The surprise jousting tournament (HH/BW Challenge Series)

On our overnight at Triangle H Farm, we woke up to a surprise. We could actually see some sunshine!

The forecast had shifted, and now instead of rain most of the day, it looked to hold off until the late afternoon. This gave us flexibility in traveling to our next location, the Boondockers Welcome where we would be through the weekend. We were told that we could stay at Triangle H as long as we wanted, and since we only had a short drive to the Boondockers Welcome, we decided to hang tight until after lunch, head to a dump station on our way, and arrive mid-afternoon.

We had a quiet morning visiting the horses and chickens, and putting away our clean laundry from the day before. A sprinter van that rolled in at 10PM left at 11AM. We didn't even see them get out of their vehicle the whole time they were there.

Soon, we noticed bits of activity outside our windows. We weren't surprised; it was a Saturday morning and we're sure people came to ride. But then we noticed that many of the people coming in were wearing robes and hats. What in the Medieval Times was going on?!

As we ate lunch, we kept an eye out the window. More and more cars pulled in, and more and more garb-clad people headed toward the arena. Then a couple of horse trailers pulled in. We started getting nervous that we wouldn't be able to leave! We needed to take a wide turn out of our spot and couldn't have any vehicles blocking our way. We decided to pack up early.

We're all for the contactless procedures at some of these Harvest Hosts, but you would hope that we'd at least get a message alerting us to the fact that an event was occurring during our stay. I even checked online at the stable's event list, but nothing was listed until June. It was like an entire Renaissance Faire just decided to show up one cloudy morning! We'd be lying if we said we weren't intrigued, though. After all, these people and horses were in our temporary yard!

As we brought stuff out to the truck, we caught one of the men and asked him what was going on today. His answer: "We're jousting! Because we're all a little bit insane."

Jousting?! Really?! Well, now that we think about it, it does make sense, with the garb and all. We talked to the dude for a few minutes, and he told us that they would be doing rounds using either foam or wooden lances. Some of the participants were dressed in clothing fabrics, and they would use the foam. Those in actual armor would use the wood. They would challenge one another, and they would be doing it all afternoon. Then he invited us to watch.

Well, we were planning on dumping tanks...but who are we kidding?! We wanted to watch jousting! In some weird way, this is what our Harvest Hosts challenge is all about. We chose this location for a gravel parking spot, and now we were getting to experience something new. We still had tank space, so dumping could wait a few more days. And, since the dude told us the joust was starting soon, we knew that most of the people who were attending were already there, and we didn't need to worry so much about not being able to leave. Nothing was stopping us from pivoting our plans!

via GIPHY

But first, we needed to have a quick study session. Jousting. What is it? What are the rules? What's its role in history? Does it actually still exist today in a structured, competitive form?

Jousting is a sport that you've probably seen at some point in knight movies, where two competitors on horseback ride towards each other with lances, hoping to stab their opponent. Jousting can also be done on foot, but horseback jousting was based on military use of the lance as a weapon, and the sport grew from this in the Middle Ages. It was very popular with nobility. Though deaths did occur during the sport, the goal was never to fight to the death. However, the goal was to knock the opponent off of his horse.

Jousting today typically occurs as a reenactment or a non-contact tournament or competition. The reenactments are theatrical, whereas the tournaments are similar to any other sport. There are competitors and there are spectators, and instead of trying to unhorse each other, the goal is to gain the most points by lancing the opponent's shield.

Even with our quick brush-up, we thought we would be fish out of water. We went over to the arena and took our seats in the small area of bleachers, along with about half a dozen other spectators. We don't know if any of these people were diehards or if they were just cheering on friends and family, but a couple of the jousters came over to us to introduce their horses and talk a little bit about the sport. They made everything feel very interactive, like we were all part of a little community.

