What Is A Women's Festival And Why Should I Go To One?

 The women's festivals are still around. They're an amazing time - think hundreds of lesbians in the woods, drinking coffee, having drum circles, dancing, attending workshops, going to concerts, you name it. I was there last summer. It's real and it's happening.

A women's festival is a festival for women. Many women's festivals are lesbian majority spaces. Meaning, while not everyone who goes is a lesbian, the majority of women in the space are lesbians. The rest of the women who go are bisexual, and there are usually also a handful of straight women. 

Picture a few hundred lesbians in the woods, many of them single, many of them shirtless, singing, dancing, body-painting, selling and buying wares, swapping things at a barter stall, forging friendships between older and younger lesbians, bonding around the campfire every night, buying lesbian fiction and reading it under the trees, then walking to the night stage for a lineup of incredible concerts. Cooking their food over a campstove. Help setting up your tent or building a fire always being one butch lesbian away. 

It's pretty common for some women to be shirtless at women's festivals. You don't have to take your shirt off. Lots of women don't. But if you want to, you are allowed. 

Alcohol, weed and edibles tend to be around for those who want it. Women will often share their alcohol or weed with you for free. Sometimes you'll see enterprising women selling their extra joints or jello shots for a few bucks. A minority of women smoke cigarettes, usually in designated-smoking areas. But the vibe is much, much more low key than a rave. You're unlikely to see anyone doing hard drugs like acid etc. 

It's easy to make friends at a women's festival, but you do have to say hi to other women. Just tell them it's your first time there, and most women will make an effort to  make you feel comfortable and make sure you have everything you need. But if you're already in this server, you're on the right track! Make an effort to get to know women who are already going to the festivals you're interested in, so you can make friends you can go with. 

Women's festivals typically consist of a mix of socializing (which is more like free-roaming,) and workshops (which are more like communal presentations) and concerts, which are more like really cool opportunities to connect with yourself while also rocking out. The lineup at these concerts aren't typically well-known musicians, but they nearly always kick ass. Meanwhile, during the day, the workshops range from incredibly substantial to wacky and whimsical. None of them are mandatory. There's a workshop schedule, but you can go to as many as you want, or none of the workshops. No one's keeping track. It's up to you. 

You might learn new things. Women at women's festivals love sharing their skills. Things other lesbians taught me while I was at a women's festival: some pretty cool hula-hooping tricks, how to build a bonfire, how to shoot a bow and arrow and how to listen to the trees. 

You might fall in love. Or have a fling. Or make a true friend. You might become more comfortable in your body. You might cry, or howl at the moon, or feel closer to yourself than you have in a long time. You might do all of those things, or something else entirely.

You might bump into a woman on the trail and find yourself still bumping into her months later (because she's your girlfriend now and you moved in together). You might find an older lesbian who you become great friends with over a rousing game of chess next to the trail. You might have a massive crush on the hot bass player from the all-girls band playing on the night stage. 

What I'm saying is you might go into the woods with the women and come back changed. I know, because it changed me. 

Ready To Find The Lesbians?

Request to join the Amazon Trail Discord, where you can find out about women's festivals, and as always, if you want to find women's land, you can check out the Women's Land Map. There are only a few of them on the map right now because I have to get permission to list them on the map from each of the lands individually, and that's taking time. But if you email me at findwomensland [at] gmail [dot] com and let me know which area you're located in, I'll help you find women's lands.