Weird Weekend 2006 - Picture Gallery

My surrogate Mum gets an `Access all Areas` pass

The village children certainly enjoyed themselves

My next door neighbour and young friend attack the pinada

Matthew Williams does his own inimitable thing

It's only rock and roll, but I like it

David Phillips - without him we couldn't have managed the event

Redders mans the barbecue

Weird Weekend: The Final Day

I remember when I was a little boy, every Christmas, my little brother would burst into tears at the end of the day because it was all over for another year. At the age of nearly 47 I know exactly how he felt.

Saturday had been an extremely stressfull day; it had been a success, but there were 101 tiny issues (and one larger one) which had to be dealt with, and by the end of the day I was so tired that I could hardly walk, let alone think. But sunday was a delightfull day, an emotional rollercoaster which saw me almost burst into tears at one stage.

First up was Paul Vella. I have known Paul for years, and for the last three years he has offered to give a talk at the Weird Weekend, and to my eternal embarrassment I have forgotten to put him on the bill - until this year. I am not doubly embarrassed, because he was bloody fantastic! Although during the rest of the weekend, I had been fairly strict about keeping to the schedule, he was so popular, and engendered such an impressive dialogue with the audience, that his 45 minute talk lasted nearly an hour and a half - with absolutely NO complaints.

Then came Jeremy Harte, who told of the folkloric accounts of how monsters - mostly dragons and wildmen - had been captured by use of alcohol. His talk was particularly interesting, when, during the discussion on wildmen, a three way discussion between him, Ronan, and Richard F, took the audience by storm.

Chris Moiser gave an entertaining and informative talk about the mystery of the Wrangaton Lion, and explained how the recently introduced Freedom of Information Act has been an invaluable boon to British mystery cat researchers. Chris, by the way, has been the only speaker, apart from Richard Freeman, to have appeared at every Weird Weekend since we started.

Then came Larry Warren - one of the most eagerly awaited speakers of the weekend. Since arrived on Thursday he had quickly endeared himself to both the children and the adults of the village. He had been playing with the kids all weekend, and had also become a firm favourite up at the pub! His Rendlesham Forest talk brought the house down, and there are now North Devonians from the age of 8 to 75 who are devoted Warrenophiles.

Next up were C.A.S, a local band, put together by David Phillips, who works at the CFZ during school holidays and at weekends. They are all fourteen, and the line up were:

Tully Reynolds Vox
Chris Buse Lead Guitar
Richard Harding Rhythm Guitar
Jeremy Manning Bass
David Phillips Drums
George Snell Yeti

I gave them my best Sam Cutler introduction, and Matt Williams provided lasers and smoke, and for a brief three minutes, we were transported back to Woodstock!

But then came the surprise. I have known David's family for thirty-five years, and his mother, Kaye, is more like a sister to me than a friend. David grabbed a microphone, and together with his two young brothers Ross, and Greg, read me a poem they had written, and presented me with a birthday cake nmade by the two younger boys. It was then, for the first and only time onstage, that I very nearly burst into tears!

Then came Ronan Coghlan, someone without whom I cannot imagine evr having a Weird Weekend. He is opne of the most naturally funny people that I have ever met, and he was undoubtedly the most entertaining speaker of the whole weekend. His talk on the goatman legends around the world, from ancient Greece, to moderm-day America.

I wrapped up the proceedings with a few words on the activities of the CFZ over the last year, and what we hoped to achieve in the future, and then it was all over!

There are so many people that I would like to thank for their help this weekend. Apart from the speakers, there were the stage crew! When we started the Weird Weekend back in 2000, it was put together by me, Richard, Graham, and Nichola Sullings - a crew of four. Now, I had a crew of over twenty!

LISA DOWLEY: Security/Floor Manager
DAVID PHILLIPS: Sound and Light
MATTHEW WILLIAMS: AV/crew
MATTHEW OSBOURNE: Road Crew
PETER CHANNON: Road Crew
JOHN FULLER: CFZ Staff/retail
MARK MARTIN: Security
JOHN GLEDSON: CFZ TV/First unit Cameraman
DAN GARRAWAY: CFZ TV/Second unit Cameraman
GRAHAM INGLIS: CFZ Management/Driver/Third Unit Cameraman
ROY PHILLIPS: Driver/crew
ROSS PHILLIPS: Floor Liaison
GREG PHILLIPS: Floor Liaison
OLL LEWIS: CFZ Staff/tour guide
NICHOLA SULLINGS: PA (Friday)
RICHARD FREEMAN: CFZ Management/Asst. Floor Manager (Friday)/Compere
MARK NORTH: CFZ Management/Photographer/Retail
CORINNA JAMES: CFZ Management/Retail/Admin
BRIAN BUTLER: Community Centre Liaison
HELEN BOND: CFZ Infrastructure
SUZI MARSH: PA/Admin/crew/retail

