The stag do who travelled all the way from Essex for Parklife 2023

A groom-to-be has come up with great way to celebrate his big day - by joining 80,000 festival-goers at this year's Parklife Festival at Heaton Park.

Sam, 32, from Leigh-on-Sea is getting married back home in August and travelled up to Manchester yesterday to celebrate the occasion. He made the journey by train from London Euston with 14 of his closest friends accompanying him.

His wife-to-be is currently back home, but will be celebrating her hen party next weekend - though he couldn't quite remember where she'll be celebrating the occasion.

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"Manchester is fantastic, what a beautiful city," Sam told the Manchester Evening News. "It's just so lovely, and we're having the best time today. We came up yesterday on the train, we're at Parklife today and back home tomorrow."

The stag party headed straight out after arriving into Manchester yesterday, but we're a little hazy on the specifics of where they went. According to one of their friends they went for bottomless brunch, and headed to Roxy Ballroom, BrewDog and the Northern Quarter.

It seems they were having quite a bit of fun, but potentially too much fun for one venue. "We didn't quite make it to Bongo's Bingo," confessed Sam. "I think we may have overdone it on bottomless brunch, but there we go."

Sam and his 14 friends, which includes Josh, Geoff, Pete, Dez and Troy - are mostly here for the stag party, but all agreed on one act they want to see. "Skrillex, 100%, they're going to be great," added Sam.

Skrillex will be playing The Valley Stage later today, followed by DJ Peggy Gou and record producer Fred Again... who takes to the stage at