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Blackbeard Pirate Festival, June 2008 - Hampton, VA
Chapter 4th - Saturday, Evening - Including various notes on dinner; a long, albeit not very diverting diversion into the lack of merit of hard tack; what really happened on the grassy knoll regarding the creation of a new slogan for Pirates in Paradise - for which the author claims no responsibility whatsoever - at all, in any way, never, nada, zip; a discussion of some of the new people he met at this event; his visiting the party boats at night; his finding the Bone Island Buccaneers there and some truly diverting diversions to make up for the hard tack stuff along with several irrelevant pictures to fill the space left by all those photographers. He really needs to bring his camera, even though he probably wouldn't use it. He's weird that way.
Returning freshly showered proved a pointless venture as your surgeon became indifferent sweaty within 25 minutes of leaving the vehicle. Fortunately, dinner was just getting underway at the campsite [See H.E.L - oh, to blazes with it.] and I didn't care. Dinner was apparently period correct, to be eaten on period correct dishes (of which your ship's surgeon has none), but Abbington supplied me from their stock and I was able to partake. Being vegetarian, I was concerned about the fare, but that proved but ill-founded. They had corn chowder not made of a chicken base (huzzah!), corn-on-the-cob, various breads and something that reminded me remarkably of Irish stew without meat (which I love).
(Photo: Michael Bagley)
Left: Joshua Sterling dining. He, of course, knew
enough to bring period correct dishes. I think he has a period-correct spoon
in his mouth, although I have not read in the literature that that's generally
the way it was held.
There were several discussions with Joshua Sterling on the long walks between the campsite to the docks. (My feeeet!) He's a cheerful kid with a sweet disposition. (I'm sure as a pirate he won't appreciate that comment. Sorry Josh.) He's been involved in many different period re-enacting events including cowboys and pirates. (Admit it, these are all the things you - especially if you were a young boy- would love to have done.) He says that pirates are his favorite. He was also happy he got out of an entire week of school last year to attend the Pirates in Paradise. I asked him if he had to write a paper or report on the event (as one of those sly things teachers do to wreck your vacation), but he said no. Things sure have changed since I got out of school to go on vacation.
Period correct hard tack complete with weevil holes.
There was also hard tack. I had read in W. R.
Thrower's book (Life at Sea in the Age of Sail) that you had to
soak hard tack in the soups or stews that were frequently served on
Naval vessels. I explained this to everyone who had taken some to show
just how much I knew about sea fare. However, soaking hard tack was
apparently some form of 18th century prank played on newby pirates,
because 10 mins. of soaking produced precious little softening results.
I decided that the hard take must actually have been provided a souvenir of some sort as there could be no way to ingest it. Personally, I saved my piece of hard tack which I plan to shellac and use to kill cockroaches with. Following dinner, I was once again pressed into carrying something – this time a huge basin of water which we filled at a generous condo-dwelling family that lived on the border of the park.
We then repaired to the grassy knoll where the Bone Island Buccaneers were hanging out, eating a late edition of dinner (they weren't period correctly dressed and thus couldn't enter the campsite where dinner was served) made special for them by Cookie, the chief cook who worked with Aminjiria's parents to provide everyone with a fine repast. The Bone Islanders enjoyed their meal immensely from all reports. (As proof that the universe is completely unfair, Scarlet Jai, who is nice and slim ate three times as much as Nigel, who is robust.) They then disappeared to visit a rum distributor (some details of which will be related later).
(Photo: Mary Diamond)
(Photo: Mary Diamond)
The grassy knoll was sort of a Bone Island hang out.
Earlier in the day, Mary Diamond crossed blades with Bone Island Buccaneers Scarlett Jai (left) and Spike Pierce (right). How does Mary do it in her heavy traveling garb?!
(Photo: Shana/ withoutaname)
(Photo: Shana/ withoutaname)
Lying lazily on the grassy knoll, your ship's surgeon was soon joined by withoutaname
(Shana) and Justin. We had a jolly time discussing costuming, re-enacting and things
that happened at PiP after hours which they seemed recall much better than I for some
reason. Shana and I determined that we may have been separated at birth and became fast
friends. She and Justin were generous with their Goslings rum which is a good way to warm
the good old ship's surgeon heart to you after hours.
Shana, with mug (left) and Justin, with mug (right ). I sense a theme here...
(Photo: Cheeky Actress)
While we're talking about interesting people met this weekend, let me mention
Dutch (bcddutchman on the pyracy pub forum.) who is with the local
Blackbeard crew.
