REVIEW: Latitude Festival is known as one of the best family festivals, so the Daily Star’s brave dad Neil Docking put that reputation to the test with his children10:20, 01 Aug 2025Updated 10:57, 01 Aug 2025Neil is an associate sports editor at the Daily Star. Formerly an award-winning court reporter at the Liverpool Echo, he is a senior journalist who has covered all aspects of news at titles across the North West, while also previously working on a freelance basis for Daily Mirror Sport.The Daily Star’s Neil Docking is used to slumming it at music festivals but lived a life of luxury at Latitude(Image: Neil Docking)As a former scout and Glastonbury veteran, I’ve never felt like such a fraud.It was last Friday morning at Latitude Festival and I’d barely been on the site for 12 hours, after arriving the evening beforehand and spending the night sleeping on a comfy mattress in a luxurious, pre-erected tent. Yet here I was, towel and wash bag in hand, strolling up to take a steaming hot shower, before I’d even got a trace of mud on my wellies.Twenty-year-old Neil – who relied on good old Lynx Africa, aka the ‘shower in a can’, for days on end, come rain or shine – wouldn’t recognise what I’d become. But I’ve got to admit, after living like a VIP for a weekend, my days of slumming it might be over!Ever since becoming a parent, I’ve dreamed of one day taking my children to a music festival. So I jumped at the opportunity to take my daughter, 10, and eight-year-old son to Latitude with my wife.Global digital bank and flexible payment provider Klarna are Latitude’s new headline partners, so we used their app to get ‘festival ready’, which has an AI-powered shopping assistant to find what you need. As an experienced camper, I opted against treating myself to a new t-shirt and instead bought my kids a pair of sleeping bags, air beds and – hold onto your seats – a battery-powered air pump.Inside our deluxe bell tent in the Pink Moon village at Latitude Festival(Image: Neil Docking)All very sensible purchases made by a very responsible dad, I’m sure you’ll agree. And all undermined by then packing the wrong bag of wellies, so my offspring arrived in Suffolk to discover their old boots, three sizes too small, which I was supposed to have taken to the charity shop. While my wife was left braving the mud in a pair of flip flops. A dad and husband in shame.Fortunately my stock shot back up once we arrived at our home for the weekend – a deluxe bell tent with two beds, bedding, tables, chairs, carpet, rug, mirror and power sockets. A bit different from the leaky tent with taped together poles I usually take camping.Our tent was in the Pink Moon village, which is a great choice for families, with access to the aforementioned luxury showers and toilets, its own bar and food court, swingball and cricket games, 24-hour security so you feel extra safe, plus a pamper station with hair dryers and hair straighteners!Henham Park in Suffolk is the stunning location of Latitude Festival(Image: LATITUDE)It was also just a short walk to the arena entrance and a brilliant festival experience. Henham Park is a wedding venue for much of the year and it’s a beautiful location, with stunning parkland, woods and a river winding through the middle of the site. More on that later.The amount of activities for children to get stuck into was incredible. On the Friday morning we headed to the Trailer Park, a creative village full of caravans and wedding chapels, where they made stick people and decorated campervans, before going to a forest school in Camp Greenpeace next door, to cook bread dough on an open fire and devour it with chocolate sauce and jam, learn how to start a blaze themselves with a flint and steel, and clamber up and tumble down giant nets in the trees.In the Cosmic Shambles Forest they played beneath giant planets, danced in front of a heat camera, visited a computer museum to laugh at the old BBC Micro their dad used to play on and learned about crustacean friends in a bizarre crab museum.The Cosmic Shambles Forest at Latitude Festival with the Kids Area in the background(Image: Neil Docking)At the Comedy Arena we saw a hilarious set from Joel Dommett, who had us in stitches with behind-the-scenes tales of working on The Masked Singer and his cringe-inducing teen diary and wannabe rap career.However, his fame paled in comparison to that of a real hip hop legend – MC Grammar in the Kids Area. Latitude Festival could have booked Snoop Dogg and he’d have struggled to get a better reaction than the Sky Kids star.Klarna had their own area of the site, Camp Klarna, where my daughter loved making a fan