I’ve been meaning to post this for a few days, but I’ve been too busy! I went to King Richard’s Faire (KRF) this past weekend with a few friends from college and we had a blast. The new fairgrounds was something I wanted to see to compare it to the last fairgrounds, and overall I wasn’t super impressed with the new location, but it’s not a bad change. I think it’s somewhat of a lateral move for the annual faire and definitely a much bigger location.
I didn’t take as many pictures as I’d have liked and even then, the ones my friends sent apparently aren’t “displayable on the web” because of formatting issues, so I’ll try to post this first then fill it in later with photos.
I’ll be super descriptive though.
Arrival Time: 11:50 AM
I showed up to the faire parking grounds at 11:50, which was a solid 15 minutes later than I would have liked to, but the main grounds were full, and so we all parked at the Plymouth airport. This was a pretty sizeable parking lot and they had a shuttle that led to and from the fair itself. I watched a shuttle bus leave while I was parking and sat in line for another 30 minutes before the next one even arrived. Unfortunately the busses were caught in the same traffic that many other people were since they were all headed to the same place on a 2 lane road and ingress was slow. I was speaking with people in line about the fair, and many people came for the same reason I did: to see the new locale. Costumes were anywhere from “slapped together (mine) to artisan levels of leatherwork”, which was nice to see! As the bus rolled up, we all got on and the bus driver was super funny. I didn’t wait for my friends because the line was horrendous. Sorry not sorry lol.
Entering the Park
First problem was buying a ticket. I bought one online and it was delivered to my inbox but then when I got to the park, I couldn’t get cell data to download and open the image. Thankfully the park had great wifi coverage — created by wizards, obviously.
Before you even get to the entrance, the entire front area of the park is surrounded by a large picket fence. This fence extends pretty far in both directions. This funnels everyone entering the park into this small boardwalk that has a few buildings, some of which are operational shops. It has a “Disney Land” feel to it. It was pleasant to walk by. I would describe it as a picturesque 1960’s storefront for the building and a 2020’s feel to the branding/logos. Not in a bad way!
Following that, there’s two large ticketing toll booths where they were doing scans of your QR code. I eventually was able to pull mine up and gain admittance. It’s weird being at a renfaire alone while waiting for someone. I had a good time but didn’t want to stray too far from the entrance so I wandered around the small “towne” that was between the entrance and the “tavern”. Many of these shoppes had cloth, leather and ceramic goods. Some had fantasy maps and laser cut keychains. It’s kind of like the next step up from a farmer’s market for storefronts since it’s both seasonal and niche. Cool goods! Almost bought some.
Once you get past the initial shoppes there’s a stage on the left past a few tents that contained leather and paper goods. I am always wary of buying things at parks so I decided to pass. There was a tent for creating a TTRPG character, leveling them up and completing a quest. That’s actually nice as it probably tricks people who wouldn’t otherwise be interested in D&D to play “D&D-lite”, then you tell them they just played D&D and they transform into the brain exploding emoji IRL.
After those tents, there’s a small sitting area on the left side. At that stage, I watched the “Loud Mime Comedy Show” who was a comedian with a mohawk who was juggling knives. It was actually a REALLY good show. I wish I had caught more of it, but was only there for the latter half sadly. Following the show, I walked around and asked a few of the leather shoppes about their work, being a bit of a leatherworker myself. I was surprised that they were able to charge so much for some of their stuff but I also completely get that A) if you know nothing about leather the prices are actually reasonable and B) it’s a quick upgrade to any outfit to add a nice belt pouch or a potion holder. It has reignited my vigor to get good at leatherworking though!
I didn’t go see the Mud Show but I highly recommend it, having seen it in prior years. Instead I opted to see the “Washing Well Wenches” show, which was a raunchy raucous romp and quite fun I might add. The comedians poked fun at a bunch of guys who were there with girlfriends and significant others. As much as I wanted to participate, I didn’t meet the criteria lol.
My friends texted me shortly thereafter to tell me they were taking an Uber to the park. I don’t blame them. By the time I left on the bus the line was probably going to be a 1-2 hour wait. I think next year the aim will be to arrive at 9:45 AM lol.
Friends, let us rejoice! Huzzah!
I met my friends Bethany and Alicia near the entrance to the park, and both were dressed up for the occasion. I thought their outfits were great and think people should dress up more often. We started off by walking around and checking out some of the tents, and then attending the whipping guy’s show over on the Queen’s Stage. He cracks whips rhythmically and sings songs. It was very entertaining! It was a show that both Bethany and Alicia had wanted to see because they’d seen him at prior faires. I do like that they have a lot of the same performers and it’s cool that both of them had seen this guy before. I’m pretty sure it was my first time seeing him but he did a great job. He engaged the audience and had fun. We didn’t stay for the whole show since seating was limited and lines of sight were narrow and sparse.