I had really hoped to chat with him more, as he was part of the reason I had
decided to got to this event. We had been discussing period correct food, about
which I had recently come across copious quantities of quotes in William
Dampier's and Woodes Roger's books. However, Dutch was heavily involved in
organizing the festivities and had to parse out his time dearly. He had
wonderfully filthy togs that suggest the likely state of clothes on the typical
sailor. (He must have dragged those slops on a cross country journey, taking all
the back dirt roads he could find.) Dutch showed me a bit of the seine (a sort of
fishing net, see our
discussion about seines at the pyracy.pub if you're curious) he was making. This
astounded me; one chance citation from a book I had put on the web forum and he had
started creating a period-correct version of it! He was very energetic and was a huge
promoter of the event. I'd like to get him out to the more laid back
Pirates in Paradise
event in November where he wouldn't be organizing and we could discuss pyracy over
conch fritters. Possibly during a battle I was supposed to be attending.
Left: Dutch inciting the colonists at the bridge. His slops give new meaning to the word.
Kate insisted I hear all about the proposed slogan for PiP 2008 directly
from the source – who was none other than Cheeky Actress. I can't
possibly recite the tale in all its glory here (ask Cheeky), but suffice
it to say that their proposed slogan for PiP '08 is "Reach for a
Leech." They seemed to feel that I had some responsibility for this
although I wasn't anywhere near them when they came up with this
thing. (Leaches are NOT PERIOD for surgeons as near as I can tell,
dammit. They were definitely around after and may have been around
before, but I've found no reference to them in period material. So
there. [Note: I have to retract this as I have since found some
references - 7/2011]
(Photo: Cheeky Actress)
Shortly after that happened they were joined by Captain Sterling and
Aminjiria/Mad Jack who began to discuss things that seemed to involve your
humble surgeon in some way and this whole NON-PERIOD leach thing
behind my back (they having formed some sort of mutant circle behind the
original circle formed by me, Kate, Shana and Justin.) Finally, I was
forced to find a space so I could at least face these incorrect surgical
procedures head on with my own self. This attempt ended utter failure, so
I wandered off to the boat dock to see the disco ship at night (which I
had heard was quite the spectacle).
Once on the boat docks, the disco ship quickly became apparent. (It was indeed quite the spectacle - naturally it had a rotating, lighted disco ball front and center. How this related to piracy is a bit of a mystery I did not solve.) Their was also a cool haunted ship lit by black lights along with so many other oddments. There several drunken parties in full swing amongst the boat people. Among the oddments were none other than the Bone Island Buccaneers, Mad Mary Diamond and Lily. They were all hauling around cases and bottles of Pirate's Choice Rum so I darted off to find the on-ramp to the docks where all the fun was occurring.
The case of rum included some Molasses Reef flavored- and a really fascinating Key Lime flavored-Rum, of which I wound up carrying a bottle - much to the detriment of the bottle. Before it was given to me, however, Nigel proved that old physics saw that full bottles are less likely to break than less than full bottles by bouncing the Key Lime rum off the concrete dock. The Pirates C. rum distributor was leading the parade, so I handed out samples from my bouncing Key Lime bottle with the best of them and bonded with the Bone Island Buccaneers. Very yummy, although not exactly like traditional rum.
(Photo: Cheeky Actress)
Somewhere along the way we lost the majority of the Bone Island Crew - I think they
staggered back to camp to share what remained of their case of rum - and I wound up
being escorted, arm in arm, by Scarlett Jai and Mad Mary (which is a picture I badly
wanted to have for you in this Surgeon's Journal. Someone took one and promised me
that she would get it to me, but no emails were exchanged and, for some reason, I
forget her face.) Scarlett pulled out her bullwhip (OF COURSE she had a
bullwhip) and started trying to crack it. Failing that, your humble surgeon, who
actually ones one, tried. Failing that, Mad Mary tried and succeeded, this being a
fine bit of irony. The result was more celebratory rum drinking and the further
escorting of your ship's surgeon (why not?)
(Photo: Michael Bagley)
We eventually wound up back at camp and shared rum with everyone we met
along the way. (Drinks all around!) We wandered over to the campfire
that was formally the cooking fire. The rest of the crew - the ones who
wisely stayed close to home when drinking vast oceans of rum - were
involved in singing some truly astounding shanties.
Several of the people this weekend were involved in pirate-oriented bands and they were all joining in. Being somewhat drunk at this point, I joined in without really knowing the words and even the excellent singers didn't seem to mind. Much. After several songs, I was extremely tired, having gotten only three hours of sleep last night...this morning....whenever I wrote this, so your ship's surgeon crawled back into his hole and zipped up the entrance for the night.
He sure wishes had gotten a picture of himself with Mad Mary and Scarlett Jai, though...
Left: Mary and Scarlett - without Mission in the shot. *Mournful Sigh...*