Archery competition "winter animal"

This post will not necessary be Viking related, but it sure is fitting! Last weekend some of my fellow archers and I went to a competition called the Winter animal on Texel. This competition has been around for 20 years now! It is a branch of archery called field archery, in which you shoot at targets on different distances and sizes scattered throughout a field, or in this case a dune forest. The archery club eilandschutters organizes it every second week of februari. They make sure there is a foodtruck, a warm tent and even a instalment of an archery shop: Asgaard archery. In case you loose some arrows during your rounds, you can get some new ones there. He also sells bows and accessories, like targets, protection and knives. It's really fun to browse when you are there as well.

Eye to eye with a coyote.

There were 60 targets in total, ranging from tiny owls to big deer. The distances were unknown, so you have to guess how far they are and react accordingly. On Saturday we started with our first two rounds: partly in the forest and partly in the dunes. We shot 30 targets per day, starting at 10-ish in the morning till around 15/16 in the afternoon. A long day of climbing trough the sandy dunes and struggling to get trough bramble infested forest. A real workout for sure! No target was the same with some being a easy hit for most of us, to some where we spend what felt like ages digging arrows from the moss carpets. We almost were like boars, digging trough the dirt. At least that was what it looked like when we were finished. We did manage to find most of our arrows, but also found some from other archers. We would take those and put them in the lost and found bucket. This is where we also found some of our own arrows. I did not break an arrow this year, but I did have a arrow head come loose. This is an easy fix though so that's nice. Writhing this I still need to glue the arrow.

One of the targets: a deer laying down.

This is the first time in years that I was able to shoot both days, which was awesome! Due to some personal struggles I used to have a lot less energy and headspace, but this time I did both days. I also shot a lot of the targets from the furthest distance, just to see if I could. Sometimes I got so close I stayed there and slowly crept closer with each arrow. Which felt really good, seeing and knowing that I'm capable. So, I'm really proud of my progress and how well I did this weekend. I also went in my kit, like I did last years. Well, almost like last years, cause this time my whole outfit was handmade and way more accurate to the Viking age then my previous attempts. I can almost use the competition as a measuring tool for my reenactment journey: two years ago I went to Texel with a fantasy fit, getting a taste of handmade clothing the next year. Another fun thing is that more and more archers each year went in fantasy/historical clothing. It is really nice to see. With us two years ago almost being the only ''crazy'' ones, this year there were a lot more. I mean, it pairs together perfectly: archery and history.

A bison in the dune forest.

One of my favorite targets!

The distance of this deer/reindeer was really hard to pinpoint. When we got closer we saw that this was because of the fact that he was way bigger then expected. This really gave it a strange perspective. But that's what the competition is about! There were a lot of memorable targets like this one, a hanging bat in the forest, a bear we had to hit from on top of the dunes looking down into the forest. There was also a hunter target, which implies you only get one try, this was the smallest owl we had ever seen. Not bigger then two fists. They did an amazing job with placing everything, almost like they have been doing it for a while. Like I said, 20 years to be precise.

The bear!

At the end of the second day I could really feel my body getting tired. The bow kept getting heavier to pull, and I got sloppy with my aim. But, who would blame me? Shooting for two full days, in rather cold conditions, walking a whole lot as well. Yeah, it was not weird that we all felt like a bath and a warm meal at the end of it all. But I already can't wait till next year! Are you excited about it and part of an archery club? There is always next year to join. Maybe I'll see you there?

In case you are interested I'll leave a link to their page here:

eilandschutters.nl

And also that of Asgaard archery, I'm not sponsored, but I did buy my bow and all the stuff to make my own arrows there!

ASGAARD ARCHERY – traditioneel handboogschieten