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Last weekend our family and some friends went to Medieval Times, a medieval dinner/jousting experience in Schaumburg. It was a lot of fun!
The experience brings you back to an eleventh-century king's feast and tournament. You get served a four course meal by a wench (well, in our case we had a self-proclaimed mensch- a male wench!) You eat with your hands. You wear a crown. And you watch knights ride around on horses, jousting and fighting for the championship.
When you go, you should go a little bit early to take in all of the pageantry. As you enter, you are given a crown, and then have your picture taken with a princess or a lord, for possible purchasing afterwards. You are also assigned to a color (the color of your knight, who you will be cheering for) You then enter a great ante-room, which is also the gift shop, bar, dance floor, and fun area. (Yes, they make no bones about it-- here you ENTER through the gift shop.)
Before too long the king's minister came out to make some announcements, sounding like a medieval flight attendant. Finally, you get to enter the arena, which is approximately the size of a football field. The arena is in the round, with tables and seats flanking the playing area, and go up probably 6 or 7 rows. Every seat has a very good view. I estimated that the arena can seat around 1000 people, maybe even more.
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The show was fun, with lots of swashbuckling, horsemanship, and a falconry exhibition. I joked to my wife afterwards that it was like a circus, but without the clowns. (There was some chatter/repartee between the king and the princess as a lead in to some of the competitions, but it wasn't comedy.) In fact, now that I think about it, it's a little surprising there was not a comedy element to this. A jester lampooning the jousting, or a comedy fire juggling act with a pre-renaissance feel would go over quite well. (Shades of Game of Thrones!)
The stage combat was pretty good, and thrilling to see.
Here's a 30 second video of the end of one of the swashbuckling fights:
And here's a video I took of 2 and half minutes of fighting, including some jousting!
As you can see, the fighting is pretty entertaining.
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There are nine castles throughout the United States, and my guess is that they will build a few more over the next couple of years.
To find out more about Medieval Times in your area, go to http://www.medievaltimes.com
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