BEYONCE KNOWLES brought the curtain down on the last Glastonbury Festival until 2013 with a stunning show in front of a packed crowd on the Pyramid Stage.
The 29-year-old Texan singer opened her set by stepping down onto the stage from a mini version of the Pyramid while ticker tape and fireworks filled the air.
Beyonce fronted her performance with some of her biggest hits - starting with Crazy In Love and Single Ladies - before teaching the crowd some of the lyrics to her new single, Best Thing I Never Had.
The latter part of her set included covers of Prince and Kings of Leon, and a medley of Destiny's Child tunes.
But it was hardly a mistake to leave early and close the festival in style on the West Holts Stage with Kool & The Gang who played great versions of Get Down On It and Celebrate Good Times.
Earlier on the Sunday, Don McLean won the battle of the two American legends against Paul Simon, delivering a beautiful slow version of Vincent before milking American Pie for all its worth.
Simon stirred the crowd with Diamonds On The Soles Of Her Shoes and You Can Call Me Al but he needlessly omitted Graceland and also could not find time for any Simon & Garfunkel tunes.
Thankfully, then, the Kaiser Chiefs on Other ran through all of their hits from their first album Employment after the Eels had helped us see in a beautiful sunset.
The hot sun on Sunday had come as a welcome relief after the heavens had poured down on most of Friday and Saturday morning.
Much of the site turned into a quagmire with up to a foot of mud in places and some of the bands struggled to rouse the crowd in the rain.
U2 were the biggest of the casualties with a largely underwhelming set.
Nevertheless, it did have a classy touch when Beautiful Day was introduced by an American astronaut in the International Space Station.
And Bono and the others will have at least pleased the purists having featured virtually all their biggest hits.
Earlier in the day, the Pyramid played host to an uninspiring set by Metronomy who would subsequently disappoint again at the Wireless Festival in Hyde Park.
On the Park, American pop duo Jenny and Johnny unsurprisingly struggled to blend their summery tunes with the inclement weather, despite their best efforts.
But, back at the Pyramid, there was total reverence as 85-year-old BB King sang the blues before, over on West Holts, Dr Jimmy Cliff hosted one of the best party atmospheres of the weekend.
On Saturday, Coldplay were another act to produce a great atmosphere at the front.
However, a truly magical Glastonbury moment - like when they finished on Fix You in 2005 - eluded Chris Martin and his band as they opted instead to finish on their new single Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall.
Elbow were a sound choice in providing the warm-up for Coldplay with front-man Guy Garvey giving the appearance of a man who could not believe his band had finally made it.
Meanwhile, much earlier in the day on John Peel Stage, Ardal O'Hanlon-lookalike Jamie 'Pockets' Fox from Fight Like Apes gave the impression that he should be anywhere other than a rock band.
That was not to his detriment, though, and the Irish group - fronted by shouty female vocalist Mary-Kate 'MayKay' Geraghty - provided a hugely entertaining start to the day with both their songs and ad libs.
After repeating the trick at Wireless, I can see Fight Like Apes - and not Shite Like Apes as a self-referential Fox amusingly called them - become another favourite of mine.
Just as the Gaslight Anthem did after their visit to Glastonbury on John Peel Stage in 2009. This year, the Brian Fallon-led New Jersey rockers were back - and playing on the big, uncovered Pyramid Stage.
But the Americans did not let the big venue unnerve them and they gave the big crowd an assured display of their talent.
Of course, as always, Glastonbury Festival has far more to it than just the main music stages though Tony Benn disappointed on the Leftfield Stage by turning up an hour early, meaning I missed him for a third successive year.
Another irritation was the new late night one-way queue system. With its winding seemingly never-ending path, it did its best to exhaust revellers even before they reached the likes of Shangrai-la and the Unfairground.
Worse still, most of these areas remained clogged up with mud even after the sun had dried out the rest of the site on Sunday.
My preview post showed I was skeptical of the one-way idea beforehand and being stuck in such a big queue did little to force me to reevaluate my opinion.
It may have been more organised for the organisers but there was an element of it becoming a chore to visit the late night areas when this has always previously been one of my most enjoyable parts of the festival.
Nevertheless, Arcadia is now such an impressive structure that Orbital played a DJ set there on Saturday night and it has certainly been a pleasure to see the venue develop over the last few years.
My favourite after-hours place this year was away from the south east corner, though. The Bourbon Street Bar gained two visits from myself.
The first was to see Sandi Thom play the blues on Thursday evening, and the second was for some late night boogie back to the jazz of the brilliantly-named Rabbit Foot Spasm Band on Friday.
Glastonbury certainly tested my patience on this fourth visit but, as usual, it still came through with a kaleidoscope of flying colours.
Hyde Park
ARCADE FIRE and Mumford & Sons impressed Hyde Park on the following Thursday, managing to stir a sleepy crowd into action after earlier sets by the Vaccines and Beirut.
And last weekend, Chase & Status, the Chemical Bros., The Streets, The Hives and Pulp were top billing at the aforementioned Wireless Festival.
Wireless was not without its hitches. A poor queuing system meant that I missed the chance to see Devotchka, a band which I held back from seeing at Glastonbury.
However, my biggest beef with the Hyde Park event was its rampant commercialism.
I understand the need for a festival to pay its way with advertisers but there were enough adverts there to make your eyes and ears bleed.
Mike Skinner of the Streets even joked main sponsors Barclaycard had approved the popping of pills during the subsequent sets by Chase & Status and the Chemical Brothers.
Earlier, Canadians Arcade Fire sprung somewhat of a surprise by featuring as many songs as they did from their first two albums, Funeral and Neon Bible, rather than their most recent release The Suburbs.
Still, another chance to hear Rebellion (Lies), Wake Up and No Cars Go live was no bad thing.
On Sunday at Wireless, the Hives played a straighter bat, reminding us of their biggest songs Hate To Say I Told You So and Main Offender.
Dressed in their usual sharp suits, Swedish front-man Pelle Almqvist ever-modestly self-proclaiming his band as the only one the crowd wanted to hear.
Of course, it was Pulp who were closer to that the description and the Sheffield band dug even deeper into their back collection to perform Disco 2000 and Babies in what was effectively a greatest hits set.
Appropriately, Jarvis Cocker and his band finished on Common People and ticker tape fell from the skies to signal the end of a party.
What a party it had been, though! An epic fortnight of music, mud, sweat and beers.
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