Faire weather: Gustine's Heartland Renaissance Festival brings the magic

GUSTINE, Texas — What’s better than watching a fantasy film with a bunch of guys in armor whaling on each other with swords and billy clubs? Seeing them do it in person.

That’s what Nicholas Ochoa hopes to bring to the Big Country March 23 when his newly minted Heartlands Renaissance Festival invites 40-odd knights for Comanche County’s first-ever medieval melee.

“It'll just be a one-day, big ole' beat-down event that we'll do,” Ochoa said, the face shield on his knightly helm propped up and topping the plate armor he wore. “We'll also have what's called Melee a' Cheval, to combine the two sports of ground fighting and horse fighting.”

To be clear, it’s not the horses who will be fighting each other, only their riders. And of course, the safety of the animals will be paramount.

As for the combatants? Eh, they’re wearing armor.

“Blunted steel,” Ochoa said, describing the edge on the weapons they’ll use.

Your hometown 'Ren Faire'

Heartlands opened on Ochoa’s ranch March 1. The address is 14450 State Highway 36, Gustine. Siri provided a close-enough location. Just look for the banners on the right side of the road as you’re coming from Comanche, about a ten-minute drive from there.

The hours until April 14 are 3 p.m. to midnight every Friday, and 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

Ren faires come in all sizes, and if you’ve been to the massive Texas Renaissance Festival down by Houston, Waxahachie’s Scarborough Faire or Austin’s Sherwood Forest Faire, you’ll know Heartlands is somewhat more modest than those other established attractions.

Troy Hunt, who lives in Hamilton and came dressed reminiscent of the Dread Pirate Roberts from “The Princess Bride,” had been thinking about trekking down to Austin’s Sherwood Forest.

“A few days ago I was looking around online and just happened to come up with the Heartlands faire,” he recalled.

The calculation — a 40-minute drive versus a two-hour trip to join a crowd of thousands at the end — wasn’t a difficult one to make.

“For me, there are two kinds of faires,” he said. “There's what I call the 'spectacle faires,' which is, TRF or Scarborough where they're heavily built up and they have thousands upon thousands of people. What you can see there is pretty amazing.”

The other side of that coin, he continued, are the “social faires.”

“Where you can have a real, human interactive experience, and you can end up talking to the person who's responsible for the fact that it exists,” he said.

In fact, Hunt said earlier in the afternoon he had been leaning against a fence, chatting with what he thought was a fellow costumed attendee but which in fact turned out to simply be Ochoa.

At a venue like Heartlands, “the vendors have time to talk, the performers have time to talk,” he added. “By this point, I've seen the spectacles. It's cool. I like to go out for that. I like to see those things, but what I enjoy the most are small (faires) like this.”

A full lineup

Ochoa had about a dozen or so vendors on his first weekend, promising a total of 43 sellers scheduled during the seven-week run of his faire.

“That doesn’t mean all of them at the same time,” he said. “Some will come. Some will go. Some will come back. Not every vendor will be here every single weekend.”

On the first weekend, sellers sold ren faire staples like handmade knives and swords, crocheted decorative crafts, magic wands, face painting and barbecue. A pair of bards, Ermagerd and Hero of Mime, entertained in between jousting and similar activities.

Lindley Wellmon was also there, promoting her Heart of Texas Nature Center, a startup operation in Brownwood. Wellmon brought a juvenile red-tailed hawk named Cal with her, which she flew for attendees in the nearby woods.

“The nature center is focused on education and conservation, through hands-on learning experiences,” she said. “Eventually, we hope to have a number of mammals and reptiles, as well as birds of prey, and then we can start welcoming guests. Right now, we're just in the crowdfunding and grant-writing stage.”

Later in the month, Ochoa said a group performing belly dancing is also slated to attend, along with a sword-swallowing, whip-cracker who juggles fire. Though presumably, not at the same time.

But maybe?

Day pass admission is $15 for adults, $10 for kids and $35 for the weekend. Ochoa offers camping as well, either behind the parking area for RVs or in the wooded area known as the "enchanted forest" at the top of the hill.

“And if you're a veteran or first responder, it's free because we like to give back,” he added.

Going full tilt

The March Melee, the Comanche County Clash, the Gustine Beatdown. However you want to call it, you can get a preview by checking out the International Medieval Combat Federation to learn more about the sport.

Yes, there is an international group for people who want to beat on each other with swords and billy clubs. Be honest. You’re not really surprised.

“It is full-contact, pretty spectacular stuff,” Hunt said, admiring the physical conditioning the men and women of the sport undergo.

Typically, the group’s annual championship tournament is held outside a medieval fortress like Ukraine’s Ancient Kyiv Park or Poland’s Malbork, the largest brick-built castle in the world.

There are no crenellated walls outside of Gustine, however. The nearest castle is probably the cinderblock one south of Thurber, Greystone Castle Hunting Club. Around here, it’s barbed wire, oak, a bit of mesquite and Ochoa’s horse arena adapted for a “new” sport older than the community surrounding it.

But as far as jousting goes, this isn’t Ochoa’s first rodeo. And he and his crew, who have experience in competitive jousting, are looking to share that knowledge.

“We're gonna do a huge clinical where we teach them how to joust,” he said. “Because a lot of these guys, they're horsemen too. But they never thought, 'Maybe I could do both?'  So, let's do both!”

Texas Highway 36 lookie-lous an occupational hazard

Is there a chance for jousting to make it into rodeo? Could cowboys in steel go for a tilt in the arena at Stamford’s Cowboy Reunion?

Considering the past spectacles of wild cow milking, wild mare racing and other events at Big Country ranch rodeos over the years, jousting may actually be too tame for those crowds.

But a crowd it is likely to draw. Ochoa learned that for himself one day as he tried to desensitize a new horse to the sensation of carrying a rider in a suit of armor.

As they rode around his arena, a driver in a pickup turned off Texas Highway 36 to see what was going on, which would have been fine. Ochoa is used to attracting some kind of attention.

It’s not every day you see a knight in shining armor trotting around a West Texas horse arena.

What wasn’t fine was when the driver blew his car horn. Nor was it fine that this wasn’t your typical car horn but the kind you’d more likely find bolted to a semi-truck’s cab.

“My horse wasn't ready for an 18-wheeler-sounding horn right next to the arena,” Ochoa recalled, laughing.

About to hit his target with a lance, he instead finds himself falling backwards as the startled horse rears up, fore hooves pawing at the air.

“I hit the ground thinking, ‘What the heck just happened?’” he said, still chuckling. “I look up, and I see a truck peeling out.

“I’m like, 'All right, cool.'” He got up, went back to work.

Now, that’s a rodeo.

This article originally appeared on Abilene Reporter-News: Faire weather: Gustine Heartland Renaissance Festival brings the magic