A Mermaid's Tail

K, time to show off my favorite part of Saturday's Ren Fest: taking pics of my friend Christie.

You ready, Christie?

Yeah, I think she's ready.

Annnnd... DRAMATIC UNVEILING!

Ok, so I've posted pics of Christie as a mermaid in my DragonCon posts before, but there's only so much you can do shooting from above in a hotel swimming pool. She also wasn't in character for those shots, since it was a private pool with almost no one around.

Here, however, Christie - performing as "Kyrin" - has a whole crowd to perform for:

I have to say, the Festival has done a great job setting the scene. This little display shows you which of the three mermaids is currently in the tank:

And the large fenced-in area that corrals the crowd is themed with flowers, hanging seaweed, netting, and shells:

The mermaid tank is just large enough for one adult mermaid - humanely rescued and rehabilitated from the wild, of course. ;)

The mermaids are a free attraction provided by the Festival, but for a "small donation" (most give a dollar), Kyrin will fetch you a sparkly glass stone from the bottom of her tank.

"The Giving of the Stone"

As an added bonus, you may get a little mermaid splash in the process. :) The tips are divided equally among the 5 workers at the Grotto.

Here Kyrin takes a breather - literally - while showing off her tail:

To avoid the inevitable barrage of questions, the crowd is informed that mermaids only communicate in little trills and squeaks, kind of like a dolphin, which is pretty stinking adorable.

Kyrin doesn't need words to connect with the kids, though:

In fact, this is where the real magic happens. Every child that approaches the tank is met face-to-face, and hand-to-hand. Kyrin draws hearts on the glass, plays patty-cake, trills and purrs, and poses for picture after picture with adults and kids alike.

Some are shy, like this little cutie:

Eventually she's coaxed into place by her parents, but you can see she's still a little hesitant:

After the picture the two share a moment, though, and she's all smiles:

SO. CUTE.

When one little boy started pulling faces at her through the glass, Kyrin matched him, sticking out her tongue and crossing her eyes. The boy was completely charmed, and walked away beaming.

I like the way her hair catches the light in this shot.

As small as the tank is, if the mermaids maneuver themselves just so, they can place their tails flat against the glass. Each time Christie did this, she was rushed by a new wave of little girls, all eagerly patting the glass & oohing:

Heck, I almost did, too. That copper & teal tail is gorgeous. 

(Since I know I'll get asked: it's Mertailor tail.)

Each of the mermaids provides her own costume and accessories, so they're all a bit different. I only caught the tail end [heh] of her set, but here's mermaid Star:

She has a reddish orange tail and some fabulous shell hairpieces:

Each mermaid is out for 45 minutes to an hour at a time, and they do two sets each per day. By the end of their first set their eyes are firey red; keeping your eyes open under water that long really takes its toll! This is a labor of love, though; they are paid, but I know at least in Christie's case that pretty much just covers travel expenses. (She drives over 8 hours each weekend for the show.) She's there because she loves it, and it shows.

I hope you enjoyed your virtual visit to Mermaid's Grotto! If nothing else, I know *I* had fun playing with all these pictures.

Oh, and if you want to see her in person, Christie/Kyrin will be at the Bay Area Ren Fest every weekend except the 22nd & 23rd (because MegaCon!) through April 6th. She also has a Facebook page with her sister Robyn for all their cosplay pics, if you want to keep up with her that way. Tell her I sent you! 

Bay Area Ren Fest, 2014

On Saturday John and I made our yearly pilgrimage to Tampa for Florida's largest Ren Fest. Thanks to about five separate accidents and a big county fair we spent more time in the car than at the festival (roughly 3 hours each way), but I kept the panic monster in line by tracking our progress on my phone. Then on the way home John plugged my phone into the car stereo and had me watch Ghostbusters on Netflix. (See, I knew that man was a keeper.)

 Medieval Ariel!

I've said it before and I'll say it again: I'm not really a Ren Fair person. I'm a classic introvert, and all the boisterous performers, vendors, and barkers are my own personal boogeymen. I live in fear of one of them noticing me, pulling me from the audience to be forced up on stage, or singling me out in the crowd for an embarrassing Q&A about my pickle-buying-habits. (Don't laugh: it happens.)

But despite these fears I keep coming back year after year, because dangit, THESE ARE MY PEOPLE.

 Marty McFly wins.

Plus when you get down to it, most of the Ren Fair crowd is really just a boozier and more interactive convention crowd. They're ridiculously nice, open to everyone, and frankly have way better age-diversity than most other geek events.

 

I helped this lovely lady tie up her corset in the parking lot. Because, really, how often do you get asked to tie up someone's corset in a parking lot?

Where even the dogs wear armor!

Most of my photos this year were of my friend Christie, but I'm going to show you those in another post. (It's a surprise!) I didn't take too many pics other than hers; after a while all the pretty dresses and suits of armor start to look the same, so I only stopped folks who caught my eye with something unique. For example, this blue fairy wore latex gloves, so she could blow bubbles through her fingers:

Fun!

The Festival offers elephant rides, so we stopped to watch the two big creatures munching on hay and begging for treats, which the handlers would tuck into their giant mouths with almost comical nonchalance:

During one stop the elephant was pretty intent on pestering his handler, who, after sharing her nuts with him, completely ignored his trunk tickling around her arm and waist. I was fascinated, and snapped a photo. The pic turned out to be a happy accident: my spot metering was off, making it way over-exposed, but I've decided I like the look:

In fact, this is my favorite shot from the whole day. I love the contrast of textures, and the lady is just stunning.

And speaking of stunning ladies:

Lady Knight!

On our way out John and I stopped to watch the final jousting match, which started with the two knights' squires doing a test run with padded lances. As the opposite squire approached our end of the field, John squeaked, "JEN. It's a GIRL!!" And then we both did little happy dances.

Here's the squire Lady Knight ran against:

 And some action shots from the real joust:

I like how this shot makes it look like there's a hell mouth opening up in the middle of the field. :D (It's really just the light hitting all the kicked up dust.)

Both knights were unhorsed, and the girl in the foreground was off and running before they even hit the ground. (She was in charge of fetching the horse.)

After a tense moment or two, both knights were up and throwing comical punches at each other:

Lady Knight's knight was defeated, but she retaliated by sneaking up behind the victor and knocking him over the head with his own shield.

It was pretty great. :D

After that I tracked her down for a photo, but she was such a celebrity I didn't get the chance to ask her name or age:

So I'll just keep calling her Lady Knight - and I'm guessing she's somewhere between, um, 12 and 28. 

(I am very bad at guessing ages. Can you tell?)

K, that's it for me! And if any of you locals want to check it out, the Bay Area Renaissance Festival runs every weekend through April 6th. 

Oh, and also for my fellow Floridians: MegaCon is less than 2 weeks away! Rest assured John and I will be there all three days, and I *think* Lady Vadore may make an appearance. I'll have plenty of pins to give away, so please say hi if you see us!