Narrative Ecology – Blog of Ron Donaldson – fACILITATOR, TRAINER AND COACH

Last week we maintained our deeply entrained pattern and returned to Whitby. A last minute cancellation of a cottage we had always wanted to hire. We entered its wood panelled ‘ship-like’ entrance hall and fell immediately in love.

We knew this was to be no ordinary week in Whitby. The Goth Fringe Festival was in town this weekend so as we walked along to the cobbled market square we were prepared for this group of alien visitors:

What we were not at all prepared for was a complete encounter with all that is Steampunk. We really didnt know what it was and until we googled it and Steampunk.com describes it as

steampunk is a genre AND a design aesthetic AND a philosophy

I just love their quote from Jess Nevins

Steampunk is what happens when goths discover brown

So outside the Tourist information our initial puzzlement was resolved:

Wikipedia explains steampunk as:

Steampunk is a sub-genre of science fiction, fantasy, alternate history and speculative fiction that came into prominence during the 1980s and early 1990s. Steampunk involves a setting where steam power is still widely used—usually Victorian era Britain—that incorporates elements of either science fiction or fantasy.

Back at the bridge a crowd of photographers was gathering so I just managed to jump in and get this shot of my favourite of the all, the detail and precision taken was breathtaking. We saw him later walking home for his tea like the tin man:

We never found out what these three were running from or to save but it must have been important:

After an amazing weekend of characters like these, market stalls specialising in red male corsets, at least 6 hearses parked up by the whale bones it was then Halloween. At nine pm we climbed the 199 steps, on the east side, to the graveyard that inspired Bram Stoker to write Dracula and … it was completely deserted. Everyone had gone home. I took this picture from the top of the steps and realise now that the whole town has been strategically lit with delicate yellow, purple, pink and blue lighting. We thought the pictures in the photographers had been photo-shopped.

Then as if that wasn’t enough for one holiday, Friday was bonfire night and we positioned ourselves at a point just below the Bram Stoker memorial seat on the West Side and saw an amazing display lighting up the whole of the town.

Then just as we were packing up to leave, the proper official Goth weekend was starting up and streets were filled with a much younger and prettier generation of Goths and ghouls: