this out before, cause schedules have changed recently...

-Bus : There is a bus from Hasselt city to Maastricht (line 20A). It takes about 1hr to get there. (info was right in 2006, confirmation it's still right would be appreciated)

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Can I bring my own drinks on the festival site ?

[2006 INFO]Official website has been updated. You can only bring small and unopened drink bricks (if you see waht I mean) into the festival site. By "small", I suppose they want to say 25cl ones.
Hiding other container into a backpack is not so easy as they search almost every bag to avoid it. Anyway, if you feel lucky, you can try, you only risk to loose your drink.[/2006 INFO]

This year, the site simply doesn't precise that bricks are forbidden, so I presume it's OK with that. It seems to be the only drink packaging allowed on the festival site.

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They say cameras are forbidden. What about it ?

There's no real problem with cameras, as long as it's not professional ones. A disposable camera or a compact (digital) camera won't be a problem.
I think the mention on the site and tickets is there only for legal reasons.

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How is the weather usually?

Weather is more likely to be hot (Hasselt neigbourhood is known as the hottest location in Belgium), but you never know. Weather in Belgium is quite unpredictable. I've known Pukkelpop under a burning sun (35° C) and under a soaking rain. When it's hot, you can't really do anything about that except searching for shade (there's a lot of shady places where you can chill out). Evenings/Nights can be quite cold though, so don't forget some sweatshirt.
If it's raining, my advice is to place a plastic beetween the ground and your tent when you set it up. Otherwise, as it rains, there's a lot of water coming up from the ground and your tent can quickly turn into a boat. I've known several evacuations of a part of the campers over the 10 last years, and as I had been cautious setting up my tent I had no problem.

You can get weather forecast here (click)

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Question from Diego (2006 Forum) : "We were wondering whether our tickets are valid for this public transport as the ticket doesn't show any note of validity...
Because on Pukkelpop.be is written that this have to be mentioned on it.
On our tickets, which are from Kartenhaus is nothing of this."[...]"We asked the organisation and they told us, if there is no note of the validity in trains, then this wouldn't work but they added, that they can't be sure and so on..
I think that there will be so much people in the trains on the 16th that, if this is not right, they would barely notice..right?"

I think it's not gonna be a problem. Even if you got some problems, there will still be people in the train going to Pukkelpop and speaking English & Dutch to explain the situation.

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I speak neither Dutch nor French, is it going to be a problem ?

There shouldn't be any problem with English. Not anybody speaks it, but quite a lot people though, especially in Flanders, and even more especially in a Festival. So don't worry, you won't be obliged to speak hand-language every day Wink

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Other tips

- Before entering the camping, you MUST change your ticket to a wristband. You can do that at festival entrance, but NOT at camping entrance. So don't begin to wait at camping entrance if you don't have your wristband. You can't take the wristbands for all your group neither : everyone has to get his own wristband.
- people @ pukkelpop keep screaming "Hoeren" all the day long. It sounds kinda like "Hooray" and means "bitches" in Dutch. There a several stories about the origin of that, but anyway, don't be affraid, it's totally normal ! Don't hesitate to scream up yourself !
- for those who can't support chemical toilets, there are 2 possibilities : 1° 200 m away of the camping is there a small town, a coffee and in there, real toilets. You can use it for 0.50 euro I think 2° on the way between camping and station there's always a man (for many years now) who rents toilets and let you use it by paying 0.50 cents too.
- You can enter and exit Festival Site and camping as much as you want. Be carefull tough that (if I remember well) no festival exit is possible during a few hours after gates opening, each day. It should be indicated.
- there's no better timetable that the one you can find on the site... print it ! The few timetables you can find on the festivalsite are not that good.
- on the festival site, keep an eye on the lightboards (?) , they indicates changes in the program.