The first thing that was noticable this opening day of the Greater St. Louis Renaissance Faire's fourth season was the great amount of vendors. The faire now boasts around 80 booths. Of course, just like the past couple of years, the faire size has again grown as well. Each year, these dedicated volunteers carve more niches and walkways in the surrounding 30+ acre forest in order to re-create Petit Lyon, France in the year 1549. Yep, for those paying attention, the faire has moved forward a few years in the future (uh... the past, future, that is). Francois the first died two years ago, leaving his second son, Henri II the monarch of France. The faire has also developed numerous guilds for volunteers to join. There's a guild for villagers, Scots, Germans, pirates, nobles, revelers, religious, military, and even faeries and magicians. Those that run the children's realm have put together a nifty scavenger hunt that leads the tykes and their parents throughout the faire in order to collect stamps from all the things to see and do at the faire. Ingenious!
I've got to say, the faire is growing quick. So quick that it's becoming difficult for me to thoroughly capture images to represent everything at that is now at the faire (and still have time to let myself be entertained by the hard work of the cast and crew). I regret that I'm only able to attend the faire one day during the first two weekends, and I apologize in advance for any images that I miss. Once again, the efforts of the great people that work incredibly hard year-round to pull off this three week show have really paid off. It's not hard to tell that these folks have spent a lot of energy to give us all a good show. It's also not difficult to see that in the upcoming years, this is going to be a great venue for rennies everywhere to visit in the spring.
As Always... click on the image for a larger view...
3 Pints Gone, a new, yet familiar tradition
