Woden Thor Medieval Festival and Joust
Jun. 1st, 2007 02:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wendyzskiA nice little first year show - the name was bigger than the site :) but the crowds were surprisingly good and very interested. When you have at least 50 people sitting in the pouring cold rain to watch the opening day joust, you are obviously doing SOMETHING right.
We headed out later than we'd hoped as Andrea had to work late, and we had a couple of issues with the cartop carrier - Fred's car is different. But all was eventually secured. We introduced Fred to Steeleye Span and Tempest, I watched most of 'Steamboy' on my DVD player and Andrea worked on her 'puter. We arrived aroung 12:40AM to the Hickory Hills Motel - your usual small local motel, though with a nice view of some pretty cows across the street come morning.
Important note - when all three of the people in your room independantly say "Have you even been tested for sleep apnea?" it's a good idea to tell your doctor. I'm sure![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
woodywhistler will feel a lot better once he is able to breathe through the night - I know WE will! He plans to tell his doctor that he needs to be tested for health reasons - if he doesn't get treated his bandmates are gonna kill him!
We knew that Saturday was going to be a thing to be endured - it was going to be chilly and rainy all day, so we expected to pretty much have no one. I was surprised that pepople actually showed up, and :we have a fan - his name is dan:. He came to ALL our sets - even to sitting by himself in the pouring rain for half an hour so that we wouldn't feel we were playing to no one. We gave him a CD. That really makes our job MUCH easier.
The rest of the day was not too much fun but we got though it, which was pretty much the point. For a 1st year faire in crappy weather the turnout was pretty substantial. These guys spent on advertising and it showed. Also the gate price was only $8 for adults - "A whole day of fun for the price of a movie". Other faires could learn a lesson from these guys.
We went to dinner and the standard WalMart run - the motel's "breakfast" consisting of sugary snack cakes and bright red twinke-looking things and I wanted some actual protein. At Culvers, a little girl with a flower painted on her face came up to me in line and said "I saw your show. You sing pretty". Awwwww!jcw_da_dmg was placing his order ahead of me, and she said "tell him I said Hi too!" Even more awwww, and I made her wait till he ordered so she could say it herself. At Walmart we met the usual odd looks and a lot more of "oh that joust thing is this weekend, ain't it?"
Sunday was much better weather-wise, and the crowds started showing up even before the usual after-church hour we had expected. We did our scheduled sets, plus a little extra that just "semeed right" - a quiet 5:30 after the joust in a nice shady spot halfway back to the gate. For entertainment, they had us, Mistress Bawd (now living in WY), Reggie the dulcimer player from MNRF - we had a nice time chatting the music biz with him - a group of pretty decent local belly dancers, and the Shattock Schoole of Defense. They also had a couple of newbies with them this time, so we comisserated a bit about that. And we learned that whenever things slow down in a show, the best thing in the world is to kick a Scotsman in the crotch. Seems to work for them at any rate. The folks that run Four Kingdoms Faire were there with their re-enactment group, and I think my favorite costume there actually belonged to a dog. There was a lady who had kitted her sled-dog-looking-mutt up with a travois and harness (stuffed with packing peanuts of course) and he tugged it around all day - very nice doggy and a very good photo op. There was a rebab player with the dance troupe, so we were all music-geeking at it.
Saturday afternoon Andrea's mom drove up from Chicago to see the show and she stayed with her Sunday night. The rest of us went to the local Chinese Buffet with the owners, though we bailed out on the mass POTC outing - I was pretty sure I'd fall asleep in a nice cool dark theatre, no matter how many 'splosions there were.
Monday was much the same as Sunday, thought traffic was pretty light until after the local Memorial Day parade was over. Generally it was a very small-town type of crowd - families with small kids for the most part, with a light sprinkling of faire junkies. There was no booze sold, but a couple of local restaurants stepped up to the plate with some nice versions of the usual faire food. The turkey legs looked nice and juicy, and the beef stew in a bread bowl was wonderfully thick and meaty. There were a few vegetarian options as well. Snacks included kettle corn and pickles, both sold from a cart. Vendors were the usual mix - a potter, a blacksmith, a couple of artists, several imported weapons places and a couple of leatherworkers, one candlemaker and the usual smattering selling "celtic" t-shirts and throws, incense and beads, pirate flags and the like. The jousters were the same as we had last year at WiRF, and there were some decent attempts at disguising the fact that the site was pretty obviously a Wild West Show grounds. There were a couple of layout issues - the stages were kind of close together considering the size of the site, the front gate was in a wierd place (Though that was fixed after day 1) and the first things you saw coming in from the parking lot were the Pepsi wagon and the big blue dumpster. But in general, we've seen 1st year shows do a lot worse than this. I hope they are able to keep this one going for a while - it was a nice little show. There is a place in the world for $20 shows and for $8 shows, and that's just fine with me.
