I'll start off by saying that, after the close of the first weekend, this faire is magical. If I rated faires, it would get an A+, making it possibly the best faire I've ever attended.

I spent the night at the Comfort Inn in Gilroy. This establishment is highly rated by AAA, and after spending the night I can see why. It's a very nice little hotel and the room was excellent.

On Saturday, I had filled up 1 1/2 of my 2 gb camera cards with photos (over 2,900 pictures) so I loaded them onto a laptop that I wisely brought along for just that purpose. After examining the photos (which took a few hours), I deleted the horribly blurry shots and one shot of someone's bodice that fell off (my site is not about that --- I always delete, permanently, any shot that is too revealing), and rotated the vertical shots. I must admit, this batch of photos came out pretty good.

I annoy my friends because I always show up early for everything. Today was no exception. I got to the faire site at 8:15am. I was so early that I got the first spot in the premium lot!

I had some time to kill, so I chatted with people as they showed up. You know, there are some very nice people working this faire.

The opening show was delightful, even though this was the second time I've seen it. After the show, I had a request to take a group photo of one of the guilds, which I was happy to do (it'll be posted in a day or two). (By the way, I am happy to do this at just about any time - feel free to ask).

Now it was time to get into the faire and have some fun. I was totally energized from Saturday, but felt the typical "Renaissance faire dust" effect in my lungs. Nothing to worry about - I had the same thing at southern and Northern last year. It'll clear up in a day or two, just in time to get it again next weekend!

I made a special effort to photograph the faire workers - you know, the ones in yellow and orange. I'll get some more photos of these folks during the next two weekends. They help make the faire successful and deserve to be recognized for their efforts just as much as those out in front of the spotlights.

I was delighted to find the Puritans had invaded the faire! I love this group, as they add a little fun to everything with their disapproving looks and attempts to make everyone act proper, whatever that means.

In fact, I took a deep breath, grabbed some courage from somewhere, and asked one of the Puritan ladies if she would ride on the horse with me. Much to my delight, she agreed!

The Belles of Bedlam were wonderful, as always. Their show was incredible, but that's to be expected. I watched their entire set and took zillions of pictures. Even though I've watched their act a dozen or more times, I never tire of them.

The height of my day was meeting the queen, again. She's a very nice lady and a wonderful queen. I spotted her shopping, stopped her, and got a picture of her and me together. That picture is special.

One of the places where I wanted to spend some time was the court, and I was glad that I did. They had a wonderful series of acts and shows and dances and other things that was delightful (am I using that word too much?) to watch. As I've said before, I like this queen and I like this court. It looks like they are all having a good time, and that spreads throughout the faire.

I wandered back over to the rocking horses as I was hungry and I noticed a lady with several youngsters. She got them all up on the horse and stood and watched. I thought she could use a little fun as well, so I offered to ride with her. She said yes!

Besides that, I spent most of the day wandering around and talking to people. I'm absolutely terrible with names, but now I'm actually beginning to be able to attach names to faces more and more. Sigh.

And, oh yes, at the request of the "Very Hot Wenches" tribe, I got some excellent photos of some, well, very hot wenches. I'll post those shortly.

I also spent some time at the Alestands taking photos for the "Alestands Gone Wild" tribe. There sure were some wild people in the stands this year!

Unfortunately, I didn't make it to the joust and I missed a lot of shows, but I'll get to them next weekend or the weekend after.

By 4pm I was thinking it was time to get on the road to home. I didn't want to go, but it was time to get back to reality  for another week at least. SO by 5pm I left the faire, got on the road and headed home. Traffic was amazing - I was able to remain at 70  mph the whole way and was home by 9:30pm.