It was off with the wellies and on with the shades as Glastonbury Festival emerged from an early deluge into afternoon and evening sunshine.

The first full day of the festival programme saw crowds of more than 130,000 enjoying shows by Neil Young, The Specials and Lily Allen – wearing a single white glove in an apparent tribute to Michael Jackson – on the main Pyramid Stage plus hundreds of other performances around the 1,100 acre site.

An overnight and morning deluge saw almost three quarters of an inch of rain fall in six hours, ensuring those festival-goers who wanted to get down and dirty in the mud were not disappointed.

The changeable weather meant that the 1,000 casualties treated by the on-site medical services were mainly split between people with sunburn and those who had slipped over in the mud, although one man needed hospital treatment for an apparently self-inflicted throat wound.

But away from the soupy mud around the festival's most well-trodden paths, the years of work and the millions spent by festival organiser Michael Eavis on drainage improvements appeared to be money well spent, as the green grass failed to turn brown even in low lying areas around the main stages.

The forecast is mostly dry and sunny for the rest of the weekend First time festival-goer Lloyd Wakefield, 20, said: ''It wouldn't be Glastonbury if there wasn't some mud to roll around in. I was expecting it really.

''I think the atmosphere here is so great that you don't notice how dirty you are. It kind of adds to the festival spirit with everyone battling the mud together."

Celebrities spotted on the site yesterday included Gordon Brown's wife Sarah, who was with supermodel Naomi Campbell as part of a campaign to raise awareness for the White Ribbon Alliance, a charity which campaigns for safe childbirth, plus Sir Bob Geldof's daughters Peaches and Pixie, and Gavin and Stacey star Matthew Horne.

Traders were quick to jump on the Michael Jackson bandwagon, knocking out T-shirts carrying logos in varying degrees of taste.

Police said crime was down so far, with 224 crimes reported by 3pm, compared to 264 at the same time last year.

Around half of the offences involved drug possession.

To read the latest reviews from Glastonbury go to Bristol's entertainment website Crackerjack.co.uk/bristol