Muddy good time as Britain's Glastonbury Festival begins

0 Comments | AFP, June, 2007

GLASTONBURY, England (AFP) — The Glastonbury rock and pop festival kicked off Friday with Arctic Monkeys and Bjork headlining as heavy rain transformed the vast countryside venue into a mud bog.

Earth's largest greenfield music and performing arts festival is back and bigger than ever after taking a break in 2006, with 177,500 people packing out Worthy Farm in southwest England to catch some of the world's hottest acts.

But the 800 acres (320 hectares) of rolling Somerset countryside quickly descended into a mudfest as repeated heavy showers soaked the giant tent city.

Men in skinny jeans and shades and women in rubber boots and hotpants trudged around the site spattered with mud.

One man pushed his two sleeping children around in a wheelbarrow while...