2011 Minnesota Renaissance Festival Photo Tour Part 4

Vegetable Justice is one of the perennial draws at the festival. Appealing to the dark side of human nature for its entertainment value, it consists of the target hurling abusive comments at the participants who, in return, hurl tomatoes. This lass flinched a bit too much in my opinion.

Chad could not resist the temptation to work out his anger issues. Maybe that girl was right to flinch…

The location of the festival is right next to train tracks and for the first time I saw one go by. It added to the surreal blending of eras already present.

After Chad failed to score a hit on the Vegetable Justice girl, the weather decided to get a tad hostile. Wind blew, light rain spat, and dust kicked up into the air.

Getting out of the rain for a bit of rest, I switched to the 55-200mm lens in one of the shops.  A test shot of the animal rides confirmed that I managed not to get any dust in the camera. While you can see the elephants, the camel there is not present in the picture. No unicorns to ride, thankfully.

At 1:00 PM there was a blacksmithing demonstration which was irresistible to our would be smiths, Brannick and Christian. Chad and I took off to check out the martial arts demonstration instead. That I’ll cover in a separate post.

I took this picture of gypsies pulling a cart just for Amber. I know she’ll appreciate it.

While half our group spoke to the dojo members about swords, I noticed blades of another sort being used a good distance away. Not used to the bigger lens, I decided to test it out. To my surprise it had enough reach to take decent pictures.

Once the Canon 55-200mm EF-S locked on, I became obsessed with capturing a knife in mid air.

After multiple shots, the last one produced a knife flying through the air at the spinning target. I love this lens!

Juggling followed the knife throwing and involved catching a lighted torch from another performer, then lighting the other torches with it while juggling them. I see a future tossing multiple pizzas at once in this guy’s future.

To be continued…

Click for Part 1  Part 2  Part 3

2011 Minnesota Renaissance Festival Photo Tour Part 3

Wherever you go at the Renaissance Festival, you will encounter people singing or playing an instrument. Back in the past, there were no iPods. So you had to lug an iBard around, which was an expensive and difficult thing to maintain. Only the wealthy could afford to house and feed them. Thank goodness for modern technology, eh?

I was pleased to see a Hmong craft stand. One of these days I will buy one of their spectacular beaded ties.

An unexpected celebrity sighting. Can you pick out the infamous face in the crowd?

Looks like Charlie Sheen, doesn’t it?  Riding a unicorn too. Turns out warlocks are part of the insidious unicorn conspiracy…

Eventually the area became unicorn free and I was able to get a good picture of the traditional dancers in action.

The first of many stops at shops selling swords and other weapons. Badger Blades has a tree growing through the shop to add character.

The first of my attempts to ambush photograph my friends and probably the best result of the lot. Not good for a picture phobic to travel with others who are nearly as bad. At least Amber was amused by something, but Chad looks as suspicious as the blond in Part 1.

Besides swords, musical instruments were another siren call for our group. Sadly, the sign read “flutes” rather than “lutes” and Christian was foiled in his quest for the instrument.

The challenge of shooting a bow was irresistible and Christian, Chad, and Brannick all tried their hands at it. Chad came out on top with the best shot. The short bows were cute and the price was not horrible for them. I’ve already got too many bows and not enough arrows, so I passed.

There were signs up recruiting for the Royal Navy, which one should avoid if historically accurate. Only later did we discover it was for a war game of sorts with miniature ships. They were taking things down when we passed by.

To be continued…

Click for Part 1 and Part 2

2011 Minnesota Renaissance Festival Photo Tour Part 2

As we wandered the grounds the sound of singing could be heard and very good singing at that. The melodious sounds drifted out of The Pub, which oddly enough, is a pub.

With most of the group wanting to keep pressing on, we didn’t get a chance to tarry there and these hurried snapshots cannot convey how good the group was. Alas, my Canon Digital Rebel does not take video at all.

Child torture device or good wholesome fun? You decide.

Whilst wandering about and looking like tourists, we were assailed called out to by gypsies seeking an audience. No, they were not seeking to curry favor, they were after warm bodies to watch their act, the Fandazzi Fire Circus. As you can see, they were quite poor and had resorted to eating fire for sustenance.

The show started with flaming whip cracking, which was sadly not done to Devo.

Flaming fan dancers were next up. The lass on the right took a tumble as soon as she came out. She hit the stage hard and it clearly was not part of the act. But she recovered to perform as pictured.

Next up was an old soft shoe dance routine – with flames.

Now I’d always heard bad things about gypsy hygiene, but marked that off to being prejudiced. However, it is obvious they have bad breath as the photo illustrates. At least they aren’t unicorns.

I wish I’d used the bigger zoom lens. Too many shots of people’s heads. Still, I was pleased with catching the flames clearly.

 

Chain twirling followed. The rest of the performance was lackluster with many a dropped flaming baton. It appears that they all had too much of a Friday night.

