AS a five-year-old girl was unable to go to Glastonbury this year due to leukemia therapy, festival-goers ensured a flavour of the massive music event was sent to her County Durham home.

Messages of support and memorabilia were posted by festival-goers to Bede Donkin, who is undergoing regular chemotherapy treatment to beat the invasive blood cancer.

Bede, teenage brother Jude and parents Alan Donkin and Saskia Gordon, from Willington, planned to make a return journey to Worthy Farm in Somerset, having enjoyed the last festival, in 2017.

But the intensive chemotherapy since the diagnosis in February meant it was not possible.

Entertainers from CBeebies, Basil Brush, magician Dynamo and other characters from the site’s Kidzfield sent messages urging her to: “Stay strong and always believe in magic.”

Bede, who turned five on the opening day of the festival, on Friday June 28, also received numerous messages, postcards, photographs and gifts from Glasto-goers hoping to brighten her day.

There was even a ‘Happy Birthday, Bede’ message, accompanying her photograph mounted on the big screen at Glastonbury’s John Peel stage.

Mrs Gordon said: “It’s been amazing knowing we were there in the hearts of so many people.

“These people save a lot of money to go to Glastonbury and for many this is their only holiday.

“Yet, they have taken time out to do such a special thing for complete strangers.

“I’ve lost count of the amount of messages with well-wishes and photographs.

“We were event sent a tepee. It’s unbelievable.”

She said that despite the sometimes daily chemotherapy Bede is “doing really well” at the moment, having been given a big lift by all the gifts and messages.

They came in the wake of her request to members of the Glasto Chat Facebook group to send Bede a postcard from the festival, never expecting the response it received.

“I just thought it would be lovely to stand a few postcards up alongside her birthday cards, but more than 200 has completely blown us away.

“Bede said she has been, ‘sprinkled with shimmer', which is such a lovely thing for a five-year-old to say.”

Mrs Gordon has been attending Glastonbury since 1999 and took Bede for her first festival with brother Jude, in 2017.

She had been looking forward to making her second visit to Worthy Farm until the diagnosis earlier this year.

Providing all continues to go well, with a scheduled end date in April, Bede and family hope to take up an offer to go back stage at next year’s festival.

In the meantime, she has plenty of goodwill reminders of this year’s event to help her through the remaining course of treatment.