My First Ever Glastonbury. And I'm Working.

My first show day at my first ever Glastonbury is busy. I find myself out in the blazing heat with the Red Button film crew and 6Music's Cerys Matthews. This is not just hot... this is more like dusty, shimmering Sahara.

We start pre-recording some links on a hill overlooking the beautiful Park Stage with the sun pelting down. Within half an hour I'm sent off to find a man called Hamish in a bunny costume (I find him backstage, sitting on a throne with a broken leg), discover the name of a band of nearby steel drummers and find some wellies, ASAP! All in a day's work...

Later, on a lone recce of the next place we're filming from, I blag a free straw hat from a stall vendor who is touchingly sympathetic when confronted with a burning redhead. I organise for Craig Charles to present a link later from a giant wooden television, flanked by people in orang-utan costumes. It goes down really well.

Back at the BBC Compound that evening the live BBC Two show is excellent and the set looks beautiful- twinkly and colourful against the vast indigo sky. The young singer songwriter Lissee is particularly amazing, with a voice clear as a bell. I arrive back at the B&B at 4am and do a little celebratory dance - I'm not sleeping in a tent!

The next day, after we've shot Cerys' links, I walk what seems like 20 blistering miles in the searing heat back to the BBC Compound to pick Craig Charles up. Yesterday I got sunburnt and will not make that mistake again so I put on sunblock every 40 seconds. Back at the 'Unfair Ground', Craig draws huge crowds of fans everywhere he goes and plays up to them when he fluffs his lines. Later, I am to be found chasing Bez around the backstage area in order to get him to sign a contributor form and watching a huge animatronic robot dog bounce around in front of a parade of various massive, clunking, fume expelling home-made modes of transport. It's like living in 'Robot Wars'.

That evening - in between being on hand for the Outside Broadcast trucks and on set - I manage to watch a tiny bit of Kylie storm the Pyramid stage with the Scissor Sisters (excellent) and laugh a lot as the caberet act for the live BBC Two show shocks Jo Whiley as he bursts from a huge latex balloon, dressed as Elvis.

The final show day arrives only too soon and, after more links out in the field, I'm off in a 4x4 to pick up Imelda May and her fabulous 50s-styled band from the Avalon stage. I'm taken by her tour manager, Paddy, to watch side stage and she's infectiously energetic, with a huge quiff, towering heels and a sassy, rockabilly style to her music.

Later, after I've dropped Imelda off at the Compound and given the poor, sunlight deprived staff in the OB trucks tea and sweets, I watch the Glasto crowds go understandingly beserk for the legendary Stevie Wonder. As Michael Eavis heartwarmingly sings along to 'Happy Birthday' a whisper goes around backstage... Stevie Wonder is coming back for an interview! When the man himself arrives, flanked by a small number of polite people, the set is completely silent. I am four feet away, standing with Zane Lowe. After Lauren Laverne and Mark Radcliffe have done the live interview and Stevie has said his goodbyes, there is a stunned silence. Everyone is totally starstruck.

Much later on, after we have finished broadcasting, packed up the production office and arrived back at one of the nearby hotels, we stay up until it's light. On the way back to the B&B, we pass children going to school. I am exhausted but elated. What a weekend.

Sam Alderson worked as a runner at the Glastonbury festival

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