and wings with help from mum to compete in a catwalk. Watching her strut her stuff made my heart melt.Don’t get me wrong, it’s not all magic moments taking children to a festival – tired little legs can spark not so little moans and a few tears. But the challenge is definitely worth it and as my daughter danced in my arms at the Second Stage that night to Scandinavian pop princess Sigrid’s hit Don’t Feel Like Crying, I laughed at the irony!Latitude Festival is a magical place at night(Image: Neil Docking)Our Saturday started with an absolute highlight: wild swimming in the river – another festival first for us. As cold as you would imagine when you first dived in, but then an exhilarating experience the kids haven’t stopped talking about.There was a huge variety of food stalls, with meals ranging from around £6 to £15. Even the pricier options were good value and my kids were so excited to try something different every meal, including bubble waffles for breakfast.Over the weekend they tucked into everything from chicken tenders with hash browns and wood fired pizzas to katsu curry and sweet and sour chicken, while I tried Syrian ‘Sujuk’ spiced beef toasties, Egyptian lamb shish kebab and halloumi and Sri Lankan cuisine, before settling on a strictly Caribbean diet of jerk chicken, mutton and goat curries, with plenty of plantain.Egyptian lamb shish kebab and halloumi at Latitude Festival(Image: Neil Docking)The festival’s main stage, the Obelisk Arena, has large stands where you can grab a seat after all the hiking about. Reasonably priced bars are also within easy reach, so we sat in blazing sunshine, drinks in hand, watching Croydon folk songstress Jade Bird impress with her huge gravelly voice and hits Lottery and My Motto.Thanks to my generous wife giving the kids an early night, I returned to the Obelisk that evening sans children to see headliner Fatboy Slim do what he does best – put on one of the best parties you could ever get an invite to.His big, brash sample-heavy dance formula is perfect for a festival, especially when combined with visuals borrowing from pop culture. Although I never need to see his face superimposed on Jamie Lee Curtis’ striptease from True Lies ever again!He pulled out all the tricks, with lasers, pyro, streamers and confetti, and mash ups like The Killer’s Mr Brightside and Underworld’s Born Slippy. Even when it doesn’t quite work, like Oasis’ Wonderwall and his own Right Here, Right Now, no one dancing away could care less.FatBoy Slim put on a spectacular show at Latitude Festival(Image: Neil Docking)While I didn’t catch Norman Cook’s secret organ set afterwards at In The Woods, there’s so much to offer in the early hours – this isn’t just a family festival.I danced along to ‘guilty pleasures’ in the Comedy Arena, to rock ‘n’ roll heroes The 45s at the Trailer Park, and in the depths of the forest to Fraser T. Smith’s Future Utopia project at the Sunrise Arena. Before remembering I would be expected to get up with the children in a few hours…Nothing helps a hangover like the sound of banging hammers, but I did my best to pass on my limited DIY skills in the Kids Area as our pair helped build a ship, sawing wood and then nailing it to the hull, without suffering any injuries!They shot down a helter skelter and soared above the festival in a big wheel, before battering into all comers on dodgems, as we tried to cram in as much as possible on our last day.Lapsley played songs from her new fourth album at Latitude Festival(Image: Neil Docking)That included seeing our favourite set of the weekend, Southport singer Lapsley, who delivered her powerful and emotional blend of electronica and RnB on the Second Stage. We had access to the nearby VIP Latitude Lounge – a quiet haven with its own bar – so stuck around later to see French duo Air serve up dreamy electronic soundscapes from Moon Safari, like Sexy Boy and Kelly Watch the Stars.As the Sunday night drew to a close, we ate churros under the stars, before throwing shapes outside the Disco Shed. The excitement on our children’s faces said it all.The next morning, they kept asking when we could go to a festival again. It might just have to be Latitude 2026 – all others are going to struggle to live up to this.Article continues belowKlarna presents Latitude 2026 tickets go on sale here on Friday, August 1 at 10am. Weekend tickets, campervan passes, Latitude Luxury and Pink Moon accommodations are available for July 23-26, 2026. Register for a Latitude 2026 loyalty reward now and you could receive £50 off your 2026 ticket. Registration is open from now, up until and including Tuesday, September 30. More