This blog is the first of a few of its kind where I cover separate weekend trip as I use my proximity to Europe to get out and about and make the most of my weekends. After realising that it was so easy to get to Europe, it started a spell of me jetting off to various corners of the continent to see friends, new places and have new experiences. After my previous two trips, I was well and truly infected with the travel bug! This first weekend’s main aim was to head to my first edition of Reverze in Antwerp. What is Reverze you may ask? It is the biggest Belgium based indoor festival, spanning across two arenas in Antwerp. 11 hours of hard dance music at the Sportpaleis Antwerp, what a way to spend your weekend!
Travel There
The first thing to do though is to get there. My method of choice was to use the cheapest of options which was to take a coach with Megabus though this meant having to travel overnight to Antwerp from London Victoria coach station. This seemed like a great idea initially until I realised that it was mainly a party bus for people moving on to Amsterdam, I would have to wake up to get off the coach when it came to the ferry crossing and finally, and probably the biggest issue was having to make sure that I was awake for my arrival at 06:40 in Antwerp. Suddenly this didn’t seem like such a great idea but I guess that’s what you get for taking the cheaper options.
After a series of panicked wake ups just as the coach was leaving certain stops along the way, I decided to stay awake between Gent and Antwerp before we finally arrived. It was just my luck that I was the only that was getting off and I was sat back right of all these sleeping people, knowing full well that they were all now hating me eternally as I “excuse me”, “pardon me” and “mind my your leg” my way down the aisle. The coach driver handed me my bag and to be honest, I had not the foggiest where I was. I’d been dumped in the middle of a bridge over the top of a motorway with nothing to indicate where I was! Brilliant… and to top it all off, the plugs on the coach didn’t work so not I had minimal battery and having to pay extortionate rates for data to find myself to the hostel I was in.
Travel Tip: If you’re going to a foreign nation and aren’t able to access mobile data, it would be advisable to not do what I did and rely on my phone to find my way. I should have done my research on where I was being dropped off and how to get to my next place. If anything, I could have taken an old fashioned map! Along with that, if you are relying on a mobile devise, it’s not advisable to allow the battery drain without a means of charging it!
So after I had paid for my extremely expensive data and rationed it along with my battery, I found a way to the hostel I was staying at, which of course was on the other side of the city! The only thing that was working in my favour was that the Reverze ticket that I had bought included free public transport for the weekend, very useful!
This weekend was one of being “very smooth” and they do say bad luck comes in threes. Well, I had lost count of the bad luck I was having! Now, some say it was bad planning but me? I’m going with bad luck… I got across to the hostel to find that the reception was closed for around an hour so found refuge in the nearest Starbucks, grabbing myself breakfast and went to charge my phone. Which was when I realised that I didn’t have an EU adapter for my British plug. There’s a term that’s reserved for people like me: Idiot!
Travel Tip: It may seem like an obvious thing to do but when creating your list to pack, ensure that you have everything that you need to go to the nation you’re heading to stop yourself from having an issues once you get there. With the reliance we have on our smartphones these days, you need to take into account the ability to plug things in.
Once breakfast had been consumed and the reception to the hostel had opened, I headed to there so that I could check in. Now, you may be thinking as to how I was able to check-in in the morning? Well, that would be down to booking the hostel for the Friday and Saturday even though I wasn’t able to use it on the Friday or else I would have been without somewhere to leave my stuff until 1400. It turns out I am half decent at preparing. Anyway, you must be wondering where I was staying so here’s your answer…
The ASH Hostel: Review
Located only a 5 minute walk from Antwerp’s central station, the ASH hostel provides a perfect place to go out and explore the city of Antwerp. This is aided by either the map that you are able to take from the reception that highlights all the landmarks of the city or the free walking tours that are given daily.
As for the facilities that the hostel had on offer, the rooms were a tidy layout with a simple and bright white decor, aided by the natural light on offer from the large windows. Providing lockers to store your valuables and a nice and clean ensuite bathroom, the rooms at the ASH hostel has everything you need for a comfortable stay. As for the beds, they were comfortable and sturdy, in a bunk bed set up for the 6 person mixed dorm that I was staying in. The rooms come in 2, 3, 4, 6 and 18 bedded dorms, either mixed or 4 bed female only.
Moving downstairs, there were plenty of amenities to make your stay as comfortable as possible and fulfilling all your personal care needs. There’s a large open kitchen with ample lockable storage space and all your kitchen needs from the utilities provided. As for other utilities that are supplied, there’s full laundry area and racks to lock your bike away, should that be your method of transport around the city.
If you’re wanting downtime here and being social, you have the option of a games area, a large social common allowing plenty of space to meet those that you are sharing the place with or the choice of heading out into the large garden to get a breath of fresh air. The perfect location to sit with a coffee and have a chat. If it’s a more quiet place that you’re needing, the hostel has its own library running on a one for one basis and study area. This is due to there being the possibility of more long term stays should you be studying here.
Prices for a stay here start at €23 for the 18 bed dorms, rising to €55 for a private room. Would I suggest a stay here? Most definitely!
