Punkin Chunkin 2011: After

As I mentioned previously, this weekend was the annual Punkin Chunkin event up in Delaware. Every year, teams bring their various contraptions made for throwing pumpkins into a field, and square off in each category to see who will be the next champion. I had never been before, so I didn't quite know what to expect, and as with any first time event, you learn quite a bit about how to better prepare for next year.

The first lesson, is to either camp out at the grounds the night before, or get there verrrry early in the morning. My friends and I camped at a campsite about 30 min away, and by the time we everyone else was up and moving around, it was already noon. I was all for camping out at the grounds using tents, but I was outvoted and the cabins 30 min away won. The reason you want to get there so early is because there is one road heading into the site, and thousands of cars trying to get there and park. The event was only about a 30 min drive from our campgrounds, but it took us almost an hour once we were there to drive up the one remaining road and park.

Second lesson, make friends and get invited to join an AWESOME tailgate section! We totally lucked out with this one. Our group drove in two cars, but we got split up in the whole parking thing, and cell phone reception was really bad. Luckily for my half of the group, we had the cooler full of beer, and the folding chairs to bring into the grounds. My friend Pete has a friend named Ryan who lives up in the area, and Pete invited Ryan to join us for the chunk [both of whom rode in my car]. Ryan has some co-workers who found out he was finally going to attend after years of bailing out, and insisted he come and join their tailgate. So Pete and I [and our cooler full of beer] tagged along and got to join a great group of people, right near the front who had gotten up at "zero dark hours" to get out to the field and start cooking and setting everything up. They had an awesome spread of food and were begging us to eat everything so they didn't have to take anything home. [It didn't take much for me to agree with their wishes] I made friends fast and we ended up having a fantastic day watching all the events, and people, all while enjoying hot chili!

Below is a brief photo recap of the day, and a quick video compilation of some of the shots. The video is really short though, because by the time we got there in the afternoon all the trebuchet, and catapult machines had already fired once, and they were onto the air cannons. Now the air cannons were very impressive and fun to watch, but half the time you couldn't even see the pumpkin coming out, or you had no warning that they were about to fire, so I missed a lot of video opportunity because of that. We waited around until dusk for the 'free fire' when the whole range opens up and teams just start launching pumpkins left and right, that was the highlight by far. So here's some pictures and video, and be ready for more punkin chunkin adventure next year!

At the site of our new friends and tailgate section.

Pete and I enjoying our new spot!

The buffet table.

Check out this awesome plate of food!

If I didn't know any better, I'd say that was a real

battlefield there in the distance!

Spitfire!

Man your battle stations!

There was some excellent people watching available as well.

In this shot you can see the guy [who I called Lance] powering

up their human-powered machine with his bike.

The fun machines.

View from the distant parking lot.

[Punkin Chunkin 2011]