Tortuga!

Twas fair weather when we set sail for Bolton Castle, early on Saturday morn. We made good time and arrived as the Admiralty were still hard at work, preparing the challenges that we were to face. The challenges started with a test of Pirate trivia, of which it appears I know far too much for my own good. This gave me a stash of dubloons to wager on various games to try and win more loot, including such delights as cannonball croquet, ring tossing, water balloons at twenty paces and lobbing balls into buckets. Great fun, all round.



By five of the clock, I had amassed a total of 28 dubloons and then donated them Blackrose Mac to allow him to purchase a captaincy and hire a suitably motley crew. I was hired on as first mate for five dubloons and then set to drinking whilst the rest of the crew were hired. We worked through more challenges, working as a team this time, to earn dubloons and clues to greater treasures. These included the stupidly dangerous man overboard challenge of getting everybody over a fence rail without touching it, which we won by dint of the competing crew suffering a twisted ankle and a near impalement in their attempt. Our Captain was caught kissing the Admiral's daughter and was flogged and had his lips sewn together for an hour at one point, but we finally managed to find out first clue.

We purchased a compass and diligently followed the directions. We quickly realised that heading due east 29 paces from the highest point of the castle would swiftly lead to falling a great distance, but that you could follow the directions at ground level. The trail appeared to be fruitless, but I reasoned that the part in the clue about 'turning your bow back to the east' meant walking back four paces instead of forward which put the location of the treasure midway along one of the buttresses. I moved some rocks out of a hole and pulled out a perfectly huge bag of dubloons. Huzzah!

The admiralty let slip that we had found the largest treasure first by following the compass rather than taking dead reckoning as they had expected us to do, and by a process of elimination we also found another treasure hidden inside the castle wall as well. I made even more money by placing side bets on the Algonquin wrestling matches that were taking place, so I had a fine stash of 112 dubloons including my share of the crew treasure.



As the games drew to a close, there was much drinking of rum leading to several unfortunate bouts of 'sea sickness' from one or two pirates who had over indulged. There were many sore heads being nursed in the morning, notably Captain Bastardo who had passed out in a flower bed and slept through most of the prize auction and the grand tourney.

By dint of our treasure hunting success we had amassed enough dubloons to nab the prize for the wealthiest crew, and also to earn our Captain the name of the Dread Pirate Tortuga for the next year. We were all able to afford choice picks from the prize auction, including swords from the Admiral's collection and an original Buccaneer boardgame for myself.



I entered the tourney, and earned a compliment for good style, but I was eventually eliminated with a blow to the shoulder. The eventual winner was Chris, who was undefeated in all of the qualifying rounds and a worthy champion.

More pictures can be found here and only remains for me to thank the Captain and crew of the "Crimson Coffin" for leading us to a well earned victory!

Yo ho, yo ho - a pirate's life for me!