Then right before the competition started, each jouster introduced themselves and their horse. Some were veterans at the sport, while others – both human and horse – were new. They are all members of a Midwest jousting collective and came from states all over this region of the country. The idea of this tournament was to have fun and build skills. No winner would be crowned at the end, though they did score each round. Scoring was out of 3 points and was based on the accuracy of hitting the shield, as well as whether or not the lance tip would break. Striking near the shield was accepted, but striking any dangerous area like the head or the horse was not.

Ropes were tied up to create two lanes, where the horses would run towards each other from opposite ends. The horses must be in a canter or gallop for a strike to be awarded points. One jouster would choose an opponent, and they would challenge each other for a few rounds, or until they or their horses would tire. Everyone would continue playing until they were all too tired and needed to go home.

Keeping with the interactive nature, we were even handed one of the broken wooden lances so we could look at the split wood post-strike.

We could only stay for about 45 minutes before it was time to finish packing and head to our Boondockers Welcome. At this point, isolated rainstorms kept coming and going, but the bulk of the storms weren't due until the evening. We wanted to give ourselves plenty of time to get settled into our new spot, so we could unhitch and go run some errands before things got dicey.

We never did figure out anything more about this jousting event, except for what everyone told us. This was their Midwest Joust, which usually takes place once a year. We couldn't find any information about it online, probably because the jousting circles are pretty small and everyone probably knows one another. One of the jousters did mention in passing that there was a "site change," though. We wonder if this had to do with the weather, like maybe they needed to move to an indoor arena. That also means that it's possible the event wasn't supposed to be held at Triangle H at all. That would give more insight into why we were never alerted and why the website didn't list anything. So maybe it was all a happy coincidence that we stayed late, saw everyone arriving, and took the opportunity to satisfy our curiosity and broaden our horizons. We went to Triangle H Farm expecting a practical stop that would get lost in the shuffle of this challenge, but we came away with what will probably be one of our most memorable experiences this entire month. Do we think we could somehow introduce jousting to the RV world?

Hmm...perhaps we should just stick to the equestrians.

We won't say that our first night at the Boondockers Welcome was necessarily restful...

At our specific location, things were actually fairly calm, compared to everywhere else at least. We had a few rumbles of thunder, but we mostly remained between the two major bands of storms. However, we know all too well that sometimes the weather is calm right before it's not. I didn't get much sleep. I kept tracking the radar and watching the severe weather system on the map. We were mere miles south of it. Oklahoma got pummeled. The state had a dozen tornadoes, and 4 people lost their lives. News like that really drives the point home of how seriously we need to take these storms.

We were placed under a tornado watch until 4AM, but our specific hourly forecast wasn't saying so much as a gust of wind.

We were more worried about what was to come the next day, 4/28. The wind was going to pick up, and later in the day we were supposed to get thunderstorms with heavy downpours.

We did our due diligence and messaged our hosts to see what our shelter options were if need be.

Probably the best response ever. We also found a local alerts website, which we would monitor in addition to the forecast. With our gameplan in place, it was time to chug some caffeine and wait for nightfall.

From about 1-4AM, the rain battered loudly on our aluminum roof. At points, it was so loud that we couldn't even hear the thunder, but we could see the flashes of lightning out our windows. Nothing more than the bad thunderstorms that were predicted, but once again, not the most restful night. That's the downside of using a Boondockers Welcome as a refuge from storms. We would love to use the multi-night stays to catch up on sleep because the overnights are exhausting. However, when the storms are at night, we just need to focus on being safe instead of being rested. It's unfortunate but necessary. We were just happy that our spot was safe! A barn next to us shielded us from most of the wind, and we were once again thankful for solid ground to park on, where we wouldn't get stuck.

Our final day brought some better weather, which marked the start of a welcome few days of not needing to worry about storms. We need to take advantage of the nice days when we get them, like by dumping in the sunshine!

We also found plenty of trash bins in the truck parking area of this Love's Travel Stop, and unlike lots of truck stops, these bins were actually emptied on a regular basis. We're happy to report that, after over a week of our challenge, we have been able to find accessible places to toss our garbage, whether that's at the location itself, or at our pit stops such as this. One less thing we've needed to stress about.