The Dragons Are Flying And The Fun Is Infectious…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

The other jousting tournament that took place whilst we were visiting Pendennis Castle in Cornwall, England was of a sort that I hadn’t seen before.

Apparently all of the tournaments have their roots in  old medieval traditions, this one doesn’t involve full armour, just a helmet and the aim of each knight is to knock the red “dragon” off the top of his opponents helmet with a baton rather than with a long lance.

The thing that puts some extra excitement into the mix is that there can be lots of knights on the field at one time  so you might be busy focusing your attention attacking an opponent, but you have to watch your back as other knights come up behind you and try and attack you from behind.

There are always handshakes between the competing horsemen after each round,  this is a chivalrous sport after all. I get some action shots of stuffed dragons flying, and after each round the winner does a victory lap around the field, then all of the knights line up and ride a lap around the field to thank the supporters in the crowd. This tournament is full of energy and the horses and riders get closer to the crowd than with the jousting with the long lances so this event has a very different feel to the other tournament.

The crowd are as enthusiastic as the riders, there are plenty of “ohhh” and “aggggh” moments as the knights almost take tumbles and when one knight is within a hair’s breadth of toppling his opponents dragon but gets caught out when a different opponent comes up behind him and topples his instead.  There’s a lot of fun in this tournament and it’s infectious… and last summer when we visited, Family Kiwidutch also caught the bug.

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

 

We Support A Winning Joust…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Of course if you are coming to a castle that has a jousting festival on the weekend that you are visiting, then of course this is going to be the highlight of the day.

The announcer tells us that jousting is an actual sport, and their horses are especially trained so that they are used to the sport and the crowds.

Regular tournaments take place  and the participants can win various titles over the jousting season.

There are specific rules as well,  from what I understood (I didn’t catch the entire explanation due to the crowd noise around us) there is a special tip on the lance, and with a “hit” this tip comes off so that the winner of each joust can be determined. There are more rules but I didn’t catch the rest.

In this series of photographs the knights are jousting in armour, racing their horses down each side of a low fence so that the horses do not come in contact with one another.

Spectators can buy little flags in the colours of the knight they are “supporting” (money raised from the flags goes to the cost of staging the event) , Little Mr and Kiwi Daughter were delighted because the knight in the yellow and green colours was the eventual winner and they were the ones in the family who had this flag and they were the supporters of this knight. We all cheered for “our” knights and the noise from the crowd was certainly at times deafeningly enthusiastic. Who needs electronic games when some medieval entertainment can be so much fun?… (Ok,  after a whole day my kids might have a different opinion on that one ha ha!)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

This horse may have lost this round…but he can still manage a big grin for the camera…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

The knight we are supporting end up being the winner!

(photograph © Kiwidutch)