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Paleo crowd, 2009

What it is: The largest outdoor music festival in Switzerland, started in 1976, with over 4.3 million concert-goers since then. In 2008, the audience was 227,000 strong, and there were 146 performances on six stages.

Volunteers, all 4,062 of them, helped to make the experience a great one for all. According to a survey in 2008, 59 percent of concert-goers came from the Lake Geneva region.

Music for all ages and tastes

And perhaps of interest to those who hesitate to mingle with the younger crowd, 31 percent were under 25 years old. In fact, 40 percent were over 35! So a pretty eclectic age mix.

Eco-friendly winning festival

The Paleo Festival is high on the list of the World Wildlife Fund’s (WWF) green list for its eco-friendly policies. In 2008, the festival produced 261 tons of garbage, of which 48 percent was recycled.

Volunteers, 300-strong! Paleo 2009

A 300-strong team of volunteer cleaners is constantly on the move, cleaning up the area, the toilets and emptying trash bins. All drinks sold on-site are sold in cups with a CHF2 deposit, which can be refunded at any bar or at the site’s Ecopoints. Background: “Big outdoor events leave major footprints on environment: WWF“, 25 June 2009, GenevaLunch

Tickets, food at Paleo

Tickets: Tickets were all sold out within hours of going on sale, no surprise there. The festival is making 1,000 tickets a day available online to reduce scalping. Regular price is CHF60, CHF50 for students. Once you are at the festival you can wander freely from venue to venue all night long. The complete daily programme is available on-line.

Food: The festival has 101 stands selling food from all over the world. A downloadable map in pdf format for the food tourists.

Getting there, getting home: transport options for Paleo

Transportation: Festival organizers encourage public transportation and car-sharing wherever possible.

Free shuttle trains from Nyon train station to the venue (gare de l’Asse) every 10-30 minutes. Last one leaves at 03:00 on Thursday 23 July (early morning!) and at 04:00 every subsequent day, except Monday morning.

Regular CFF trains from Nyon to Geneva after 23:00, at: 23:10, 23:23, 23:50, 00:23, 00:51

Regular CFF trains from Nyon to Lausanne/Montreux after 23:00, at 23:10 (change at Lausanne), 23:37, 00:10 (ends at Lausanne), 00:37 (ends at Lausanne).

Special after-hours Paleo trains from Nyon to Geneva: 02:00, 03:00, 04:00 (this last one only on the Friday am, Saturday am and Sunday am. Special free buses are available on arrival on many Geneva lines

Special after-hours Paleo trains from Nyon to Lausanne: 01:30 (only on the weekend, Thursday on Friday, Friday on Saturday, Saturday on Sunday), 02:30, 03:30. Special free buses are available on arrival on many Lausanne lines.

Regular CFF service starts fairly early in the morning, 05:10 in the Lausanne direction, 04:54 in the Geneva direction for the serious concert-goers.

Details (Fre, pdf) on these and other transportation possibilities, such as buses to other parts of French-speaking Switzerland.

Klaxonne matches people who need a ride with people who have space. The SMS service works like this: for example, if you have space in your car: offre x (number of places in car) from (name of place) to (Paleo,say) 17:30 (time). Send to 911. If you need a ride: cherche 2 paleo neuchatel 01:30. Send to 911.

See GL’s Paleo Photo Album and the rest of GenevaLunch’s coverage of the Paleo Festival.