That evening in the pub, someone asked me what the point of the whole thing was. I told him that although it is the only English speaking cryptozoological conference in Europe, it is more than that. The CFZ is fast becoming a truly global community, and the Weird Weekend is the one time in the year that this community meets in the flesh. It is a place to see old friends, and to meet new ones. It is a place where people of all ages (3-80+ this weekend), all nationalities (11, this weekend), and from all walks of life can get together, have fun, and be happy.

In the modern world, occasions like this are a real rarity, and it truly has been a very weird (and heartwarming) weekend.

WEIRD WEEKEND - DAY TWO

Strange days indeed!

The show kicked off bright and early with some suitably intellectually mordant doom and gloom from Richard Ingram, an old friend of mine from Exeter, who was talking about the `Decline of Civilisation`. A slightly downbeat subject for the first talk possibly, but it was very interesting and resulted in an almost unprecedented amount of audience feedback for a talk scheduled so early in the morning.

Then came Lionel Beer, who was on the Search for Camelot, which took us all across the celtic nations, and brought us back to the French Dictionary. I have known Lionel for many years, and it was good to have him on stage at a Weird Weekend at last.

Later, all the way from sunny Switzerland came Andreas Trottmann, who gave a fascinating talk about the Lake Monster traditions of Central Europe. It has to be said that all our foreign speakers have been excellent this year, but also very kind and generous to us. After his talk, Andreas waived most of his fee, and said that he would rather that monies raised at the event went back into the CFZ to pay for our ongoing programme of research.

Then came the notorious WW quiz, which was won by the home team, mostly because of the sterling efforts of young Ross Phillips (11), who is rapidly becoming one of the most eccentric, and loveable, members of the team.

Enter Paul Cropper for the first of two talks on Australian forteana. This was about one of the most notorious poltergeist episodes from the Antipodes, and went down very well. He was only on for a relatively short time, because he was a last-minute replacement for Tim Matthews, who had been taken ill, and had been forced to pull out at the last minute!

Then came one of the highlights of the weekend. Jon Ronson, an old mate of mine, and one of the big stars of British humorous journalism, gave a talk about his experiences when he infiltrated the notorious Bohemian Grove country club in northern California. The knowledge that our world leaders appear to indulge themselves by carrying out mock human sacrifices to a stone idol of a giant owl, can only give us even more respect for the powers that be in this ever more bizarre world.

Back came Paul Cropper, for one of the most eagerly anticipated talks of the weekend - on the Australian Yowie, the Antipodean analogue of bigfoot or the yeti! He was fascinating, nd what's more, an impassioned speaker, which was all the more extraordinary, when you consider that he had travelled for well over 30 hours from Australia only a few days before. Respect dude!

Nick Redfern, who is probably my closest freind apart from the boys at the CFZ with whom I live and work, was on next with a fascinating, if slightly chilling, account of why many researchers (mostly in the UFO fied, but including yours truly), have been under covert surveillance from H.M Government. Chilling stuff!

Then came the CFZ Awards, presented this year to:

DAVID PHILLIPS
LISA DOWLEY
SUZI MARSH
CHRIS MOISER
PAUL CROPPER
JOHN GLEDSON

and then, much to my embarrassment, I was presented with a special lifetime's achievement award, for services to cryptozoology, which - at the age of 47 on tuesday - made me feel that my career (or my life) was about to draw to a close. Seriously, however, I was very touched, and would like to thank Oll Lewis in particular for his kindness in thinking of it.

Finally came our very own Richard Freeman, gothboy of this parish! He gave an animated talk about the recent Gambia expedition, and was joined on stage at the end by Chris Moiser, Lisa Dowley, Suzi Marsh, and Oll Lewis.

During the day, Chris Moiser did a workshop, and there were all sorts of other things going on, like a Mad Hatter's Tea Party for the kids, and a children's treasure hunt, but it is 9.57, and I am due at the Community Centre in three minutes to soundcheck a 14 year old punk band who are playing a song about the yeti, sometime this afternoon.

Hasta la vista Baby!

Weird Weekend - Day One

I have suddenly realised with a horrible jolt, that it has been over a month since I last posted on the blog. But have I been sitting back, lazily fanning myself under the big beech tree in the garden? Has some horrible mishap hit the CFZ?

Nope.

