We met with a small group of Hobbits traveling in the Misty Mountains, and escorted them to the quaint village of Breck-on-Ridge, where we heard reports of a large, menacing troll in the area, which had been frightening the locals. Making a short foray into the forest near town, we quickly came upon our quarry in a clearing, not even attempting to hide from the daylight. At first we warned him to leave and threatened him with force of arms, but as it happened, he was not a common stone or mountain troll, but one of the rare Wood Trolls of the Misty Mountains, who had left the service of the Enemy long ago and, much like their cousins the Ents, had chosen to live peaceful lives amongst nature. He told us his name was Isak Heartstone, and we had many amusing conversations. Finally, we bade Isak Heartstone a fond goodbye, and made back for the village. We had a slight problem with a rogue Nazgul along the way, but thankfully none of our party was harmed (he was not a very effective Nazgul). At this point, our halfling companions set off back for town to reassure the villagers that the troll trouble had been thoroughly investigated and put to rest. Then the rest of our party made for a nearby abandoned Dwarven mining operation. It was, thankfully, free from orcs, trolls, or other, more dangerous creatures, so we finally reconvened back in Breck-on-Ridge for a bite to eat and a pint at the local tavern.
All in all, a very successful adventure!
In plain English:
We got some folks together to go visit a large art installation up in the ski town of Breckenridge, called Isak Heartstone. It was built several years ago by artist Thomas Dambo, who has done similar large wooden troll sculptures all over the country - but the residents of the area where he initially built it got a bit mad, because of all the new traffic to their neighborhood, so he moved it shortly after to its current location, near the public ice rink. It’s just a short jaunt into the woods from there, so we got a professional photographer to come take some pics of all of us with Isak (those are being edited currently, but I may post some when they’re done). At this point, the folks who just wanted to come for photos took off into Breck (where they were currently holding Oktoberfest), and the rest of us took off for a nearby trail with some incredible views of an old mining operation. The field of rubble produced from just these couple of mines was INSANE. Afterwards we reconvened in town for a bite at a local Irish pub before heading back to the Denver/Colorado Springs area!
I am finding lately that this seems a good way to engage with new folks in our local scene - that is, aim at the people who are most interested in cosplay and LARP by offering fun photo opportunities, and then encourage anyone who wants to get deeper involved to come along for a hike. Seems to be a nice balance of inclusivity and in-depth participation, for the moment at least. I’ll probably be planning more of these kinds of “casual” outings in the near future, and using it as a means to recruit interested parties into the more “hard-core” side of things, while still allowing everyone to have fun at their own speed!
Anyway, Here’s a link to the full Google Drive folder with all of the images I took, ands a few others as well (at a MUCH better resolution), for anyone who might want to have a look:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... jLj8DTT5Mk
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