Antwerp
How did I entertain myself then during the Saturday on my own in the the city of Antwerp? First thing was to grab a nap and ensure that my energy levels were up again. Once that was completed, I grabbed a map from the hostel that I was at and decided to take a day long tour of my own of the places that were marked up as the things to see on the hostel map. Fortunately the weather was favourable for this with blue skies, the odd cloud and bright sunshine, painting Antwerp in a lovely winter glow. This allowed me to slowly go around and tick off the places that I had marked up, I was taking a picture or three of them and admiring the architecture of the buildings, taking in the minor details that you only notice when you sit and take these places in. The only downside to this method was that I didn’t really hear about the history of the places.
Travel Lesson: During this point in my life, my travelling experience was small and I was still in the process of finding what I enjoyed when I went away and travelled. Yes, I enjoyed seeing the landmarks and sights of the city that I’m in but I didn’t feel as fulfilled as I thought I would do. It’s all well and good seeing the places however for me, I later found out that learning about the places I was seeing gave me a much more satisfactory experience.
Being in Europe, I forgot about the varied culture when it comes to the presence of the Red Light District areas of the cities, which led me to an… eye opening experience to say the least! I was following the map I had with its direct route to my next stop, whilst texting a friend back in the UK, I didn’t realise the street that I had turned down was in fact one of the three allocated streets in Antwerp for this kind of activity. So when my attention was grabbed by some knocking on a window, I was not expecting to look up and find a few scantly clad women beckoning me over!
So what did I think to Antwerp? Well, it had plenty of character from the mixture of old architecture and buildings looking fantastic amongst the modern day builds, especially the Stadsfeestzaal Shopping Centre, which I was not expecting to come across! There were plenty of tourist locations to enjoy, some providing great picture opportunities such as the the river and the centre. If you get tired of walking around outside, there’s a plethora of museums on offer as well as exploring the older buildings, giving you a chance to learn about their history. Even though I’d only come here for Reverze, I came away with a lot more than I was expecting and would recommend it as a place to go to should be heading the Begium.
Reverze
After a bit more rest, it was time to head to the event that actually brought me to the city. Again, I was very thankful for the free transport that was on offer with having a ticket for Reverze.
Now I had been to festivals on my own and coped well with it but with this being my first indoor festival and purely hardstyle, I was quite apprehensive about the experience, especially being on my own. It’s not like an outdoor festival where you can meet people on the campsite. I relied slightly on some from the hostel going and turned out that wasn’t the case at all! So I was flying solo for the evening.
The evening overall was a very enjoyable one for me! This was even if I was apprehensive about the evening due to the fact it was going to be 11 hours of partying to the high BPMs and hard bass. Starting with the line up, there were plenty of DJs on offer from all sections of the hard dance spectrum and plenty for me to go and enjoy. If you’re a fan of the hard dance scene, there’s certainly something for you at Reverze. I must admit, I was pleasantly surprised as I wasn’t expecting it to be so big as I’d never heard of Reverze as much compared to Defqon 1 and Qlimax. I even came away as a fan of plenty of new DJs.
The set up that they had at the arena was a good one, supplying plenty of food and drinks areas with a variety of options for all tastes from pasta to burgers to wraps and some deserts. The way for paying for the food and drinks was a little irritating with you having to pay for tokens to then hand those over to the stall that you’re at. I have covered my point of view on this matter in other blogs but overallI find this way of paying very annoying as it means that you aren’t able to just pay for things, you have to queue to get your tokens to then queue again for whatever you want. Adding to that, they are always odd values meaning that it’s hard to try and track how much that you are spending. Why can’t they be as simple as one for one or one for two? But no, instead it’s seven for ten, for example.
My other gripe that I had with the event wasn’t the layout itself but was the fact that the movement of people between the two arenas was controlled too much and if anything, caused more issues that it solved. There were two separate paths for “in” and for “out” of the each arena but had staff blocking them and only allowed groups of 10-20 people out every couple of minutes, which caused a massive backlog and a lot of pushing and shoving. It seemed to completely defeat the point of what they were trying to acheive. I will be returning to the Reverze 2019 so that’ll be something that I’ll update on if it’s been amended.
How long did I last then? Unfortunately I wasn’t able to last until the end of the event. I left at the beginning of Angerfist, which was the last set of the night, but that allowed me to get out before the main crowds started to leave. Just an hour short so close but no cigar!
My overall thoughts on my first indoor hardstyle festival are that the concept was amazing and very enjoyable! The set up of the adjacent arenas allows there to be a larger, more varied line up to suit plenty of tastes which is always a good thing. I’ve obviously highlighted the issues I found with these two adjacent arenas, as well as the problems I have with the use of tokens at these events. Would I recommend it to a fan of the hard dance scene? Definitely, giving it a solid 8 out of 10
Home Time
The Sunday didn’t have much to it if I’m honest. I slept in until the very limit of having time to get up, get ready and get out of the hostel before I slowly made my way through Antwerp to grab something to eat and something to take with me on the coach back to the UK. Even though I knew where to go for the coach, it still seemed like a very odd place for a coach drop off and without a sign post, I had no idea that I was truly in the right place! It would have made sense if it went to the actual coach station only a few hundred metres away. That pretty much rounds it off: I boarded the coach once it arrived and headed back to the UK.
That finishes another blog! I hope you’ve enjoyed the read and found the information useful, especially with it being a mix of review and story. If you’re a fan of the hard dance scene and always wondered what Defqon 1, the biggest festival in the scene, is like? Well, I have a blog for that here!
As well as that, if you don’t already, be sure to follow the blog on the social media links to be the first to find out when the new blogs are published and I’ll see you in the next one!
