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Been a while since I did one of these write-ups but here it is, wedding no2. All the usual happened; I was told we had a small (ahem) show coming up for a wedding. I was picked up by Gren and off he drove up on high into the hills to a farm house, where a large marquee had been set up as the main venue, outside were some of the guests enjoying a game of cricket with a 10 gallon barrel as the stumps.
We drove on down further into the field and pulled up by Pete's car where upon I promptly jumped out ready for action. Straight around to the back of the van I rushed ready to unload a selection of small gear and get ready to fuse up the shells, I opened the door…eh this is a 5" fan rack??? What's going on here this is supposed to be a small show, what's this a box of 3" Maltese multi breaks, is this tomorrow's van load ready for something they haven't told me about "ere do you want all this out or are they for something else" I said rather confused.
No unload them they are for this show was the answer, excellent was the only thing that was going through my mind. So we started unloading the gear. What the chuff a 6" tube lay before me so I pulled it out and all of a sudden (queue shocker) aagghhh I was set upon by an 8" tube with a box next to it clearly labelled 8" brocade crown. This had gone from setting up a few small shells and cakes for a decent show, to all of a sudden jumping up a rather large gear to include some rather impressive pyro.
The set up commenced without a hitch 3 racks of blockbusters (hate them they hate me suicidal gits) a nice piece of lance work for the happy couple, a few 19 shot barrages the large silver whirlwind cat4 cake, a great western fancake and one of the monster kimbolton 150 shot cakes Thunder rain, also one of my leftovers from the last new year bash shoguns X cake.
The shells were all loaded and racks secured nothing left to do except visit the marquee and see big Dave in action this time as barman extraordinaire (due to it being a family wedding) instead of setting up and letting rip.
Mingled about a bit got to see what was going on and enjoyed the music for a while all the time waiting to fire and what would you know, I bumped into an old school teacher (cant go anywhere these days) the sun set and Mars came up it was one of those things that you remember for the rest of your life. Atop a hill in the middle of nowhere waiting to let rip with explosives and Mars is just staring at you. Firing time came so we made our way back to the fireworks to get geared up. Gren donned his terminator attire whilst Pete and I removed covers from the fireworks.
I had my camera at the ready for the ground zero pics I was after portfires were lit and the show commenced. Red to blinker bengals filled the field with an eerie red glow turning to a blinding strobe effect as the lance work fired into life, a lovely red heart with angled gold fountains on either side brought on the aahhhss from the crowd.
As this burnt for a while Pete moved on to the first cake up went the first few shots to a cheer from the crowd whilst I frantically tried to snap the pics I was after. BOOM the first set of shells left their mortars, I looked up waiting for the breaks my heart was pounding waiting for the sound BOOM as they broke "I was in heaven again" id been waiting to hear that sound for a long time. Things moved on a blockbuster rack was lit and I moved away rather sharply me and blockbusters aren't very keen on each other and with them being explosive I tend to let them have the upper hand and keep away 8). Well the camera was snapping away wildly I had no idea if any would come out but just kept on snapping anyway, and an airbomb barrage started knocking chunks out of the sky as the shells wowed the audience these triple breaks were far better than the run of the mill shells and made for an excellent show. Gren shouted to Pete how many racks he had left so it was time to move onto the bigger cakes ready for the finale.
Me being ground zero mad missed it all whilst trying to get a shot of the thunder rain cake firing and what a result I got as you can tell by the pic . I got as close as I dared because this thing aint tame took the shots just in time to look up and catch the heart shells breaking, as the thunder rain was going mad the 6" went up and then on to the 8" BOOOM as the shell left after shaking you to the bone up up and up then it just filled the sky right above my head with stunning golden trails with a circular centre of golden stars doing their own thing superb.
Crowd cheer huge grin on my face time to check tubes and pack away, Id heard a rumour about free beer and didn't want to hang around too long to see if it was true. We got back to the marquee and the beer started flowing everyone had enjoyed a lovely wedding capped off by some outstanding pyro and a mad party afterwards.
Me I just wanted to go home I had a big day ahead of me the next day but had to wait for a lift home so I was happily supplied with beer until id completely forgotten who I was and what I was supposed to be doing the next day, aahh such is the life.
Thanks again to SKYBLAZERS FIREWORKS for having me along again. Return to main fireworks
site Pictures and report courtesy Graham Mann. Feature ©2003 UK Firework Review |