After the performance ended, we decided to check out the Enchanted Forest. To enter you pass by what used to be a hobbit hole. Sadly, no hobbits are to found in it like ten years ago. The trail took us past many a scaled down fairy house and informative signs about said residences.

After descending down the trail, a sudden vista comes into view. It is quite lovely emerging from the dark forest to behold this.

The trail was a bit crowded and there was a sign promising a Secret Garden. Near the end of the walk we found it and singing going on.

It was a nice performance and well deserving of a tip.

Opposite of the bards was a small waterfall and pond perfectly in scale for fairies.

Upon exiting, this sign is encountered. Good to know everything is in order.

To be continued…

Part 1 can be found here.

2011 Minnesota Renaissance Festival Photo Tour Part 1

Labor Day weekend marks the end of summer and it seems like I missed the whole season. But at least I got to the local renaissance festival this year. A group of my younger friends and I did a road trip up to Shakopee with me toting my big camera this time. My quest for the elusive killer photograph continues…

So on to the pictures!

Note: No unicorns were killed in the production of these posts.

Though we got there at a relatively early time, the parking lot/field was already filling up. In the distance you can see towers and a pirate ship beckoning.

This was the row we were in. It foretold encounters with unicorns – the other other white meat. Yes, I don’t like unicorns. Unless served with a good BBQ sauce, that is.

Even before getting through the gates, performers are there to heckle you. They also heckle you when you leave. Ah, abuse.

Once through the gates, it takes awhile for the crowd to break up and head their separate ways. This weekend the promise of a longbow competition had us interested and this was the first sign showing the way.

Oh great, a unicorn already. The blond giving me the evil eye obviously doesn’t understand I’m documenting the pernicious and evil influence of the mono-horned creatures upon our society. Sorry, this photo was not about you.

The forecast warned of rain and possible thunderstorms. We drove through both coming up but blue sky appeared. A promising start to a banner day.

This qualifies as a good sign, doesn’t it?

You see all kinds of cosplay at renaissance festivals. This was one of the more elaborate attempts. Unfortunately the still can’t convey the awkward walk those goat leg stilts caused. I think she was going for a D&D tiefling or something like it from a video game.

We passed by a glass blowing demonstration and I got a couple of snaps of the bottle being crafted being reheated in the furnace. There wasn’t time to linger since the longbow competition awaited, wherever it was.

Funny, this looked more like food shops to me. I was soon rerouted to the entrance to the shooting grounds I’d walked past. I have to say the gator and shrimp were tempting, but I was determined to have a scotch egg again – I keep failing to get that delicious item every trip.

The longbow competition was not as impressive as hoped. It was underway when we arrived and this was the only photo I could salvage from trying to photograph through the crowd. Check out the traditional Japanese archer and his huge bow.

At this point, I wondered if I should have put the big 55-200mm zoom lens on the Canon Digital Rebel. Not having had a lot of chances to use it, I was uncertain if it would work out better than the 18-55mm in crowds.

To be continued…

Huffing and Puffing and Blowing…

…but the house is still standing. Though I did get to witness rain being blown through the air conditioner.

At 7 AM we had another round of severe wind from storms this morning and branches are down all over the property again. One small tree/bush is broken at the base in the small windbreak – which has had a literal meaning this year.

Not worth it to take pictures this time and I see that damage is far worse elsewhere again. One fascinating thing is how the grass was blown flat in the somewhat overgrown West yard which took the brunt of the storm. That is a new one for me.

I should go out and see what the damage is on Highway 16 locally. We’ll see if time and schedule permits – not to mention if weather allows. More storms are in the forecast for today and tomorrow.

My being a human barometer meant that I did not get much sleep last night due to pain, but sadly I lacked the wisdom to realize what it meant. I should have checked the weather instead of whining to myself!

It is time to think of planting some fast growing trees farther out to create a better wind break. This mini-break isn’t going to hold up much longer.

Hopefully the weather will be nicer up North at the Renaissance Festival tomorrow.

Thought for the Day

Nico Machiavelli discussing the cautious Roman general Fabius Maximus methods versus Scipio’s desire to take the fight back to Africa during the war with Hannibal and the invading Carthaginians:

…if it had been left to him, Hannibal would still be in Italy, for he did not see that times had changed, and that new methods of warfare were called for. So that, if Fabius had been king of Rome, he might easily have lost this war, since he was incapable of altering his methods according as circumstances changed. Since, however, he was born in a republic where there were diverse citizens with diverse dispositions, it came about that, just as it had a Fabius, who was the best man to keep the war going when circumstances required this, so later it has a Scipio at a time suited to its victorious consummation.

For this reason a republic has a fuller life and enjoys good fortune for a longer time than a principality, since it better able to adapt itself to diverse circumstances owing to the diversity found among its citizens than a prince can do. For a man who is accustomed to act in one particular way, never changes, as we have said. Hence, when times change and no longer suit his ways, he is inevitably ruined.

-- from The Discourses, “Adaptation to the Times”

Italics are mine.