There are few horrors worse than watching a cataclymic natural disaster bearing down relentlessly on your family and friends. There are few emotions more terrible than the feeling of utter and complete helplessness, being unable to do anything to prevent or even mitigate such a disaster. Those were Ryleh's feelings in the Fall of 2005, when first Hurricane Katrina launched a deadly assault on Louisiana and Mississippi, followed shortly by Hurricane Rita striking the Texas Coast. Watching these disasters unfold both on the Web and on television was bad enough, for most of Ryleh's faire friends and family live in either Texas or Louisiana, but the feeling of helpless horror increased astronomically after receiving a worrisome phonecall from Aviana (Photo, Right), telling me that she and her family were getting ready to evacuate Houston in advance of the storm! Ryleh advised her to head for Dallas -- well north of the then-predicted storm track -- but her family decided on Austin instead as they had friends there, offering shelter. Unfortunately, Rita was aiming for the Texas Coast just below San Antonio at that time, which would have put the hurricane right over Austin if Rita had stayed on course. Worse, the mass evacuation of Houston was not going well at all, with virtual gridlock on all roads -- both major and minor -- leaving town. Needless to say, the thought of Aviana being stuck in a traffic jam somewhere in the open cattle country between Houston and Austin with a Category 5 Hurricane bearing down on her did not make Ryleh very happy!!!
time. Now during her tour of Texas, Allison had packed only 45mph winds at worst, yet still managed to kill 23 people and cause more than five billion dollars in damage in state, alone. It was not hard at all to imagine what sort of havoc a full-blown hurricane would wreak on Houston, especially if it came straight thru the downtown area with all those soaring towers of steel and glass. Worse, with all the roadways out of town gridlocked solid by evacuees, many of my Rennish friends there had simply decided to hunker down and ride out the storm (Photo, Right: Hurricane Rita approaching the Gulf Coast as a Category 3 hurricane packing 115mph winds; courtesy of Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Hurr-rita-irloop.gif)! This was not as bad as it sounds. Since most of my faire family in Texas already camp the Texas Renaissance Festival every weekend throughout the faire season, they're used to primitive conditions: no ice, no running water, no electricity, no fans, no air conditioning, no hot showers. So all they had to do was break out their camping gear and secure plenty of canned food and bottled water and let Rita do her worst -- they were ready!
In fact many of the Houston Rennies took to the Web at this time, maintaining communication by posting individual status reports frequently in Rennish chatrooms across the Internet. While this was greatly reassuring, indeed, Ryleh still couldn't help but worry about their lives and safety as the hurricane bore down relentlessly on the Texas Gulf Coast. As luck would have it, however, Rita's storm track continued shifting east until 24 September 2005, when she finally made landfall on the Texas-Louisiana border between Sabine Pass (Texas) and Johnson's Bayou (Louisiana). This was small consolation for Ryleh, as his friend, Ben -- AKA "The Grinning Demon of TRF" (Photo, Left: Ben in his full "Demon" garb at TRF) -- lives in Beaumont, Texas, only a short drive away from Sabine Pass! Ryleh could only hope that Ben and his family had already evacuated from Beaumont well ahead of the storm, heading for shelter at his ranch further inland near Tyler, Texas. Unfortunately -- for all intents and purposes -- Aviana and Ben had both dropped out of sight by this time, vanishing into the vast Texas hinterlands around Austin and Tyler, without trace. Nor could they be reached either by phone or email. For the next three days, all Ryleh could do was watch the weather reports, follow the developing news, read the chatroom threads, chew his fingernails and worry constantly, trusting that all was still well with Aviana and Ben as well as all his many friends and family along the Gulf.
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Standard Disclaimer: This webpage is strictly an *Unofficial* look at the Texas Renaissance Festival held near Houston every year since 1974. The author of these pages is in no way, shape, manner or form connected with the Texas Renaissance Festival (OFFICE ADDRESS: RR 2 Box 650 Plantersville, TX 77363-1505) and/or any of the sponsors associated with this event. All opinions expressed are strictly this author's own. Unless noted otherwise, all photographs are copyright ©2001-2006 by George Laking.
