over the weekend, Kevin and i went to the 41st annual Fort De Chartres Rendezvous, just outside of Prairie du Rocher, Illinois.  it’s about two and a half hours south of springfield.

“Rendezvous is a re-creation of the traditional Frech fur trapper’s holiday of the Eighteenth Century, and is one of the oldest and largest events of its kind in the United States. Join with the buckskinners, militiamen, artisans, and entertainers as they celebrate life in the shadows of the great fortress known as Fort de Chartres.”

that’s what it says in the brochure, anyway.

Kevin was going down there because other guys in the 114th were going to, to run the shooting competition.  kevin said they’d like it if i brought my laptop; i could enter the scores into a database.

we got up EARLY on saturday morning and made it to the fort by 10.  it was already sweltering hot, and there were people all over the place dressed in full wool uniforms.  primitive tents were set up all around the fort, and people were selling all kinds of period stuff.  first thing,  kevin went to the shooting area and i set up in the delightfully air-conditioned office.

a big marching thing was about to get underway, and i noticed the men not wearing any pants right outside my window.  now, there were some guys dressed as indians and they REALLY weren’t wearing much, but i’m not exactly sure who these guys were representing.  the pantsless fur traders, perhaps.

scottish guys marching in.  i’m not entirely clear on why there are scottish troops represented here.  look at the little kid with the big drum.  there were plenty of kids at the event, including three adorable little boys dressed as indians – as we walked by, the one who was probably about five was tying the loincloth of the littlest kid, who couldn’t have been more than three.

those were the scots, and these must have been the frenchmen marching in.  i loved their fire engine red pants, although i’m sure they’re not called pants, but i know they’re not bloomers…knickers, maybe?  very colorful.

this guy was a chaplain of some sort, and he was wheeling one of those little cart things that help you walk – he was moving so fast, though, that i didn’t get the best picture of him.

here are the guys at the shooting area.  is it called a “range” here, i wonder?  i guess it is, but it seems that maybe there should be some old-timey word for it.  anyway, there were five guys working the shoot, but attendance was way way way less than they expected.

one of the guys had brought me some authentic clothes to wear, which i’m sure consisted of a big dress and a bunch of hot stuff.  luckily kevin told them i had poison ivy, so nobody seemed to care that i wasn’t dressed authentically.  plus, of course, i was mostly IN THE OFFICE, so i don’t think it mattered anyway.  maybe, if i hadn’t been itching, i’d have worn the stuff – it did look kind of neat, but i continue to not completely wrap my head around the concept of wearing all that hot, hot stuff when it’s over 90 degrees and unmercifully bright and sunny.

i love this shot of the woman craning her neck to check out the indian in the loincloth.  i also like the fact that although he looks so authentic, he’s carrying to big plastic bags of ice. the indians wore elaborate makeup; red all over their bodies, some had black all over their faces, plus warpaint.  their heads were shaved, and they all had feathers attached to them.

the pantsless shooter.

people pulled these oxen around the fort all day.

i wish i’d taken a picture of the little card in front of this thing that said what it was, exactly.  i said to myself, “i’ll remember the name of it,” even though i’m sure that when i was saying that to myself i KNEW THAT COULDN’T BE TRUE.  i could swear it was a teepee or something, but clearly it doesn’t look anything like a teepee.  ok, i just looked it up and it’s a wigwam, plus did you know that “teepee” is actually spelled “tipi?”  so that’s my lesson for the morning.

lots of the tents here just had people camping in them.

here’s my cute fella, hard at work!  jim leinicke, who organized the 114th guys for the shoot, has lots and lots of clothes from different periods, and he lent these to kevin.  except the fabulous tricorner hat, which i bought him for his birthday, or maybe for christmas.  many of the tents in back of him were the people selling the stuff.

there were just a few too many pelts for my taste.

this is the very front of the fort.

past all the vendors, there were more and more tents with elaborate set-ups, but the people were just there to be authentic and revel in their authenticness.

see all those ribbons hanging down in the middle?  clearly, these people got lots of awards for their setup, which did look very cool.

the thing is, they had to haul all this stuff into camp, and then back out again when it was over.  good LORD.  what if it had rained?  it would have been a very muddy mess, that’s what.

for some reason, captain jack sparrow from “pirates of the caribbean” was staggering all around.  he looked a lot like johnny depp, and he had the accent and the slurred speech and he was quite funny…but what, exactly, was he doling there?

this is my favorite picture, captain jack checking out the indian’s butt.

so i told you there weren’t many shooters there – they were expecting maybe 60 of them, and instead there were only 16.  so this is me, pretending to be hard at work at the computer.

soon i will have more pictures of the weekend.

ok then,

mrs. tuesday morning hughes.