Sunday 19 June 2011

The day when I faced a berserker.


I have to admit this moment of yesterday made my stomach lurch a little bit. I mean, I knew he wouldn't chop me, I did. I just couldn't be absolutely 100% certain of that, that's all.

...oh, he didn't chop me.



It all happened at the Viking Days at Hafnarfjörður. We spent half a day there just walking around, eyeing booths and shows and generally taking in the scenery. Rather awesome, if I may say so! I loved people's clothing, the crafts and foods.


Here's some general photos of the area. Like always, all photos can be clicked bigger.


The event took place at Fjörugráin at Hafnarfjörður. I can recommend the place for their restaurant's menu and the surroundings as well. Not the best viking restaurant I've ever been to (that's Harald of Tampere, no question about it - om nom Canute's Shield + tar or cinnamon beer!) but among them, definitely.



Foods at the festival. Snu had a cup of traditional soup, which is made of lamb and veggies. And those critters on the grill are pork.


Naturally, since such a festival is for the whole family, there were various children's activities such as archery and ax throwing.


Drinking horn -maker on the left, in the middle is... agh. Please someone with better English skills, I need help. In Finnish we would call that "lautanauha" but what is it in English? Board weaving? Tablet weaving? Anyway, musicians on the right.


Naturally this was what interested me the most.


Guard on duty.


Then to the other thing that interested me the most, that is, the fight show! It started with these two guys, the red shirt accused the gray shirt of theft while the gray shirt insisted he had done nothing wrong.


Then they put him in the stocks and sheared his hair. And they really did that, it was no pretense or a trick! I went a bit FFFFFF when I realized this.


Except that while they were at it, someone had caught the real thief and this made things quite awkward for the red shirt. A group of loyal supporters of the gray shirt appeared...


...and there was much fighting!


At this point the red shirt realizes the fight is going sort of badly for his side.


Red shirt down!


They slit his throat after this (that was pretense though).


However, gray shirt was still in a fighting mood and used necromancy. It was super effective!


So he got another round with red shirt!


Every now and then the cleaning personnel showed up to clear the field.


Meanwhile...


Black clad guy was rather awesome, but nowhere near as awesome as gray shirt.


At this point the gray shirt asked the audience what he should do with the black clad. The children screamed frantically at him that he ought to
KILL HIM KILL HIM KILL HIM KILL HIM KILL HIM
which is how you can tell they were children and were having the time of their life.


Well, then he killed him. Got to keep the audience happy, no?


End part. This is where they all zombied up again to bow.


The gray shirt was still feeling like fighting,


so they attacked the audience. 


Would go again, oh I so would!

4 comments:

  1. That looks definitely cool! I'd have loved to see that fight show thingy! It looks like so much fun (and there is SWOOORDSSS, I like sowrds >__>'.)

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  2. I was wishing to see more spears and battle axes, but swords are cool too (and it's easier to have a showy show with swordfighting). I wish I knew the swordsmith, I'd love a chance at visiting his smithy.

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  3. Ooh, those included, that'd be way beyond awesome! Maybe you should give them an anonymous tip for the next time ;D.

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  4. Maybe I should try to partake next time... takes me back some years to my wild youth that included such things as larping and boffering...

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