The opening of the 2004 Faire Season in Texas did not go at all well for me! Oh, I'd planned it out well enough: I'd put in for vacation at work, with my week off beginning on Opening Weekend at the Excalibur Renaissance Festival; and I was off early enough in the afternoon that I could rush back to the house, load all my gear into my truck and head on out to Smithville, beating the usual Friday night stampede out of Houston. So I made good time, arriving at the Rocky Hill Ranch near Smithville with plenty of daylight left to find a good campsite and pitch my tent. Just in time! The day HAD been sunny (Photo, Above: a view of the campground at Excalibur with members of the Trash Tribe in the foreground), but the weather deteriorated FAST: barely had I finished setting up camp but it began to rain. HARD! Needless to say, there wasn't much socializing going on so -- since I was tired from a full day's work already -- I turned in early with fond hopes of a good night's rest before faire on the morrow. Yeah. Right. SURE!!!
It was still raining sometime around 2am when I awoke to the sound of steadily-dripping water. Simultaneously, I also realized that my sleeping bag was soaking wet! Flicking on my flashlight, I quickly discovered there was a steady leak through the roof of my tent, directly above me. Now this posed a serious dilemma for me: I could stay abed and try to go back to sleep -- despite being thoroughly saturated, my sleeping bag was still quite warm and cozy from my body heat -- even tho the steady "drip-drip-drip" from the overhead leak was the natural equivilent of the infamous Chinese Water Torture in the enclosed space of my small tent; OR I could get up, get dressed, go outside and pull one of my spare tarps completely over my tent to stop the leak entirely. OK, so I wasn't COMPLETELY awake while I was thinking about my situation!
After a few moments' reflection, I decided to tackle the leak. Fortunately, I had a spare set of dry clothes handy -- all praise to the Godz for plastic totes with snap-on lids! -- so I dressed quickly, grabbed my foul weather gear and the extra tarp and stepped out into the rain. Now throwing the tarp over my tent might seem quick and simple and easy, but it proved to be a whole LOT harder to accomplish than it sounds! For one thing, wet nylon is slick. So is wet plastic. Put the two of them together and the "Coefficient of Friction" effectively drops to zero! It certainly didn't help the situation that there was also a goodly breeze blowing, which worked against me, too. All of which meant that, while I was working on one side of my tent trying to pull the tarp up and over the roof, the tarp was slowly sliding back down to the ground on the other! On to Plan B. I now broke out my hammer, spare tent pegs and some nylon line and systematically began tying down the tarp at every available grommet. That worked, even tho it wasn't easy trying to hold the tarp in place, wrestling with it in the wind and rain and darkness while simultaneously trying to set tent pegs at the same time. Fact is, it took almost an hour to accomplish that task -- by which time I was thoroughly soaked with sweat (my foul weather gear is great at keeping the rain at bay, but it's also terribly effective at holding body heat IN!); and wide awake to boot. But at least I'd stopped the leak inside my tent. RIGHT!!!
Back inside, I suddenly realized two things: first, both my sleeping bag and all my bedding was completely saturated. Which meant that, if I tried to go back to bed, I'd have to slip my warm, relatively-young (on a geologic scale) body into a wet, COLD sleeping bag...which certainly wouldn't be conducive to a restful sleep at all. Second -- and worst of all -- that the entire inside walls of my tent was now covered with beads of moisture where the rain was bleeding thru the nylon! Then it dawned on me, abruptly. Apparently the torrential rains of Closing Weekend at TRF way back in the Fall of 2003 had finally put paid to the water-repellant compound on my tent, but since I didn't do any camping thru the winter months, I wasn't aware of this particular catastrophic failure until now. True, my tent was ***TWENTY YEARS OLD*** so it wasn't like I didn't get my money's worth out of it, but the precise timing of this revelation couldn't've been worse! I mean, here I was: frustrated, cold, wet, wide awake but still tired with seven more dark and rainy hours ahead of me before Excalibur opened. At that point, the prospect of sitting and/or trying to sleep in my truck until then lacked considerable appeal, needless to say. I weighed my options: tough it out or go -- and decided I was simply too cold, wet and miserable at that time, so I scrubbed the mission! There would ALWAYS be next weekend when I could return with a new tent. THEN let the rains do their worst!!!
Standard Disclaimer: This webpage is strictly an *Unofficial* look at the Excalibur Renaissance Festival held near Bastrop, TX. The author of these pages is in no way, shape, manner or form connected with the Excalibur Renaissance Festival (OFFICE ADDRESS: 1007 Main St., Suite E, Bastrop, TX 78602) and/or any of the sponsors associated with this event. All opinions expressed are strictly this author's own. Unless noted otherwise, all photographs are copyright ©2000-2005 by George Laking.