Archive for November, 2009
knitapalooza, a day at the fair
Posted by springviolet in Things We Do on November 13th, 2009
Posted by: springviolet
Saturday was festival day so we woke reasonably early. It didn’t take us too long to get ourselves together enough to go to the festival. We had a little discussion on whether to leave the space heaters on or not. It was chilly during the day which meant night would be damned cold. Our cabin opted to leave them on set on low.
Just before we got in the cars to go for the day, Connie told us about a sign on the bathhouse door that she had just seen. Sadly, we couldn’t get a clear photo of the sign but the gist of it was: “Please do not take a shower as you may get an electrical shock.” There had been no sign when I was in the bathhouse half an hour earlier. It was very weird. As we were pulling out of the park we saw power company trucks arriving. We figured whatever the trouble was, it would be fixed by the time we got back in the late afternoon.
The New York Sheep and Wool Festival is big. To quote Douglas Adams: “You just won’t believe how vastly hugely mindbogglingly big it is.” Okay, maybe that’s a bit much, but it’s still pretty damn massive.
Connie-Okay I’ll take over from here. And yes… HUMONGO! I was a Rhinebeckian Virgin and had no idea what I was in for. Sure, other knitters TRIED to warn me but I could never imagine such a huge festival.
We waited in line, got our tickets and regrouped. There were cute Sheepies and Llamas and Bunnies. There were even Kangaroos! And 2 big tortoises. Why? I do not know. But still, it was awesome!
As much as I loved all of the animals and the pretty piles of yarn, my favorite was the food and the free samplings. Here’s my top Five eats from the fair.
5. Apple Dumpling Thing – I don’t know exactly what it was but In the morning I had a few bites of Jo’s apple dumpling strudel thinger with cinnamon and it was full of tasty nom.
4. The Cheeses – In one of the show buildings there were a bunch of tables set up and covered in maybe 20 different kinds of cheeses. I had a blast sampling a lot of them. I bought some of the Habanero Jack.
3. Wines and Meads – One table had these delicious chocolate wines that I could just die for. And another booth had some really tasty meads. I love me some mead!
2. Lamb Burgers – Fan-fucking-tastic. The end.
1. Maple Cotton Candy – It’s like an orgasm for your tastebuds. This shit is the bomb-diggity of cotton candy. Heaven!
So after roaming around the festival and getting videos of alpacas and kangaroos and buying some yarn I decided to take a nap in the car until the rest of the group was ready to leave. My Rhinebeck cherry had been popped and I just needed to rest up before we’d be heading out to dinner for the evening. My car group made it back shortly after I had gone to car and we headed back to camp. This is where the story gets iiiiiiiinteresting… But I’ll let Jen tell that part of the story in the next post. :)
knitapalooza, the prelude
Posted by springviolet in Things We Do on November 4th, 2009
Posted by: springviolet
October in Rhinebeck, NY is beautiful. The trees are turning glorious colors and the air is crisp with the spicy scents and chill of autumn. It’s also when one of the biggest, baddest, sheep and wool festivals appears out of the morning mist on the grounds of the Duchess County Fairgrounds. (I’m tempted to go on a whole long Brigadoon tangent, but I’ll save you from my love of show tunes, for now.)
A few of us went to Rhinebeck last year. We had rented a cabin at Margaret Lewis Norrie State Park and spent the Saturday on the fairgrounds. Wow! What a good time! As soon as we arrived home afterward, we started planning this year’s trip. I use the word ‘planning’ here very loosely. We all sort of suck at this thing called firm decision making. There’s a lot of “yeah, that’d be cool!” going on when we plan, but not so much “this is what’s happening” being decided.
This year we had a few more people hoping to join our merry band. Since the year before had been so nice, we rented two cabins at the same state park near the fairgrounds. As we got closer to our departure date, we figured out what we were bringing, and worked out who would be driving.
I couldn’t believe it when we met up and left the city on time. I know, amazing isn’t it? The Friday afternoon trip up was a lot of fun. I was riding with Jenn and Connie so you know there was silliness and girl-talk to be had. The only thing missing on our trip was Andrea. Sadly, she couldn’t make it. Of course we sent her love notes via Twitter. I had forgotten to bring a mug, so I asked that we stop within New York so I could pick a up a cheesy “I Love NY” mug from a gift shop. I got a pink one.
The trip was timed perfectly. Both cars arrived at the campground at just about the same time and even better, it was still light out. We figured out who was sleeping in which cabin, unloaded our stuff and headed out for dinner in nearby Tivoli.
It was an excellent evening. Highlights included meeting Charlie, the shop dog at the local yarn shop, browsing in a great used book store, and a laughter filled dinner. No one had a tire blow out. No one had to go alone to the marina with the creepy park ranger. No one got lost driving in the wee hours on one of the half-dozen different Route 9s. By the way, what the hell is up with the Hudson Valley region and all the main roads being Route 9?