It's just that we have been gearing up for the annual Weird Weekend; our annual conference, held here in the sleepy North Devon village of Woolfardisworthy (Woolsery).

It is now the ungodly hour of 8.30 - an unprecedented time for me to be awake, up, dressed (and even wearing a tie!) and for the CFZ Office to already be a hubbub of activity. Mark North and John Fuller are printing out programmes, and young Michael Ingrams (8), the son of one of our speakers is lending a helping hand, whilst bouncing around the room to the jolly sounds of the Afro-Celt Sound Sytem.

Mark Martin is wandering around the garden together with Matt Osbourne (a member of Bideford Town Council, who somehow has found himself co-opted as a roadie for the weekend), Dr Darren Naish is asleep on my kitchen floor, and in the drawing room Nick Redfern, and notoious circlemaker Matthew Williams can be found sleeping the sleep of the just (or the hungover, I'm not sure which). On my dining room floor is Dr Lars Thomas (fresh in from Copenhagen), and Ronan Coghlan (from Northern Ireland), and upstairs, in my bedroom, trying desparately to wake up, and probably wondering how she managed to become alpha-female of this madhouse, is my darling Corinna!

We have been working solidly for weeks on this event, and it all started to happen on thursday night when ovcer sixty people piled into the CFZ grounds for the annual Weird Weekend Cocktail Party! The day has been an exhausting one, with speakers arriving at intervals throughout the day, the aforementioned Matt Osbourne arriving with an enormous marquee, my future elder step-daughter, Shosh, and future step-son-in-law, Gavin, arriving in a large white van packed to the gunwhales (errr... do vans have gunwhales?) with impressive model cryptids and dinosaurs kindly lent to us by Anthony James of Nuneaton, and the whole afternoon was punctuated with Graham to-ing and fro-ing from Barnstaple station with yet another speaker, or yet another case f tequila.

The cocktail party was a resounding success, and a splendid time was had by all. Highlights included Nick Redfer's raucous singing, Larry Warren's expert work as a cocktail barman, and the sight of dozens of small children beating the living crap out of a pinada kindly donated by Lisa Dowley.

Our new policy of pitching the CFZ at a family audience, rather than just as a bunch of confirmed cryptodudes and cryptochicks is certainly paying-off as we are rapidly becoming a truly community audience; albeit a community-based organisation which has room for shaven headed, gloriously drunk, Brummie ufologists (I mention no names ... snigger), singing So What by the Anti Nowhere League at the top of their voices in my garden during the wee small hours.

Friday was hectic, and top of the list odf people who deserve to be mentioned in

Mark Martin is wandering around the garden together with Matt Osbourne (a member of Bideford Town Council, who somehow has found himself co-opted as a roadie for the weekend), Dr Darren Naish is asleep on my kitchen floor, and in the drawing room Nick Redfern, and notoious circlemaker Matthew Williams can be found sleeping the sleep of the just (or the hungover, I'm not sure which). On my dining room floor is Dr Lars Thomas (fresh in from Copenhagen), and Ronan Coghlan (from Northern Ireland), and upstairs, in my bedroom, trying desparately to wake up, and probably wondering how she managed to become alpha-female of this madhouse, is my darling Corinna!

We have been working solidly for weeks on this event, and it all started to happen on thursday night when ovcer sixty people piled into the CFZ grounds for the annual Weird Weekend Cocktail Party! The day has been an exhausting one, with speakers arriving at intervals throughout the day, the aforementioned Matt Osbourne arriving with an enormous marquee, my future elder step-daughter, Shosh, and future step-son-in-law, Gavin, arriving in a large white van packed to the gunwhales (errr... do vans have gunwhales?) with impressive model cryptids and dinosaurs kindly lent to us by Anthony James of Nuneaton, and the whole afternoon was punctuated with Graham to-ing and fro-ing from Barnstaple station with yet another speaker, or yet another case f tequila.

The cocktail party was a resounding success, and a splendid time was had by all. Highlights included Nick Redfer's raucous singing, Larry Warren's expert work as a cocktail barman, and the sight of dozens of small children beating the living crap out of a pinada kindly donated by Lisa Dowley.

Our new policy of pitching the CFZ at a family audience, rather than just as a bunch of confirmed cryptodudes and cryptochicks is certainly paying-off as we are rapidly becoming a truly community audience; albeit a community-based organisation which has room for shaven headed, gloriously drunk, Brummie ufologists (I mention nio names ... snigger), singing So What by the Anti Nowhere League at the top of their voices in my garden during the wee small hours.

