Friends of TFT,

We announce some changes that are being made in the hope of improving the quality of the event and boost attendance. As you can imagine, the cost of putting on a first class event is not low. For most of us the prizes are not the real reason we rendezvous, but the re-creation of a unique American and Western piece of history, the fur trade rendezvous of 1825-1840.

All of you know that competitors must be members of the White Smoke Company of Buckskinners, Inc. The club has three divisions, Texas Free Trappers, Fritztown Free Trappers and the White Smoke Brigade. FFT has rendezvous on the second weekends of March and October; TFT has rendezvous on the second weekend of April and November; WSB has black powder matches on the fourth Saturday of each month. All four rendezvous will be at the La Vernia site for the foreseeable future and WSB matches are on private land on Highway 306, east of Canyon Lake.

That being stated, we are going to have the same $15 entry fee for TFT rendezvous competitors. In addition, there will an opportunity to re-enter each event. A re-entry fee of $2 will let you make an attempt to better your score. The score of the last event entered will be your score, so if you do worse on the re-entry you can re-enter one more time….event schedules and daylight permitting.

As before, each event will have a First Place prize winner with the number of additional Second and Third Place prizes determined by the number of entries; the more entries the more prizes.

Guns must be loaded with black powder or a substitute for black powder. No smokeless powder blends are permitted. Only patched round balls may be used.

Smoothbores used in smoothbore matches may not have a rear sight.

Tomahawks must be of traditional design with blades no longer than 4 inches.

Knives must be of traditional design and no longer than 13 inches.

I was contacted by a family in Iowa that cooks breakfast, fry bread and Indian tacos at rendezvous and bike rallies that will be setting up at Rendezvous XIII as a “trial run” in this area. I had great success with a similar operation at two of my Taos Free Trappers rendezvous in New Mexico. You might become an addict of fry bread and Indian tacos like I am. We will try to teach them to make breakfast tacos. This is their webpage: www.crazyladyscafe.com

Members of Celtaire String Band, a group that plays at Texas Revolution events, and other places, is planning to join us Saturday to get introduced to rendezvous and regale us with some period music at Council Fire.

Our good friend, David Sutherland, the bagpiper who lives in La Vernia is invited too.

We asking any serious buckskinner in our group to study up on a character from the fur trade and entertain us at Council Fire with a true story (or tall tale) from the life in the Shin’ Mountains.

In closing, I also ask you to participate in all of the Council Fire activities and show some appreciation to the folks who make a presentation or perform period music with the goal of bringing the fur trade era back to life. These programs are for your entertainment as well as knowledge and are not available at many rendezvous.

Keep an eye on the horizon . . .

Grey Wolf, Bushwah
wolfbear@gvtc.com
830-935-3121

More details are available on the Events page.