And now for more adventures

[kareina]

My friend, aelfgyfu is visiting this weekend--it is her last stop on her Drachenwald tour this summer before returning to An Tir. She flew in last night, so I am taking a long weekend. She and I will do nearby sightseeing today, probably heading out to Gammelstad, and tomorrow, when lord_kjar is also off of work, we will do a road trip and hiking adventure, including such stops as Storforsen. Then on Saturday there is a sale of new and used Swedish Folk Dance costumes and accessories at the museum, and a visit to lord_kjar's parent's house. Finally on Sunday is SCA fighter practice (she has her armour with her, so it gives me an excuse to actually get mine out, too), followed by our normal folk music and dance. She flies out on Monday, whereupon I shall return to work and see how much I accomplish before our summer holiday starts.

In good news, this week I devoted my energy to doing something with my research from Italy, and managed to get the paper draft to a reasonable point to email it off to my boss down there for comment before I had to go to the airport to fetch aelfgyfu. It would be nice to get that one far enough along to submit it for publication. Heck, it felt great to actually do that with the paper from my PhD research last week Monday.

I never have typed up anything about our trip to Double Wars, so perhaps I should say something about that before I put down the computer and go play...

First of all, I cannot recommend spending a week in Cyrpus right before the event--acclimating one's body to the heat of a Mediterranean island right before camping in Sweden in the spring makes the cold seem even colder! Luckily, I have plenty of wool, which I wore, nearly constantly. The only time I didn't wear at least two wool tunics was the night of the banquet--the rest of my household was eating the banquet (I didn't buy a ticket as I don't eat that late at night), so I joined them and hung out in the hall visiting with people. Since I knew I would be inside all evening, with lots of other people I decided that I could put on my silk bliaut and enjoy feeling pretty. However, that plan might not have been so sensible--someone opened the doors and windows, so it still managed to get a bit cold in their. It also meant that when the ladies took her Majesty away for a "Hen party" (bridal shower is the closest US term, I think) I didn't go, because I was *not* dressed warmly enough to leave the hall. Therefore I don't know how a Hen party differs from a bridal shower (not that I have attended many of the latter, either).

I did see a bit of his Majesty's Stag party though, since after the men dragged him away from court the next evening to do penance for his sins* (by matching any knight who asked drink for drink) they brought him around to other parties as well--so they came by the camp where some musicians were singing and playing (gee, why would I be there?) for a bit--the poor King looked like he had been doing a fair bit of penance at that point. Indeed, it wasn't that long later I saw the Queen, who reported that she had tucked him into bed, with a bucket nearby, just in case...

I am told that this year's Double Wars was a record for classes--56 different classes offered over the week+ of the event (which, given there are only somewhere near 200 people attending, is a rather good number!). I, however, only went to one of them, and then only because the others in my household were going (tips on easy ways to make a period looking box or chest using easily available modern supplies, taught by the other laurel in my shire, so I didn't really have to travel so far to get the information). Why did I attend so few classes? Because my time has been SO full lately that to counterbalance it I didn't even look at the event schedule! I made it to the Laurel's meeting, to Court, to the banquet, to the ball, and I fought in the Rose tourney--that was the sum total of the things on the official calender that I attended (and I didn't know about the ball in advance, just heard an announcement when someone came to the vigil to announce it to the people waiting their turn.

Ah, yes, the vigil! Early on after my arrival at the event (which was Tuesday, since my obligation to go to Cyprus with the undergrad geology trip meant that I was late to the event and missed the first weekend), as I was relaxing and enjoying my new sunshade, I commented that it would be nice if a party came to the sunshade one evening. Very soon after that I noticed some people scurrying in and out of the Frostheim tent, which, like my pavilion, also faced into my sunshade. One of them was a knight, carrying a nice wooden wash basin and ladle. Being able to put two and two together fairly quickly, I went over and asked if they would like to store some of the armour from that tent in my pavilion for the evening, and was met with a grateful "yes". I carefully did not ask for whom the vigil was, because I like surprises, but it was impossible not to notice that they were setting up for one, having done that myself before.

Therefore I was not surprised when they called up the knights during court, and watched eagerly to to see who it would be when the Crown determined that their numbers were not complete, and sent them out to find the candidate, Viscount William of Richwood. I was very delighted with the choice--while I haven't had the chance to cross swords with him (since I haven't really fought much since moving here), William has always been the epitome of knightly chivalry, and I think he will be a wonderful addition to the order.

Since the vigil tent was in our camp that meant that I could enjoy an evening at "home", and have a party come to me, since the waiting area was around the fire under our sunshade. This made me very, very happy. Indeed, camping in my pavilion at all made me happy. At the end of the event, as we were packing up and getting ready to go one of my household members commented that she and her partner (lord_kjar's brother) were both a little homesick and ready to return north. I realized that although I had been quite homesick in Cyprus, I was not at all homesick at the event--I had my pavilion and my loved ones with me, I was "Home" already!.

Be that as it may, the trip home was also nice--I recommend road trips in full sized buses that have been remodeled into a mobile home. For part of the trip we passengers gathered around the coffee table near the driver and chatted, worked on projects, and shared yummy food. For other parts we stretched out in the bunk beds, or along the bench seats, and slept. (One of the fighters was feeling tired and sore from lots of fighting during the week and took one of the bunk beds early in the trip and slept through a full 11 hours before waking up again!) The 23 hours it took to get home went very quickly, and with lots of hands to help we had our stuff unloaded and into the apartment within 30 minutes of arrival. We got home about noon on Sunday, which meant that we had time to put away some things and relax a bit before heading to Swedish folk dancing that evening.

If anyone wants to see photos from the event, I didn't take any, but liadethornegge did and she has them on line. she also collected links to other people's albums.




*At the end of court, when the herald asked if there was any further business one of the Knights came forth, accompanied by a robed and hooded representative of the inquisition, and they did accuse the Crown of all seven sins. They read out each sin, and shared a funny Pennsic story about the King that exemplified that sin, at which point he had to confess that yes, that was him, then they hauled him away for penance/stag party, and the Queen closed court...

Comments

[darttn.livejournal.com]

Sounds like you had an exceptional time at double wars!