After that, we went to get some food (which is a whole thing) and I sat and talked with a guy while I waited for them. The guy was telling me his 5 year old grandson was “knighted” at the park because he looped some ring on the dragon-slaying ride and that they had brought him here when he was 1 year old and he remembered it so well that they just had to come back. That’s so great. That kid is gonna love Renaissance faires! Alicia and Bethany got arrived with the “classic turkey leg” in haul lol. I wish I had a picture of that thing tbh, it’s pretty big and a KRF staple. The pulled-pork nachos were way too big, but I finished them because… Well I don’t have a good reason. It’s meat, cheese and carbs, how can you not finish it?? Double question mark for exasperated incredulousness.
Ye Olde Lane of Memories (Personal stuff — skip if uninterested)
Reminisced for a while with Alicia and Bethany while we ate some sweets. I can’t say how nice it’s been to hang out with people from college again and to see how their lives have been and changed. I’m glad Bethany reached out to me to see Rilo Kiley a few weeks ago because it’s led to so many cherished memories already. My friends were already going to that show so it was incredibly serendipitous and I was able to hang out with them beforehand.
The following week I went to Portland Oregon (which you can read about in this very blog!) and the week after that I went to see Immortal Technique. Bethany and I hung out beforehand and went to a local “international cuisine” festival in Somerville, MA. We had some sisig and kulfi. Both things I’d never tried and both were absolutely delicious. After we parted ways around 7, I walked back to my car and drove 15 minutes to a parking lot near the Middle East (a venue on Newbury St.) for the Immortal Technique show. At the show, I ran into my friend Maryam from college while in line. Had a blast talking to her and catching up! She’s doing great and she was telling me about other people from college that she still talks with. Really cool vibes and very fun talking to her.
Back to the faire, I thought I was going to see Chris (Alicia’s SO) and their kid Adelaide (sp?) but alas, she traveled solo, which I totally get– a 2 year old might have been a bit much at the park. There were enough crying children already lol. Catching up with her was really nice too. I hadn’t seen her in like 10 years.
After not seeing anyone for a while, I’m just super happy to see that we’re all still extremely handsome and very funny lol. I’m serious! All my college friends still look the same or better, and that’s great considering all that’s happened in all these years. I feel like I look great compared to me a year ago. Tons of stuff going on in people’s lives! Suffice it to say, I’ve been catching up with a lot of people lately and it’s been great. I recommend you reach out and see how people are doing, especially if it’s been a while.
Smoking at KRF
I went off to smoke a cigarette before the day was out, and started talking to this woman named “Shivan” Now… I was gonna ask her if it was spelled like the dragon (https://gatherer.wizards.com/1E/en-us/0/shivan-dragon) but after talking to her for like 5 seconds I realized the joke would be lost and anyone named Shivan has probably heard it a bunch when talking to magic nerds like myself. Besides, I’m sure her name is actually spelled “Siobhan”, which is a gaelic name pronounced roughly “Sha – von”. Anyway, she lives in Cali and came to KRF with her 70 year old mother. She was out of control lol. Her blouse was hanging off her shoulder, she kept fussing with it and other certain things, and I had to re-tie her bracers (another reason I like buckles over lace!) then yell at her when she kept moving around lol. She was being super touchy-feely, which is fine, but like — invite me to dinner first lol. She was telling me about how she bought this drinking horn for like 50% the normal price instead of what some other guys had paid. She explained that they were Marines and then talked about her veterancy and tours and I thanked her for her service. It was a weird vignette and transition segment to the end of the day. But whatever, I like talking to people. Everyone’s weird. Insert Shruggie.
All’s Well that Ends Faire
At the end of the day people started vacating the fairgrounds pretty quickly. I ran into Bethany and Alicia on the backstreet of the initial fairgrounds and we took some great pictures. Bethany volunteered me to take pictures for a bunch of strangers, which I am happy to do so I don’t care. Whenever I go anywhere and see people struggling to take selfies I always offer to take pics of them for them. It is free, and it increases the general happiness in the world, so why not? It’s also a good opportunity to talk to people, ask them why they’re there, or how often they go, or where they’re from, etc.. I still don’t think I’m extroverted no matter how many times people say it.
As the faire was vacating, we got on the bus and someone gave us some frog stickers, a little frog figure thing, and some “rock facts”. I love this kind of stuff, especially when it’s weird and random and someone asks if you want something. As an FYI, I’m also very recruitable for cults and thoroughly enjoy esoteric cult-like behavior. Anyway, so we got these little trinkets and boarded the bus towards the parking lot. I really enjoy spending time with those two. So we stuck around and spoke for a bit afterwards and said our goodbyes, hugged it out and then went our separate ways with plans to meet back up at some point soon. I hope we do!
tl;dr
All in all, excited to go again. The tl;dr is something like…
Pros
- There’s a parking shuttle
- Everyone looked cool who was dressed up
- Lots of fun outfits to rent or look at
- Cool handmade goods to look at
- Discussing crafts with craftspeople
- Incredible talents and showpeople
Cons
- There’s a parking shuttle ;_;
- $5 water bottles (holy hell, the sticker shock here…)
- Everything is pricey, but you can haggle
I’m gonna be heading to Japan in like 5 weeks so expect that for some updates. Not sure if I’ll update any time in-between.
