The biggest individual event at the festival has to be the joust. We connected with more friends who had come up and agreed to meet there. It is always packed so we thought arriving a half hour early would be perfect.
We were wrong.
It was already crowded and we ended up on the grass by the horse stables. Not a good vantage point at all. So if you go to this, prepare to arrive an hour early and be bored during that hour unless you have little kids participating in the games beforehand.
The same master of ceremonies that I remember from ten years ago is still conducting the joust. Technical issues with the wireless microphone setup made his brogue incomprehensible at times.
Like I mentioned before, not a good vantage point – especially for taking photos. Between the sun angle and all the floating dust it became apparent I wasn’t going to get the shots I’d hoped for.
The heel of the match, Sir William.
Moving the bars used for the kid games earlier in front of us didn’t help things. I believe our side’s champion was Sir Jacob in the green.
At this point in the afternoon (after 4 PM), the dust was a real pain and not just to taking pictures. Stinging eyes and filled sinuses were the order of the day.
Preparing to joust. These guys really hammered each other on and off horseback. Like professional wrestling it is all staged -- but the physical abuse is staggering.
I never was able to get the actual impact photographed. They converged near the boy who threw the autofocus out of whack. Even when that didn’t happen, my timing on the burst shots never worked out. In this case a direct hit took Sir Jacob out of the saddle with a resounding crash.
Musicians could be found everywhere and we passed this finely dressed lady as we headed out from the joust.
Sounds appetizing, doesn’t it? Puke and Snot are the vulgar comedy duo that have become a franchise at the festival. One of them died several years ago and has been replaced. Didn’t find any unicorn burgers there, sadly enough.
Another glass blower shop with the dungeon in the background. We went into the dungeon which turned out to be a nice reprieve from the heat and humidity. The displays inside also gave Amber ideas.
I got excited when I saw a sign saying something about vikings at the mill. When I found out it was advertising football games at the pub attached to it I was disappointed. Now if they showed Norse berserkers beating each other to a pulp I’s be interested.
Since the exit is the same as the entrance, we had to carefully avoid the legendary and obnoxious pickle guy seen sans shirt at the right. Meanwhile, I’m being given the evil eye by the brunette on the left. Sorry darlin’, you aren’t my type.
I was going to write something flippant about the unicorn again, but the delighted expression on the little girl’s face made that impossible to do. Maybe the existence of unicorns can be be justified after all. Bah…
From there we exited and made our way out to the parking lot. It had been a fun day despite some dodgy weather.
For once I was financially prepared and picked up a couple of things including a leather check book cover. Only been shopping for one I’d actually like for fifteen years. This particular one isn’t on the Oh Susanna’s Leather’s website, but I’m pleased enough to link there anyway.
Not the end, for there is a special post dedicated to the martial arts exhibit yet to come.
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