Hope and Horses: Renaissance Faire

We were asked by Phyllis, our former driving teacher, to come out to Emmet to help her out with carriage rides at the Renaissance Faire. She sometimes needs someone to hang on to the horses while they load and unload the carriage.
Sadly, we could not really help out the day she did the carriage rides, because the ball was that day. But we did go on Sunday, and she was there with her Gypsy Vanners.
Gypsy Vanners are a breed of draft horse that used to pull the carriages of the gypsies. Today, they are rather rare, but are becoming more popular because of their beauty. They are high upkeep horses with all their hair, though!
Phyllis has two Gypsy Vanners, Blue and Orion. They are both beautiful and have amazing temperaments. Because they are drafts, they are rather slow to spook, and rather slow at a lot of things! Both pull carriages, although Orion is still in training, and both can be ridden sidesaddle.
Jousting was a most exciting event to watch. Before it started, Blue pulled the carriage for the King and Queen, where, upon arriving, they took the best seats before the jousting began.
I got lots of fun ideas for our own horses, (not necessarily jousting; that would not fly with either of our horses!) but other ideas. There was one event in which the rider canters, or gallops, with a spear and tries to stab a cabbage on the ground. They did this same thing also with the cabbage on a pole anchored to the ground. Sort of like jousting, just not at an opponent.
There were all kinds of fun things to look at, although it was not really a reenactment because there so many vendors tried to sell you their cheap imitations of medieval clothing. Many people come dressed up in what they consider appropriate clothing, but it looks more like stuff out of an old Disney movie like Sleeping Beauty.
One person rehabilitated birds, and displayed her falcons and even an owl to the public. Sword fighting was also fun to watch, and one lady had real reproductions of some of the clothing they would have had during the Renaissance.
One thing that I thought was interesting was no one could really identify what time period everyone altogether was representing. The lady in the tent said according to everyone, it was 1200 to 1600! So, not altogether organized, but still fun nonetheless.
My favorite part was definitely the jousting. The jousters did an excellent job, and really knew their stuff and were quite good at it.