Weekend in the Weald

[gothwalk]

We were all up early on Friday morning, and at the ferry port at 10:30, for the 11:30 sailing. I got there first, Cernac a few minutes afterward, and Master Sigmundr arrived with some extra tools, the legs of my armour, and sundry bits and pieces. We had a huge pile of stuff - I think something like eight bags and bundles of weaponry to check in. And then we found that the ferry wasn't sailing until 13:00, and then not until 14:00. So we waited, did some armouring work, Cernac went back into town in search of waxed thread, and eventually, we got on the ferry.

As soon as we were in reception range of the UK, we phoned ahead to check on the rental car, because we didn't actually get in until 18:30. Pile everything into the car, squeeze in alongside, and we're off. Much navigation later, we arrived at Vicomte Sir Michael's house in the Weald in Kent at 02:00 in the morning, got licked by Bear the German Shepherd, and crashed out.

Morning arrived in the form of Bear at 07:30. Up, and breakfast, and training. There were a number of useful things taught - both discussion-style and practical, showing us how to do things, and then exercises to improve them. We played baseball - at least the batting part - in armour, with swords as bats, for precision training. For some reason, I was far better with my left hand than my right at that. One thing that a few people said is that everything that you train in with the right hand, you should also train in with the left. I'm going to be doing a lot of that.

Sir Michael (the one from Scotland) was particularly helpful with basic things, and all the knights were really good teachers. King Elffin arrived in the afternoon, I think, and was giving good advice too - or rather, asking good questions of people.

There was a discussion in the evening, while the drinking was going on, of what Knighthood was about - the ideals and the practicalities. That was well worth while, even as it fractured into about six different conversations, all fascinating. I sat and talked with Cernac, Sixtus, Master Paul de Gory, and King Elffin for a long while. I'm very impressed by his Majesty, who's one of the nicest people I've met in the SCA - and that's saying something.

A few hours sleep, and then we were up again, to a small amount of individual training, and then melees. I was allowed play in the melees, despite not being authorised, and I learned almost as much from those as I did from watching the others fight in the bear pit. We did work on shield walls, and then Vicomte Michael gave command to Cernac and myself, as the least experienced people there. I got to play with squad level tactics, which was really really good fun, and I seemed to do well at it too - splitting our advancing wall, wheeling the wall around the side of the opposing wall, and I even got a kill myself, one which I was pleased with because I was applying things I had learned the previous day. Mostly, of course, I got killed, and I was very glad of the secure knees in my armour for falling onto.

There's an odd form of salute that I hadn't encountered before; something equivalent to a clap on the shoulder, I think - a tap of the sword tip on the left of the breastplate, with the words "Good call", or whatever.

At some point in this, too, I managed to take a firm whack in the right arm - I think Master Terafan was on the delivering end - which gave me my first good bruise as the armour bit a little and spread the damage a lot. I'm unreasonably proud of it.

Finally, we wound down slowly, as Master Paul and Vicomte Michael worked on a new piece of armour, and the rest of us sat and watched and talked.

The drive back was quiet - I slept through a lot of it, and we were back in Dublin on Monday morning at 08:30.

Comments

[iresprite.livejournal.com]

This is a very cool account. It almost makes me want to get out there and do armored combat. I ran into one of the Seattle Knights this weekend in a store and chatted with him for a while. Evidently, he was in a History Channel special I saw once! Very cool.

Anyway, please keep these stories coming. I find them highly fascinating. You'll have to show me some of the basics when I visit.