Teston Bridge Kite Festival 8 -10 August 2003
The kite festival at Teston Bridge might not be the biggest event in the kite calendar, but in the humble opinion (!) of our webmaster it is one of the highlights of the year. It's less than an hour's drive from Team ELF - land, and it's in the most beautiful location.

Flying kites is in many ways just an optional extra for the event. It's a good chance to sit and relax with friends. The weekend began for us with twelve elves camping out on the Friday, together with probably about thirty of our kiting friends from all over the south east (also camping) joining us for fish & chips in the evening. Our group was joined over the weekend by four more camp (ing) elves and over a dozen more elves & friends & relatives of elves coming out for the day to enjoy the festival together with hundreds of the general public
Four hot babes.

Literally !!

According to reports we've since heard this was the hottest weekend for years. With no wind at all on the Saturday we sat and sweltered, pausing only every five minutes for a slow stroll to the ice cream stall.
There's a river nearby. We asked the park warden if we could swim in it. He laughed. So we said, "is it banned then?" He laughed some more, and warned us that while there was no actual ban, there was a sewage out fall a few miles upstream. But look - we've got girlie types in charge - can't go wrong, can we ?
Well, look at the piccy. The girlies went wrong by assuming that the littlest elves were the ones that needed looking after. The biggest elves got great big water pistols and, having watched too many "Rambo" films, all got Vietnam flashbacks and saw "gooks" under every lily pad.

Oh the nice fisherman DID laugh !!
One of the good things about kite festivals is that they have special permission from the civil aviation people to fly kites HIGH, and all other air traffic is warned to stay away. For ages we'd joked about tying "bait" to a kite line and "sky-fishing" for eagles or light aircraft.

 

Look at the one that got away !!!!!!
Normally Stevey wouldn't have let something that size get away, but duty called and Stevey set about creating the best barbecue that many of us had ever tasted.

Now, always remembering manners, El Presidente & the Webmaster decided it would be rude to eat such ambrosia and have to wash it down with cheap rotgut, so they decided that it would be polite to create a "special cocktail" to complement the food.

Now normally such a drink recipe would be a closely guarded secret, but if you're reading this drivel, you're probably the sort of person who can be trusted with this information.

OK. Four litres of "Um Bongo" & half a bottle of Rum. Mix & shake. There you have it - "Rum Bongo"!!
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It didn't really "complement the food". It was more along the lines of of "asked who the food was looking at, if the food wanted a fight & then took a wild swipe at the food before falling in a heap and being sick". But that didn't stop the punters pouring it down their necks.

El Presidente, having mixed the nectar, then flatly refused to touch a drop of it.

The Webmaster had a swig and promptly went off to declare war on the people from Suffolk for eating salad. It was all a bit vague after that, and we are sure that the rumours of the Webmaster wandering about dipping celery in his Rum Bongo whilst sporting a REALLY SEXY hat are malicious lies.
However Team Elf can accept no responsibility for the effects of Rum Bongo on Chairmen of brother kite-clubs or Webmasters.
The second day of the festival took us all by surprise. Not only were people still alive after having partaken of the "special cocktail", but there was also enough wind to fly kites.

So we did

 

 
Team ELF would like to extend the most grateful thanks to Ron Dell for putting on such a wonderful weekend.

And be most assured we will be back again next year !!