One of the ancient Whitsun Ales, the Kirtlington Lamb Ale can be traced back to the early 1600’s, and took the form of a village festival and feast. Since Kirtlington Morris was revived in 1979, the Lamb Ale has been an annual event held on the weekend of Trinity Sunday.
The Sunday sees morris happening all over the village, starting with a procession to church and a Lamb Ale service for those so inclined. This year we were lucky enough
to be invited to join the festivities.

We were, to be honest, a bit short handed, and so pictures are of everyone except us.

We joined the procession to the church, and, following the service, the procession through the village to the school.

Kirtlington get underway at the school.

The Kirtlington Maids do their dance.

After a dance from all the attending sides, we split up and moved to different locations around the village. We started at the Dashwood Arms.

Adderbury outside the Dashwood.

We then moved on to the Oxford Arms, where our hosts joined us.

Outside the Oxford Arms.

Kirtlington concentrate on their sticking.

As anyone who has been following the cricket World Cup will know, the weather has been a bit, well, soggy of late. Our next stop was to be outside the Village Hall,
but a downpour moved us into the hall. After that, it was back to the school for one last dance each.

Kirtlington lift off!

The Lamb Ale is quite a do. For the last dance at the school, we were the 19th side to dance! A good day; we’ll be hoping to be invite back.

Monday’s not a usual evening for an ale, so it was a barely quorate Havoc – 4 dancers and 1 musician – that headed out to East Challow on Monday 21st March for what sounded like a low key Winter Ale hosted by Cornucopia Appachalatian Dance. Only a £1, snacks provided, bring your own drinks.

Our hosts, Cornucopia

In fact, it was a very jolly evening. The promised snacks turned out to be considerably more substantial that we’d expected, and I have to mention a particularly fine ginger cake.

Unusually, dancing did not stop for food, so everyone ended up doing 5 dances. Luckily, we were joined by familiar faces from Icknield, Ridgeway Clog and , plus a side new to me at least, Garston Gallopers, so we got a fair break between dances.

With only four dancers, we had to adapt our dances down from the usual 6 or 8. In most cases this was straightforward, but a reduced Vandals of Hammerwich did require a careful run-through of the hay with coins on the table before we tried it. And, slightly surprisingly for all, it worked first time.

There being nobody spare from Havoc to hold a camera, you’ll just have make do with pictures of the other sides.

Ridgeway Clog at the Cornucopia Ale

Garston Gallopers

Masons Apron at the Cornucopia Ale

Saturday March 12th, and it’s one of the highlights of the Havoc year for your correspondent. The Vale Islanders Ale.

Our hosts, the Vale Islanders

The Vale Ale is always a good do. I have to confess that a major attraction is the 17th century dinner they provide!

Vale Ale menu. Yum.

Dinner!

We shared the evening with some familiar faces from Icknield Morris, Owlswick, Ridgeway Clog and Hazzaz Belly Dancers from Witney.

Ridgeway Clog at the Vale Ale

Hezzaz at the Vale Ale

Owlswick (plus two substitutes) at the Vale Ale

It’s the evening of Valentines Day, and all the restaurants are full and charging outrageous prices. What are you to do? Go to the Oxford City Ale instead, of course.

As usual for an Ale, there was a couple of rounds of dancing. Slightly unusually, everyone had to do two dances per rotation, which meant a bit of frantic calculation as we’d only come prepared for two dances. We only just had enough people too, so nobody spare to take photos.

Lepton Morris testing stick resilience at the Oxford City Ale 2015.

But we managed a very respectable Sidesteps, Constant Billy, Banbury Bill and finished with an enthusiastic Vandals, aided by an interloper borrowed from Wolvercote. Charlbury added a melodeon to the music for Vandals, too.

Charlbury Morris plus an interloper from Wolvercote Morris, at the Oxford City Ale 2015.

Well done to Nerys for doing all the dances. Pretty good going when you only started in September. And thanks to Audrey and Steve for the music, and for Rolling Home our spot.

Local 17th Century dance side The Vale Islanders held their annual Ale on March 1st. Despite a perfect storm of clashing diary entries, we got together enough Havocs to appear, and a fine time ensued.

We danced our old standbys Banbury Bill and Constant Billy, and then four intrepid Havocs joined Owslwick Morris for a Vandals of Hammerwich. As can happen when you mix two sides, it turned out that both knew basically the same dance, but had some rather different ideas in the final figure, at which point much confusion ensued. Much to the credit of all concerned, everyone had somehow recovered to the correct position by the end of the figure. I’m really not quite sure how.

And then the food. This is a highlight of the Vale Ale, being authentic 17th Century food prepared by the Islanders themselves. Our annual chance to gorge on pease pudding and other delicacies. All washed down with West Berks Good Old Boy.

Unfortunately we managed forget to bring a decent camera, so the pictures are from Jim’s phone. Which does not do a good job in low light.

Dancing Banbury Bill at the Vale Islanders Ale 2014

Dancing Constant Billy at the Vale Islanders Ale 2014 with ATMD looking on