Friday was hectic, and top of the list odf people who deserve to be mentioned in dispatches are Lisa Dowley, who did her site-managerial thing witgh flair and aplomb, David Phillips, who despite being only 14 did a remarkable job on sound and lights, and his younger brother Ross whorushed about the room after every talk taking a roving radio mic to everyone who wanted to ask questions of the speakers.

The first days events were:

1. The introduction and welcome, by me and Rich, ably assisted by the children from the Woolsery Children's choir who sang some illitterate doggerel that Freeman had written so sweetly, that one's faith in human nature was restored.

2. Bob Morrell MBE from APRA books who gave a fascinating lecture on the beast gods of the ancient world. Everyone enjoyed this mightily, and this set the tone for the whole event.

3. Brian Butler, from the Village Hall management committee who explained how pasties are an increasingly rare species of Devon animal, that can be found deep in Devoin hedgerows (and which were on sale in the bar).

4. Dr Lars Thomas from Denmark gave a smashing talk on Scandinavian Lake Monsters, and there were so many questions at the end, from both the cryptozoological community, and the people of the village (note that I don't say `Village People` because I don't want to imply that there a bunch of openly gay folk rushing around dressed as red induians), that we seriously over-ran.

5. Matthew Williams talked about crop circles to an enthralled audience, and one local friend of mine was heard to mutter "I gotta get myself a laser pointer and a compass", as he wandered away from the talk, deep in thought.

We ended with the raffle, with generous prizes donated by Lisa Dowley (a silver Ninki-Nanka pendant that she brought back from the Gambia expedition,
anjd Simon Wolstencroft who kindly donated a year's subscription to Tropical World

The evening ended with a suitably psychedelic experience from Matthew Williams and his laser show. We all went home (except for Lary Warren who ended up sleeping in some chick's car), and had a few glasses of wine before staggering to bed and awaiting the morrow...

What a strange week it has been....

I have spent a large part of the past week, sitting at this computer waiting for news to arrive from the expedition in the Gambia. But not all of it by any means...

To start off with, we had a housefull! Nick and Dana Redfern (all the way from sunny Texas), and my old mucker Nigel Wright (from not-quite-so sunny Texas). The three of them arrived on the friday afternoon, and (to my chagrin, because I am doing my best to persuade Baldy the Bandicoot and his lovely missus to move to North Devon), the weather was chilly with intermittent showers. However, I still maintain that it wasn't as bad as all that, and Fig 1 will show how Nick and Dana overreacted to the weather. Poor Dana; usually it is nice to sit outside at night during July. It was lucky that one of my late mother's anoraky things was hanging up in the porch for her, but it doesn't excuse her hubby dressing up like a scouse drug dealer...

`ere Chuck, you wanna buy a hooky dvd player?

The saturday was the Village Fayre. Now, I have always wanted to use the headline `A fete worse than death` but I can't, cos it was great fun and a splendid time was had by all. Helen the CFZ Housekeeper, (and generally believed to be the brains behind the whole operation), and Lynsey (who filled the same role before going off to have a baby), were absolutely marvellous and manned the CFZ stall all afternoon ably assisted by Nige, me, and the Redferns although it has to be said that Helen's little girl Jessica tooke one look at Dana R, totally fell in love with her, and took her by the hand and paraded her around the fayre all afternoon...

Lynsey (L) and Helen (R) do their own inimitable thing
Nige (L) Helen (middle) and Baldy the Bandicoot (R) trying to flog tickets to the Weird Weekend..
Nige, back doing what he does best

A splendid time is guaranteed for all

Dana and Helen understand the value of product placement for the Owlman book

But that wasn't all. I had to disappear half way through saturday afternoon to collect Corinna from Barnstaple railway station. Cos monday was her 50th BirthdayParty. We showed her that the CFZ may not be very good at a lot of things but we can't half throw a memorable party. Lots of people came, lots of cake was consumed, lots of champagne and tequila was drunk, and several hangovers ensued.

But I think that the reason that Coinna and I are going to be blissfully happy when we get married next year, can be summonned up by the two main gifts that I gave my darling to celebrate her half-century on this planet: a broadsword, and an Argentinian horned frog (below). Any girl who can not just be happy with such things, but actually expressed a desire for them some months before has got to be the most perfect bride, some fat weirdo who runs the world's largest cryptozoological research organisation could possibly ask for.

Happy Birthday Darling!

Catfish Rising

At the CFZ it sometimes seems that we go for weeks and weeks with nothing more interesting to do than do admin work, mow the lawn, or argue with the Inland Revenue, and then along comes a day when everything happens at once. Today is one of those days. Not only have we had the saga of the Lincolnshire dolphin (see below), and the ongoing adventures of the boys and girls in The Gambia, the kids from the village who have dran the Ninki Nanka piccies but the plumber is here removing a downstairs toilet, and we have just taken receipt of a delivery of catfish. These were kindly donated to us by Helen Bond (our long-suffering housekeeper), and her family.

