Knights, magicians to perform at East Idaho Renaissance Faire starting this weekend
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RIGBY — Calling all lords and ladies, knights, jesters and minstrels! The East Idaho Renaissance Faire opens its 2021 season at Krupp Scout Hollow in Jefferson County this weekend!
The Faire, now in its fifth year, will be a kaleidoscope of sights, sounds and tastes. Faire attendees can see a wide variety of entertaining presentations, browse the wares of various vendors and sample delicious food, all in one location.
While last year’s Faire was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the time off gave organizers extra time to map out this year’s event and make it really special.
“It’s kind of nice because we’ve had two years to plan it,” Faire spokesman Sam Hughes told EastIdahoNews.com. “So, we have a lot more stage shows this year. We have some local performances, we have some non-local performances. We started out with one stage show, which was a magician, and now we have the magician, we have a couple of musicians, we have a husband-and-wife storytelling team and we also have a dragon who’s a hypnotist.”
Other new additions include a kids’ area for younger faire goers, which features a maze that children can try to find their way through. There will also be quests that kids can go on to learn some history and earn prizes and more games and activities for Faire visitors of all ages.
All this expanded Renaissance Faire fun is happening at a new location this year, Krupp Scout Hollow. It was previously near Yellowstone Bear World, but the new location gives Faire organizers increased access to amenities that should greatly improve the faire experience.
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“This allows us to expand our food selection,” Hughes said. “We’ve probably tripled the amount of food items and things that we’re doing this year. It’s going to be really good.”
The new food and entertainment options are greatly needed because, by all appearances, east Idahoans are chomping at the bit to attend an event like Renaissance Faire after a year spent stuck indoors and separated from other people.
“We’re seeing a massive increase in everything that we’re doing and in terms of our ticket sales,” Hughes said. “Usually our Kings Feast is sold out a month in advance. But this year, it sold out two months in advance, and we added fifteen tickets each night, and those sold out in four days. That’s sixty tickets gone. In four days.”
“I think a lot of people are super excited because with COVID, everybody was locked up, and now they want to get out and do stuff,” he added. “They want to get out and they want to do something fun, that’s family-oriented. So we’re seeing a lot of people that want to come to the event. We’re expecting record-breaking numbers for us.”
While Renaissance Faire 2021 appears headed for soaring heights, Hughes says it’s equally exciting to look back at how the event started and how much it has grown.
“We weren’t sure we were going to survive our first year,” he said. “Now we’re sitting here five years later. We started this in 2017. And it’s crazy to think that we’ve been working on this that long. Every year up until now, we’ve been like ‘We’re not going to survive. This is our last year doing this.’ And every year, it’s just gotten more popular. It’s grown into this thing that’s become a family tradition for people. More and more people are making it part of their summer.”
You can check out the East Idaho Renaissance Faire for yourself when it opens this Friday, June 25 at Krupp Scout Hollow between Rigby and Rexburg. The Renaissance Faire runs from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. each Friday and Saturday through July 17th. Visit the Faire website or Facebook page for more information.
