Medieval Lye

It rained pretty much all day yesterday, half of the bunch ventured out to Kovik and Fröjel between some showers and got some very, very fresh air. Since it was raining *again* today (on the "Island of Sun", hahaha), we decided to ignore it and head for Lye to the advertised Medieval market.

It was a good half hour's drive, and there was a hand-painted sign pointing the way to go. It was at the church, and there was extra, free parking. We thought: great, only a dozen cars, everyone else was afraid of the rain, we will now enjoy ourselves.

We looked for the market. All we saw was one tent, but there were women in long skirts heading from a building there. A sign said "Coffee and cakes", and since there was not much coffee in general during medieval times, we walked around looking for the market. We checked the church - chock full of families getting out of the rain, and some wall paintings including a nice little devil in the back - no market. We found the medieval toilets (outhouses) and then continued on.

There was just the tent. So we went in.

There were 5 stands.

1. She was selling woven rugs and saffron cakes in baggies. Nothing medieval here.
2. An old couple was selling wooden trinkets. Lots of modern stuff like a brick-a-brack rack. Or did they use egg cups in Medieval times? At least he looked good in his costume.
3. A potter selling some okay-looking modern pots.
4. A lady selling stones she had glued fossils and shells onto with some tiny cloth flowers for decoration. I suppose she used medieval glue. She explained to us what each of the fossils was. Maybe.
5. A guy selling ice cream - from an electrically powered ice chest.

Finito.

We dashed through the rain into the building for coffee. Two more women wearing medieval costumes, selling juice and coffee and nice cakes. Did they have almonds on Gotland in medieval times? The walls were lined with the same woven rugs and wooden stuff, and some wollen socks and shawls and pulse warmers, all for sale.

I think the town name is misspelled. It should be Lie. Medieval Lie.

We sent an SMS to the other car, which was planning on taking in 20 churches and then meeting us at the market, that we were heading for the ceramics factory. We got tickets, stood in line there for 40 minutes, and both Teenies and I made ourselves nice little pots on the pottery wheel and got ourselves dirty with clay top to toe.

The cultural car caught up with us and dragged us through two more rainy natural highlights before everyone gave up in disgust and went home for cakes and coffee. Non-medieval.