First time in Leamington for Renaissance Festival

By Deanna Bertrand

It was a weekend filled with medieval-inspired events including sword fights, archery, axe throwing, jousting with Knights in full armour on Percheron horses and more at Leamington Fairgrounds for the first annual Renaissance Festival.

Bringing back something old in a new way was the idea of Jen Robinson of the Leamington District Agricultural Society. She said she had seen an advertisement for the Dorchester Renaissance Festival and thought that “nothing like that had been done around here for a very long time, so I thought, let’s try something new.”

A crowd favourite was to see the trained Knights of Valour suit

up in full body armour mount their horses holding a wooden lance in one hand and reins in the other while trying to dismount their opponent from their horse.

As the knights went charging at each other, their lance would strike the opponent’s armour, breaking off in several directions and looking just like a scene out of the movie A Knight’s Tale starring Heath Ledger.

Robinson sees this first event as a building year.

“We have a lot of suggestions for next year,” she said. “We hope to keep building on it and give people something to look forward to.” Robinson said the Knights of Valour also reached out ahead of the two-day event to offer area school children a chance for an educational field trip and to see first-hand what it was actually like in medieval times.

“It is part of the Grade 4-5 curriculum. We had grade school kids come out, home school kids, and even some high school students,” she said of the three days prior to the festival.

Gate price of $25 included access to shows and events, including a birds of prey demonstration, Kobbler J, Zoltan the Adequate, jousting tournament, artisans, merchants and a food booth.

The Leamington District Agricultural Society will hold its next event – the Leamington Fair – May 25-28. The society is also celebrating its 175th year.

A pair of jousters from Knights of Valour perform at the first annual Leamington Renaissance Festival on Saturday, May 13. SUN photo by Deanna Bertrand