Mountain Man Rendezvous 2010

This year my family's reunion was at a mountain man rendezvous, which is a reenactment of the days when the mountain men of the old west would gather and trade with each other and with the Native Americans.  They would trade, celebrate, sing songs, tell stories, and enjoy a break from the solitude of their way of life.  My family attends a MMR every year.  They camp in the "primitive" area, where everything from clothing to tents to cooking equipment has to be authentic.  It's like you step back in time for a few days and leave the cares of the modern world behind.  We got to join in the fun for the first time, after hearing about it for years since they started going.  Here are some pictures:

This is a portion of the primitive area.  My family's camp is the two tents on the lower right.

It rained pretty much half of the time which made it really cold, but the scenery was beautiful.  And when the sun did come out, boy we were grateful.

There was lots to do, including a spear throw (this is in Trader's Row and you can see some of the vendors' tents in the background) and a candy cannon (not pictured).

This was my grandfather's leather working set.  Adam is putting it to work.

Here Mitch is using a piece of glass to burn designs in leather.  Yes, those are my sunglasses and no, they're not period.

Caleb is proud of the design he burned onto his sword.

Adam really got into these watercolors.  He sat and worked on his painting for a long time.

Brandt loved my nephew's dog.

Some of the group went knife and hatchet throwing.  This is Mitch nailing it.

We ate a lot of my mom's delicious Dutch oven cooking.  Here I am dishing up chicken noodle stew.

Despite all of that fun I think it's safe to say that, at least for Caleb and Dallin,
the absolute favorite activity...

...was sword fighting with their cousins and uncles.  I know.
It's not exactly period but it was a lot of fun.

Their uncles and cousins outfitted them with armor they crafted out of scraps of leather
(this is my brother Joshua).  

Divided into teams, they charged each other,

fought valiantly (taking proper time-outs if they took a death blow),

and if they got lucky the attacking army rescued the princess (my niece, Savannah).  Caleb was good at sneaking around the fray and escorting her to safety.

They had an absolute ball.

I think, overall, everyone did.