Ready for battle

We had an opportunity last weekend to take the new camper on its second adventure.  We headed off to Canon City, Colorado?  Why you ask would anyone go camping in the prison capital of the USA?  Our favorite grandson was in a sword play tournament.

Irv hates having campfires.  I love campfires so I insisted on one the first night.

Even Mr. Beans got into roasting some marshmallows.  He likes to burn his so it's ready quickly.  I like to slowly roast mine and then make a s'more out of it.

A beer by the campfire...doesn't get better than this.  I think even Mary enjoyed it.

The next morning Shiloh got up early and drove himself to the tournament grounds.  His day was filled with classes prior to the 3:00 tournament so we had some time to kill.  There was a big rock shop across from the hotel.  It had really cool stuff...we ended up going there not once, but twice.

Irv got a kick out of spraying the rock with water to bring out the colors.

Around 2:00 we headed to the Abbey.  Irv was Shiloh's squire and helped him get ready for battle.

I had never been to one of these tournaments before.  Let me tell you, it's not fake stuff.  They really go after each other.  Shiloh got stuck in the thigh  which really made him mad.  

He ended up coming back to win the match after de-arming his opponent.

He had a giant grin on his face all day.

Day two was armor day.  They wear lots of protection and need lots of help getting ready.

Shiloh is slowing collecting his own armor, but he doesn't have a full set yet.  His teacher loaned him several pieces so that he could compete in armor.

Keep in mind that it was near 100 degrees and Shiloh has to put on nearly 80 lbs. of gear.

The squire is there to keep Shiloh from having to exert any energy prior to battle.

The goal is to keep him as protected as possible.

Ready to go!  We had to keep him in the shade because he very quickly got too hot to touch.

This helmet almost was the end for Shiloh.  He couldn't see anything and his opponent ended up getting his sword up under it and scraped Shiloh's neck.  It is all about safety so in his next rounds....

...one of his teammates loaned him a helmet with plenty of  chain maille to keep his neck protected.

Irv had to borrow Shiloh's shirt and pants and dress up like a squire once the tournament started.  They only allow proper time period attire on the far side of the field to keep the photographs authentic.

In one of his final matches Shiloh gave everyone a scare.  He almost went over the fence, but then fell forward.  We all thought he was passing out, but no, he's just made of rubber and that's how he protected himself from going over backwards.  Notice his squire is right there to help.

These two are quite a team.

Here's a video of his triple challenge on armor day.  Enjoy!

Did I mention there was a photography contest?  There are lots of rules, most notably there can't be anything "modern" in the background.  I took over 300 photos and came up with five to submit.

Below are two additional photos that didn't make my cut, but I thought they were pretty good too.