Who needs tech...?!

This afternoon my Editor & I had our annual pilgrimage to Chopwell Woods, near Gateshead, to buy our Christmas tree. (We were a little later than in previous years - see here and here.)

However we came across a group of actors who were just finishing their session of Live Action Role Play (LARP). We'd not heard of this organisation before but we've now Googled it and apparently it's an international thing dating from the late 1970s. There's generic information about it on Wikipedia here. It seems that there's more than one group based in the Newcastle area: the group we saw is one of about 20 groups nationwide calling themselves "Fools and Heroes". This local group meets in Jesmond Dene on the first Saturday evening of each month and in Chopwell Woods on the 3rd Sunday during the day. 

Fools & Heroes is set in a fantasy version of our own world. England is called Ithron, Wales is Sortho and Scotland is Lirron. It seems that there are similarities to Lord of the Rings in that characters can be Human, Halflings, Elfs, Half-Elfs and Dwarfs. They belong to a range of guilds including Physician, Alchemist, Templar, and Blacksmith. If you want more information go to this link and follow through to the pdf of player information. Fascinating!

About the photo. This guy was very happy to pose for me. Unfortunately when we arrived they were just starting to pack up so I actually took his photo in the car park. That was a bit naff so I had to Photoshop him onto a scene in the woods; if you look closely you'll see that I didn't get it quite right (his feet don't look quite right) but it was fun to try - I clearly need more practice!

Oh, and we did get a rather nice tree. Getting that was, of course, my Editor's main reason for going to the Woods. (Maybe I had another more important reason? - to get my blip of course!)