Notting hill carnival is something everyone needs to experience at least once in their life, however it's not something you can experience properly just stood on the pavement miles back from the floats, to really experience carnival you need to get in to carnival spirit, get to the procession route and dance till your feet hurt and then dance some more. What I love most about carnival is that anyone can get involved, it doesn't matter if you're 1 or 100, male, female, white black, under weight or over weight, everyone is welcome to grab a plate of jerk chicken and cup of rum punch. If you're brave enough you can jump on the procession route and whine and twerk (none of this miley cyris business though) your way up Ladbroke Grove to ragga dance hall with the floats or just hang back and admire it all from the pavements.
Yes it is very crowded and yes you'll end up dancing with strangers but that's the joy of carnival, it's one big, colourful, drunken party.
Have you been to carnival before?xo