Thursday, Octobers, 1989
The Battalion
Page 7
Eleven-year Renaissance Festival employee Tamera Norgaard paints a rose
on 5-year-old Houston resident Courtney Campbell’s cheek.
Texas
Renaissance
F estival
Celebration
offers fun for
all who attend
Story by Katsy Pittman
Photos by Kathy Haveman
Of The Battalion Staff
ear ye noblewomen and noblemen! It’s
time to eat, drink and be merry as the
15th annual Texas Renaissance Festival
beckens you to leave the 20th century
behind.
Hear the screams of an audience as two jousting
kinghts race toward each other in a deadly battle. Feel
your heart skip a beat as a chain-dragging, nine-foot
ogre arranges his bony fingers around someone else’s
neck. Breathe a sigh of relief as a lascivious wench flings
herself on another man until she is paid to unwrap her
self.
Regardless of what you already know about the Re
naissance, you can learn even more by traveling back in
time to this year’s Renaissance Festival.
“I learned all about the Renaissance era at A&M,”
said Wendy Hendricks, a 1989 A&M graduate from
Beaumont. “It’s neat to see what it was really like back
in the 16th century.”
Indeed, ’tis very easy to imagine you’ve stepped back
400 years as you listen to the chants of madrigal singers,
eat your way through a pheasant shish kebab and watch
jugglers throw flaming batons.
The only things out of place at the Renaissance Festi
val are the bathrooms (or “privies”), which are defi
nitely up to par with the 20th century.
And it’s a good thing they are. The Renaissance Fes
tival has drawn crowds up to 250,000 in its 15 years of
existence and it looks as though the crowds might break
that record this year.
So do you care to alleviate those weekend blahs?
There are about 50 different performances or dem
onstrations that go on each day at the Festival, many of
which repeat several times throughout the celebrations.
The two most suspenseful acts are “The Flaming Idi
ots” and “The Juggling Schlamazels.” Although it’s a
toss-up as to which juggling act makes your palms sweat
the most, the “Juggling Schlamazels,” two 16-year-olds
from Houston’s Bellaire High School, win the novice
prize hands down.
When the suspense gets to be too much, wander on
over to such comedy acts as “The Beggars of Meart,”
“Don Juan and Miguel” or the “Green Ogre.” However,
be ye warned! The acts are not always family oriented.
Can’t laugh anymore? Take flight with “Sir” John
Karger, the Royal Falconer, and his birds of prey show,
or watch Leonardo da Vinci repaint “The Last Supper.”
“Lady” Carol Shannon and her “Intriguing Belly
Dancers” show a lot of navel again this year. Or you can
go observe one of the many demonstrations of the Gu
tenberg press, blacksmiths or glassblowers.
There’s also an incognito A&M graduate parading
around — the king of the Festival himself — King
Henry VIII. However, Henry, like the other partci-
pants in the festival, believes he’s back in the 16th cen
tury, so straight answers are about as easy to find as an
empty bench in the shade.
If eating is a little more down your alley, you’ve come
to a timeless eating heaven.
“The food is definitely the best part of the Festival,”
said Tom Lindsay, a speech communications senior
from Kingwood.
With the plethora of foods being offered, it’s easy to
see how a patron could spend all day eating.
Try the Incredible Edible Toad Stools (fried mush
rooms), the Fyne Swine (roasted pork on a stick).
Dragon Eggs (Egg Rolls), Seymour’s Sceptre (chocolate
and nut-covered vanilla ice cream) and down it with
Lady Lynn’s Luscious Libations (coconut shells filled
with pina coladas, daiquiris or margaritas).
The apparent favorite every year is the Feast of Fowl,
or charbroiled turkey leg. So many of these gargantuan
drumstricks are consumed that the Festival’s cooks
must order them a year in advance.
Anyone worried that there are only 87 shopping days
until Christmas?
There are over 200 different shops filled with Cock
ney-accented retailers to remind you of this fact.
The shops encompass an incredible array of goods
including jewelry, clothing, musical instruments,
leather, woodcrafts, stained glass, potpourri, clocks,
candles, hats, knives . . . the wares go on and on.
A few of the more Renaissance-style goods are the
flowered hair wreaths (running from $8-$20), magical
crystals and coats of arms. Face and body painting
booths and elaborate hair-braiding shops also abound.
For $10 you can buy a more intangible good. Tarot
card, crystal ball, numerology, palm, and “aura” read
ings last for 15 minutes on the gypsy side of town.
If you’d like to work off a little stress from the first
round of exams, the Festival offers several forms of
physical fun.
The stocks are a great place to retaliate against your
roommate for monopolizing the phone. Once a pris
oner in the stocks, no one goes anywhere until someone
pays to get them out. A word of warning, however:
Captives tend to let a lot of secrets fly at this point.
Take, for instance, 12-year-old Amanda Adams, who
was locked up by her gleeful 15-year-old sister.
“If you don’t let me out now,” Adams threatened,
“I’ll tell mom about every single boy you’ve had in the
house!”
She was walking free in 30 seconds.
Other forms of fun are the “King of the Log” pillow
fights, the Mud Pit, the Knife and Axe throws, and the
“Drench a Wench.”
Or if you’d prefer to watch other people put their
lives in danger, go watch the chariot races or jousting at
the new Jousting Encampment.
“The jousting isn’t an act,” said Joyce Floyd, craft
coordinator for the Renaissance Festival. “It’s ex
tremely dangerous — they flat joust.”
If you’d like to catch all the sights, sounds and color
of the 16th century, the Renaissance Festival is open on
weekends through November 12th. It is located 50
miles north of Houston, between Plantersville and Mag
nolia on Highway 1774. Tickets are ordinarily $12.95
per adult, but being a lucky A&M student, you can pick
them up at the Rudder Box Office for only $ 10.95.
The Renaissance Festival is worth the 400-year wait.
In a jewelry booth called the “Wire Wizard,” mannequin
heads display the brass and nickel-plated headbands de
signed by Ken Cams.
Above: Full-time artist Dave
Sheppard paints his version of
Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last
Supper,” which Sheppard be
gan months ago. Sheppard ex
pects to finish the full-scale rep
lica, which varies slightly in
width from the original, in three
years.