These catfish are of particular interest to cryptozoologists because they illustrate how new species are found all the time, and will be part of the South American exhibit in the museum when it is finally built later in the year. The saga of the "L Numbered Catfish" is an interesting one.

As my colleague David Marshall wrote in issue 9 of Tropical World magazine:

"In the late 1980's a small variety of loricarins new to the U.K. aquarium hobby began appearing in aquatic retail outlets. All of these fish were given exotic-sounding common names so a small white fish with black stripes was sold as the emperor or zebra peckoltia, a fish with wavy black and yellow markings the scribbled plec, and one with a dark black body and white spots was sold as the vampire plec.

From the scant information that could be obtained, mainly through friendly retailers, U.K. aquarists were led to believe that all of these fish had originated from the Rio Xingu area of Brazil and were vegetarian by nature. It would take sometime for this information to be corrected, and make aquarists realise that these particular loricarins’ natural range extended beyond the Xingu area and that their dietary requirements were actually very varied.

As more of these loricarins began to appear, the sales tickets on their aquaria (first seen in Yorkshire through L 018 - Baryancistrus niveatus 'golden nugget') began to show a sequence that began with the letter L"

There are now dozens of these fish, all still awaiting categorisation. We hope that our exhibit will illustrate what is one of the most interesting developments in contemporary aquaculture. However, back to the story:

This morning, chaos reigned at the CFZ, and so we got Graham to storyboard the events so we can share our activities with you all out there in Internet-land....

Helen arrives clutching a bucket containing four or five disgruntled catfish. Because tank space is at a premium here at the moment, she puts them into a sexagonal viv which we are reserving for treefrogs. Don't do this at home kids...

This may look unfortunate, but it is the best way of transferring these hardy little fish

The last fish in, we have two delightful (but unexpected) visitors.

Ross and Greg stare, fascinated, at the armoured catfish

They may look a little cramped, but they are happy and healthy

Mark North essembles a flat packed table for the tank to rest on

The kids help Mark and Helen get the equipment from the car. Ross demonstrates a firm grasp of the CFZ ethos..

It was only afterwards that Graham remarked that by happenstance both Mark and Helen were wearing almost identical clothes which made them look (or so he claimed) like a pair of deliverymen from B&Q

Helen enjoys a cigarette as she admires the aquarium she has gifted to the CFZ

Another mystery solved

Over the years I have discovered a fascinating fact about cryptozoology, or rather about cryptozoological researchers (and, I suppose, fortean researchers in general). Newspapers around the world are full of stories about local mysteries. Often this is the first (and the last) that anyone has ever heard of the story.

This week saw a case in point. The Louth Leader in Lincolnshire ran this story yesterday:

MYSTERY SURROUNDS SKULL DISCOVERY

A MYSTERIOUS skull has been found in woodland in Little Cawthorpe.

The skull - thought to be from a marine animal - was discovered by
Graham Houlden of Haugham Pastures lying on the ground in an isolated
area on Wednesday. Mr Houlden said he was not nervous when he came across it even though he originally thought it was a human skull.

Mr Houlden, a game keeper, carried it home to his cottage and after
showing it to his wife Nancy, the pair decided it could be from a dolphin. Eager to find out more about their find, Mrs Houlden took the skull along to Louth Museum where the opinion was also that it came from a dolphin.

Local naturalist, Phil Trevethick who viewed the skull said he was
fascinated by the find and said: "I think it belongs to a bottle nose
dolphin."

Mr Trevethick also pondered on how it got to the wood, adding that it didn't swim or fly there".

This story was intriguing, particularly becauseif left unsolved, it is precisely the sort of story that would end up - years down the line - in some book on British mysteries. To make sure that this did not become the genesis of some convoluted Lincolnshire seaserpent story in years to come I contacted the newspaper.

I am used to such email enquiries going unanswered, so I was very pleasntly surprised to receive the following email this morning:

Dear Jon

We have found out that the doplhin skull was found on a beach in Lincolnshire two years ago by a local man. He then buried it in the woodland because it was so smelly and fleshy. Please find attached a photo of the skull. Thanks for your interest.

Kindest regards
Beverley Peck.

So, the mystery has been solved, and more importantly I have managed to banjax the best selling book which would (on an alternate time-stream) have been written several decades since: The Lincolnshire Seaserpent - a nameless horror in blood.

Ha!