Liberty Summer of Love Shoot July 22/23 2017
by Queen Bee
KLFA Roving Reporter & Crossbow Queen
After a lot of driving, walking, and cycling on my hols in the Yorkshire Dales I didn’t feel I could do both days of the Liberty weekend shoot so I booked myself in for just the Sunday. Sunday morning dawned bright and sunny and I set off to Libertyin good spirits. 40 minutes later I had to do an emergency swerve onto the track, to the blaring annoyance of the idiot on my tail, because there was no sign out. The place was deserted and locked. Well, I thought, it’s Sunday and you’d have thought someone would have mentioned the shoot had been cancelled. Yes, you’ve guessed it – it was the wrong Sunday. Duh! A quick email to Ruth had me booked in for the following weekend.
After tremendous winds overnight the promise of rain during Saturday from the BBC didn’t materialise, but the wind had dropped completely and the temperature was perfect. Mike and I were the only KLFA representatives on the Saturday (Nicky N and Ro were only doing the Sunday), and I was delighted to find I was shooting with him. His presence always gives me confidence – even if he doesn’t say anything archery-related. We were also shooting with Karen and Shirley from Spirit of Sherwood. I’d shot with them before so knew we were in for a super fun day and I wasn’t disappointed. Even with lower numbers than normal there were still a fair few archers, and the theme this year was Summer of Love.
There was a running quiz with clues on about half the targets and we had to guess the song and the artist. Without the actual music playing in was incredibly difficult to put the words to a tune, and after struggling without success for an hour or two we more or less gave up. It wasn’t a particularly difficult course but we all laughed so much none of us shot a blinder. Innuendoes flew back and forth and with three to one in the gender balance I think Mike thoroughly enjoyed the day. There were a great many grinning pauses in the conversation as we all thought about what had just been said!! The 40 targets took us until after 5 to complete and it was a very tiring day because the majority were walk-backs. After lots of hugs and kisses we went our separate ways and hoped we’d be shooting together the following day.
The Liberty meal this year wasn’t steak. A Filipino restaurant in Lakenheath was providing a buffet and I was really looking forward to it. Back in the van I primed myself with home-made plum wine and set off for a nosh at about 7.30. Many archers had dressed as hippies with appropriate dress and hair, and there were lots of waving placards proclaiming things that were important to the masses in 1967.
Replete after a tasty meal, slightly light-headed from home-made plum, and serenaded with 60’s music, I rolled untidily into bed with a lopsided smile under my rosy cheeks as the light faded gently from the sky.
I don’t think the contents of Filipino food agree with me because I spent an extremely unsettled night living through five versions of the same dream. It was of Dusty Miller and his crossbow I was thinking of buying and had arranged to try after the shoot that day, but he’d left by the time we finished. In every dream I just missed meeting him and woke up each time in a panic. One dream involved my husband wearing a long, frilly cream skirt whilst trying to repair a broken fridge full of various types of fish lasagne. Do, please try and rid your mind of that vision, (if you need counselling I can recommend a good bod). I’ve never, ever had a premonition before but my dreams were certainly that because during the following day I discovered that Dusty had sold his crossbow to someone else on Saturday! Nice.
Sunday’s weather didn’t look promising at all so most archers toted a waterproof of some kind. I was still a bit miffed about the crossbow incident and wasn’t as jolly as I normally am, but I was shooting with such a terrific group my dark clouds were soon dispelled. We were all less than perky after the activities of the previous day – Karen and Shirley probably from the evening’s entertainment, Mike and me because we’re both a smidgeon older and I’m a bit decrepit with it, and Mike had driven three fairly lengthy journeys. But we coped.
At ten to two the heavens opened and the rain came down in vertical stair-rods and by the time we’d fiddled with waterproofs the insides were as wet as the outside. Through the thick, moist air we could see grey silhouettes of archers huddled in bent groups under flimsy branches, steam rising from their backs. After about 20 minutes the rain began to ease and we carried on shooting. Of course everything leather was soaked through and finger tabs became dangerously slippery. However, the air was still quite warm so we steam-dried over the next few targets.
Yesterday’s hideously distant moose at 90 yards had been reduced to about 80 and both Mike, and Karen who was shooting woodies, hit the kill-zone. Mike with an almost central pro-kill. Muggins here listened to a Marshall and aimed so high the arrow cleared the moose AND the netting by about 5 feet. I don’t think it’s landed yet!
The entire day had been damp and grey, and when we at last shot the final arrow so were we.
The presentations were unusually under-way in almost indecent haste. Probably because we’d been having such a rollicking time on the Saturday and not paying as much attention to the quality of our skills Mike was pipped into second place by only 14 points. I felt really guilty as I was responsible for most of the innuendoes, but he took defeat like the true champ he is. Nicky and I went home with a T-shirt with Summer of Love emblazoned across the chest area, and Ro went home with lots of honey.