steamfest 2015

Oh how I love Steamfest!!! All the smells, the sounds, the sights…….every year I think 'oh maybe I won't go this year' and every year I go and remember how much I like it! From the spinning shed with all the lanolin smells and friendly spinning ladies, to the bullocky controlling his huge, horned steers with a long whip and a few incomprehensible words. I love all the old household wares - pitchers, bottles, knives, chisels, baskets - all priced and stacked on tables as if they were items still in everyday use, not long redundant and now just mere curiosities.

This year there was an old fair organ that ground out its raucous never ending tune while the wooden ladies danced the hula and the soldier marched bravely on. This year, and every year, the medieval group had a mock battle while we wondered once again, how the heck they coped in all that heavy armour! This year there was another contest for the best dressed person wearing steampunk style clothes and without a doubt it went to a woman with a marvellous set of wings that could be folded and unfolded. Amazing! This year the children are all older and spent most of the time rummaging around on their own leaving me to meander along at my own pace when Stuy wasn't there or sharing thoughts with him when he was.  I'm sure the children sampled all the sweet dishes available and I only just managed to snap a pic of the Dutch pancakes before they were devoured! 

And for the first time, we were treated to a wonderful display by the TasmanianLighthorse Brigade  and it really was a spectacle - theres certainly something special about a horse and a man in uniform ;) But my most favourite thing of all is the grunt of the tractor pulling competition followed closely by the smells from all the old engines! True!! I just love the deep throaty roar of the big tractors as they strain to pull the weighted trailer to the end of the course, and the tension that mounts, the slower he gets….until he stops short of the finish line and its on to the next tractor. Yes. Yes I do. I love it all. And I come home every year and think, 'oh, that was so much fun, can't wait till next year!!'