I napped most of the way home whilejcw_da_dmg and woodywhistler had some eccentric geezer bonding in the front seat over tapes of 'The Goon Show'. Andrea had actually left early to go home with her mom. We got back to ChiTown around midnight. All in all, not a bad first road-outing for the new group.
We headed out later than we'd hoped as Andrea had to work late, and we had a couple of issues with the cartop carrier - Fred's car is different. But all was eventually secured. We introduced Fred to Steeleye Span and Tempest, I watched most of 'Steamboy' on my DVD player and Andrea worked on her 'puter. We arrived aroung 12:40AM to the Hickory Hills Motel - your usual small local motel, though with a nice view of some pretty cows across the street come morning.
Important note - when all three of the people in your room independantly say "Have you even been tested for sleep apnea?" it's a good idea to tell your doctor. I'm sure
woodywhistler will feel a lot better once he is able to breathe through the night - I know WE will! He plans to tell his doctor that he needs to be tested for health reasons - if he doesn't get treated his bandmates are gonna kill him!We knew that Saturday was going to be a thing to be endured - it was going to be chilly and rainy all day, so we expected to pretty much have no one. I was surprised that pepople actually showed up, and :we have a fan - his name is dan:. He came to ALL our sets - even to sitting by himself in the pouring rain for half an hour so that we wouldn't feel we were playing to no one. We gave him a CD. That really makes our job MUCH easier.
The rest of the day was not too much fun but we got though it, which was pretty much the point. For a 1st year faire in crappy weather the turnout was pretty substantial. These guys spent on advertising and it showed. Also the gate price was only $8 for adults - "A whole day of fun for the price of a movie". Other faires could learn a lesson from these guys.
We went to dinner and the standard WalMart run - the motel's "breakfast" consisting of sugary snack cakes and bright red twinke-looking things and I wanted some actual protein. At Culvers, a little girl with a flower painted on her face came up to me in line and said "I saw your show. You sing pretty". Awwwww!
jcw_da_dmg was placing his order ahead of me, and she said "tell him I said Hi too!" Even more awwww, and I made her wait till he ordered so she could say it herself. At Walmart we met the usual odd looks and a lot more of "oh that joust thing is this weekend, ain't it?"Sunday was much better weather-wise, and the crowds started showing up even before the usual after-church hour we had expected. We did our scheduled sets, plus a little extra that just "semeed right" - a quiet 5:30 after the joust in a nice shady spot halfway back to the gate. For entertainment, they had us, Mistress Bawd (now living in WY), Reggie the dulcimer player from MNRF - we had a nice time chatting the music biz with him - a group of pretty decent local belly dancers, and the Shattock Schoole of Defense. They also had a couple of newbies with them this time, so we comisserated a bit about that. And we learned that whenever things slow down in a show, the best thing in the world is to kick a Scotsman in the crotch. Seems to work for them at any rate. The folks that run Four Kingdoms Faire were there with their re-enactment group, and I think my favorite costume there actually belonged to a dog. There was a lady who had kitted her sled-dog-looking-mutt up with a travois and harness (stuffed with packing peanuts of course) and he tugged it around all day - very nice doggy and a very good photo op. There was a rebab player with the dance troupe, so we were all music-geeking at it.
Saturday afternoon Andrea's mom drove up from Chicago to see the show and she stayed with her Sunday night. The rest of us went to the local Chinese Buffet with the owners, though we bailed out on the mass POTC outing - I was pretty sure I'd fall asleep in a nice cool dark theatre, no matter how many 'splosions there were.
Monday was much the same as Sunday, thought traffic was pretty light until after the local Memorial Day parade was over. Generally it was a very small-town type of crowd - families with small kids for the most part, with a light sprinkling of faire junkies. There was no booze sold, but a couple of local restaurants stepped up to the plate with some nice versions of the usual faire food. The turkey legs looked nice and juicy, and the beef stew in a bread bowl was wonderfully thick and meaty. There were a few vegetarian options as well. Snacks included kettle corn and pickles, both sold from a cart. Vendors were the usual mix - a potter, a blacksmith, a couple of artists, several imported weapons places and a couple of leatherworkers, one candlemaker and the usual smattering selling "celtic" t-shirts and throws, incense and beads, pirate flags and the like. The jousters were the same as we had last year at WiRF, and there were some decent attempts at disguising the fact that the site was pretty obviously a Wild West Show grounds. There were a couple of layout issues - the stages were kind of close together considering the size of the site, the front gate was in a wierd place (Though that was fixed after day 1) and the first things you saw coming in from the parking lot were the Pepsi wagon and the big blue dumpster. But in general, we've seen 1st year shows do a lot worse than this. I hope they are able to keep this one going for a while - it was a nice little show. There is a place in the world for $20 shows and for $8 shows, and that's just fine with me.
I napped most of the way home while
jcw_da_dmg and woodywhistler had some eccentric geezer bonding in the front seat over tapes of 'The Goon Show'. Andrea had actually left early to go home with her mom. We got back to ChiTown around midnight. All in all, not a bad first road-outing for the new group.