COACHELLA WITH CLAIRE’S

I still can’t quite believe I accomplished my dream of attending Coachella a few weeks ago. Claire’s invited me along on their #ClairesChella trip with Vloggers Lucy & Lydia and teen star sisters Nadia and Ruby; and I had the best time! The trip started with a long flight to LA and a one night stay at the Calamigos Ranch, Malibu. I had never been to that part of LA before, so it was amazing to see something different. The ranch was UNREAL! It’s very popular with weddings and you can see why. You’re surrounded by beautiful landscapes and nature. The ranch features mini bungalows which are so roomy with a bedroom, huge bathroom and living space. I had one all to myself! We arrived at night so we couldn’t see much in the darkness, so it was a lovely surprise the next day to see the ranch in daylight and have a walk around. Our first day was spent at the Malibu Wine Safari, which was so much fun. We got driven around in a safari jeep, shown the animals and even had a mini wine tasting session. I’m not a huge drinker, and rarely drink wine, but the Stanley white wine (named after the giraffe), was absolutely delicious! If you go there, you must try it! After our safari we had a delicious lunch and spent some time at the Calamigos Ranch beach club before heading out on a long drive to Palm Springs for Coachella!

The drive took about four and half hours to Palm Springs because of the typical LA traffic! If you’ve never experienced it before, you’re lucky! We had such a fun trip in the car though, I think we listened to Justin Bieber’s new song Despacito about ten times! We arrived around 8pm at night, checked into our hotel, Korakia Pensione and headed straight out to the Palm Springs street festival. I’d actually been before a few years back, so it was amazing to be able to visit again.

We had another surprise the next day when we woke up, as we were able to see our second and final hotel of the trip in daylight; WOW, it was beautiful. The hotel made you feel like you were in Greece not USA! Claire’s had a few fun filled days for us ahead including going to Coachella, so we were all rearing to go at this point. Our first day consisted of a fun Lady Gaga choreography class; which was really interesting as I hadn’t danced in about 10 years and Nadia and Ruby were insanely good! We then had lunch at our hotel and spent the afternoon getting Coachella ready!

I couldn’t quite believe how big Coachella was when we arrived. I’ve never been to Glastonbury before but I assume it’s the same size or even bigger. We went to the festival around 4pm because it was just too hot to go any earlier, it was around 37 degrees, which was ridiculously hot. That to me is sunbathing weather, not festival weather! But hey ho we tried not to moan, because come on, we’re from the UK and it never gets that hot! I was glad we had VIP tickets as it was nice to get out of the big crowds the later it got. I think once the sun went down, everyone came out to party. The VIP section was lush too, way nicer than UK festivals. Another thing I noticed too was that everyone was SO friendly and there was also NO litter on the floor! It amazed me! At all UK festivals, when it gets to the end of the night and you’re trying to find your way out, you have to stumble over empty drink bottles, paper cups and leftover food. But not at Coachella! Day one was amazing and we were all still so excited for the next few days.

On day two, we spent the morning at our hotel before setting off to Claire’s store in Palm Springs. Claire’s challenged us to spend $50 on festival accessories which we were allowed to keep and style into our Coachella outfits. I even spontaneously got my ears pierced at the store! They have a new blue star stud to help raise money for Make A Wish, so anyone who gets their ears pierced with the earrings or purchases them, $5 goes to the charity, which I think is a lovely idea.

After the store visit, we popped into salon All Tressed Up for a little bit of pampering. I got my hair Coachella ready with a cute braided hairstyle and finished off my makeup with some glitter and face gems, of course! We headed to the festival from the salon and arrived around 4ish again. As soon as we got inside we headed straight to the ferris wheel to capture that classic Coachella shot; we couldn’t not! There were lots of great acts playing on day two and we finished the day watching Lady Gaga on the main stage.

On the final day of Coachella, we got dolled up in our festival outfits and headed to the Doug Aitken art installation for some snaps. What an amazing idea, the mirrors were so effective reflecting the desert landscape. Once we took some photos here, we headed to The Saguaros hotel for drinks before finishing getting ready for the final day of Coachella. I definitely saved my best outfit until last, I think; I went all out with the sequins and glitter.

Coachella, you were amazing! I just want to say thanks so much to Claire’s for taking me along, I had an awesome time with the whole team!

If you want to see more of what I got up to, then head over to my YouTube channel, where you can catch my weekly vlog and festival aftermovie.

Peace
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