Abandon All Hope

[howeird]

is what my Pirate T-shirt said. Took the 65-mile drive to Vallejo's waterfront, a place I have never been, for the NorCal Pirate Fair, and it was worth the trip. Lots and lots of people in costume, some piratical, some not. Much eye candy (aka Pirate Booty), including the lovely and talented jadecat9 and sinmix, neither of whom recognized me although I spent maybe 10 minutes shooting at them.

There was some good music, sea chanteys, celtic, general renaissance period, etc. with a huge stage tricked out to look like a ship and another for the kids. there were two other stages and a couple of informal areas where the official pirates had pitched their tents which also had random musical things happening. I didn't catch any performances except a Jack Swan look-alike, who juggled an apple, a bowling ball and a large knife, while eating the apple. Very impressive, especially in a 25-knot wind. Both he and his talented sidekick guy stayed in character for the whole show.

There were some stars from POC3 signing autographs when I arrived at 1:30, but they were gone soon after. Not a huge line to meet them, I suspect they were not main characters.

Definitely a coup for Vallejo, well-attended, free, lots of good food, though the lines were waaaaay long -the longest being for, of all things, burgers. I had the obligatory turkey drumstick, and some really bad ice cream. I really don't get gelato - to me it has no flavor.

The drive up took 2 hours, thanks to more than 30 minutes on the 4 miles leading to the 680 bridge. Coming back only took a little over an hour.

Took lots of photos, which I will upload to flickr Real Soon Now