SEQUIM — Dozens of frontier-era re-enactors broke camp Sunday amid a midsummer downpour — a soggy but satisfying end to the Peninsula Long Rifles’ 44th annual Rendezvous, according to participants in the event.
“It was a good weekend. A beautiful bunch of people were able to get together — but they forgot to turn the sprinklers off,” said Don Abel, known around camp as “The Ram,” who joked about the rain that sent rivulets of water down dirt roads in camp.
This year’s Rendezvous was busy with rifle events and visitors Thursday through Saturday despite the current countywide burn ban, Abel said.
While the event continued on Slab Camp Road south of Sequim on Sunday, rain kept some people away, he said.
The primitive camp-out and re-enactment of an 1840s trapper and trader camp for re-enactors and primitive riflery enthusiasts included flintlock, caplock and archery shoots in range-shooting contests, knife-and-‘hawk throwing contests and youth activities.
There were 78 shooters this year, a drop from previous years when more than 100 participated in the events, said Margaret Abel, Don Abel’s wife and business partner.
Traders’ Row allowed visitors to purchase trade items similar to those that might have been available in the 1840s, observe old-time camp activities and join in events similar to those that might have been held at early trade camps.
The Abels make and sell handmade, antique and “primitive” period costumes, a few animal furs, and a selection of camping and outdoor gear from their canvas sales tent.
Margaret Abel creates most of the clothing and beadwork hat bands and belts, while Don is a flintknapper, carefully creating arrowheads from many types of workable stone and obsidian knife blades, which he fits to antler-bone handles.
Both do most of their work at their home in Kenmore during the winter and in summer and fall attend 12 or 13 rendezvous events put on by groups like Peninsula Long Rifles in Washington and Oregon, Margaret said.
While some participants and visitors gathered in the Abels’ tent, many other remaining participants took refuge in their canvas tents, decorated to appear as close to accurate for the era as possible.
Julie Hatch of Port Angeles with her daughter Cindy Anderson and 7-year-old granddaughter McKaylee Anderson, spent the long weekend living in a canvas tent near the back of the campground.
The two-room white tent included a bedroom with a big wooden hide-covered bed and wood stove, changes of clothing, trunks and chairs, washbasins and a kitchen area — everything a frontier family would need to carve out a life in a trading camp for the summer.
What isn’t period appropriate is usually covered by something that is, Hatch said.
“The rain only makes it seem more real,” she said.
McKaylee Anderson was only slightly slowed down by the rain, bouncing from the bed, playing with her grandmother’s terriers and running among the nearby trees in her frock and pinafore.
Cindy Anderson said it was the family’s second year taking part in the re-enactment camp, and looks forward to taking part in more events in the future.
There will be one more chance for North Olympic Peninsula residents to take part in a camp re-enactment this summer.
Primitive riflery and the fur trading camp will return to Sequim for the Labor Day weekend, Sept. 4 to Sept. 7, during the Green River Mountain Men Rendezvous, also held on the Peninsula Long Rifles property.
For more information about the Peninsula Long Rifles’ Rendezvous, visit www.peninsulalongrifles.com.
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Reporter Arwyn Rice can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5070, or at arice@peninsuladailynews.com.
