Photos &c.So, finally, it has been done.Friday, July 21 and Saturday, July 22, the Meeting has taken place.
Many of you have asked for Photos, so this is now the official Documentation and Photo post of the 2017 Meeting.
I've started uploading pictures, but individual description and proper presentation will take some time.
For now, here are just all the picures we took (this does not include the ones taken by Goblin King and No-Writer), in chronological order.
I've already "post-processed" them (rotated them, corrected lighting etc.) and resized them to a forum-friendly scale. Clicking on an image will link to the original size.
Once upon a time,
the day before yesterday...And so our six brave heroes,
The Goblin King, his father,
Big Bene* and his wife
and No-Writer and his son,
made their way through woods and badlands to once again save emperor and people.
*
The homonymy is purely coincidental. Big Bene the gallant hero is not related to Big Bene the wicked dungeon lord. Other than beeing the exact same person, they have absolutely nothing in common.There it is! The secret entrance to the dreaded underground dungeons of Siebeldingen!
Carefully and sneaking, Big Bene, the Goblin King and the Goblin King's Father approach.
Through many a dark and narrow tunnel their way leads....
They sneak in to attack the wicked goblin Karl (son of Big Bene) from behind, not noticing how well armed he is
And so, the Father of The Goblin King becomes captive of the wicked goblin...
"You will never get out!"
But, of course, the heroes can defeat him. Goblin King and Big Bene's Wife have freed thw King's father and taken Karl hostage.
So, in the middle room, they find the evil dungeon master - what's he up to?
Oh no! He's playing a game of HeroQuest - an arcane art that enables him to send hordes of monsters with the mere rolling of some dice and putting down some tiny statuettes.
But The Goblin King, The Son of No Writer and No Writer himself take on the challange (The Wife of Big Bene is with them, but takes the photo)
Meanwhile, in the "real world"...But seriousely folks, here's the real documentation of the real event.
Friday Barbecue
Left to right: Goblin King, No Writer's son Pascal, No Writer (in the Background at the grill), yours truly (Big Bene) with son Michael.
This outbuilding will be a gaming room when the house is finished. I tried to get it ready for the meeting, but we ended up playing in the living room. My wife thought it worthwile to show you a picture of the future gaming room, anyway.
Still eating. This time, I take the picture.
Left to right: Goblin King, No Writer's son Pascal, Michael, my wife Sabine, No Writer.
And in the evening:
Heroquest!More details on the games will be given below.
And yes, it was very hot these days, well over 30° Celsius. I'm not normally having guests in a sport's shirt.
Saturnday morning at 10 AM, Goblin King and his father (who had slept on a camping ground) came by for breakfast. We then took some time to take care for ourselfes and the children and met again around 1 PM for sightseeing.
First, we went to Landeck castle.
It's not the most historically important or interesting one, but it has some great spots, a nice restaurant, you can explore it freely and you can go with the car almost to the gate (many castles around here require to make the last part of the way by foot, between some minutes up to a hour, often uphills). All this makes it great for short afternoon trips with the boys, who love it.
Karl at once started to play.
I said it would be nice to have someone in the cage for a photo, which resulted in Goblin King and his father playing rock-scissor-paper and dad ended up caged.
Karl, of course, loved it.
A general view of the court.
Your's truly with Michael.
Michael exploring on his own.
Those windows with the pair of stone benches are great. They were once part of a building, which is now ruined, so they are directly facing the court. Here, Goblin King, his father and Karl had a look on the surrounding Palatine Forest.
Joined by my wife Sabine.
Another view of the court.
Here you can see the abovementioned window in context. Somebody has put fold up benches on the stairs to prevent people from climbing up, as the railings are under repair. I trusted my guests to be careful and removed one of those - you can see me puttingit back in place in the background.
A small sandstone "model" of the castle in its un-ruined form.
A look down on the outer fortifications. They are a great place to visit, too, but at the time closed due to archeological excavations.
A view from the castle on the upper rhine valley.
Next we went to Berwardstein castle.
It has something that is very common in Britain, but extremely seldom in Germany:
this is a
haunted castle, it has a
real Ghost (as real as ghosts go - it's a real, traditional, local folklore).
As this castle is privately owned and still partly inhabited, you have to take guided tours. This guy was our guide.
This manhole was originally the only entrance to the cellars we were visiting when taking this picture.
Outside view of Berwardstein.
We took more pictures inside - have to look for them.
We took a small detour on our way home to have a look on Trifels castle at least from the outside - I would have liked to show it, but time went short. After this, I just had to stop for this old cellar entrance - it has an unbelieveable Heroquestian look.
... which was lost on Michael.
Back home for the real thing.