A Fine First Fest

Ms. B. proved to be the main draw at my table.
I think I'll keep her.

As I had posted last week, Brewed Awakening Café in Danville, VA, formerly Binding Time in Martinsville, VA, hosted its first annual book festival yesterday, continuing the tradition it had begun at its original location several years ago. I have participated in each, and while I miss having the shop in my old hometown, the owners — John and Bonnie Hale — appear to have made the right decision by relocating. Since its grand opening last week, the café-slash-bookstore has already made an indelible mark in town, generating remarkably positive publicity and drawing substantial crowds since day one. All my copies of my novels Blue Devil Island and The Monarchs sold out quickly. I kept replenishing my stock with various books lurking in my devilish bookbag, and those, too, departed post haste, all having been rightly devalued with my distinctive John Hancock.

Brewed Awakening, at 610 Craghead Street, Danville, VA, occupies an old brick warehouse building, one of many that has been renovated after years of disuse in what had, decades ago, been a thriving industrial district. With tobacco and textiles, once the city's economic foundation, now moribund in the southeastern US, Danville has taken admirable steps to rebuild its infrastructure and its image, and while it still has a long way to go, its efforts are showing measurable results. There are numerous new, upscale restaurants, taverns, and shops, a first-class library, countless historical buildings and monuments, Averett University, and parks and trails that are unrivaled in the region. Not only did Brewed Awakening's book fest draw a bigger crowd than the past two or three fests in Martinsville combined, the economic benefit spilled over to other businesses in the area. After the event, Kimberly and I visited the new, nearby Golden Leaf Bistro to celebrate with a couple of glasses of wine, and who should appear but veritable hordes of festival attendees — including writers and patrons — all but storming the castle.

One of many distinctive old buildings
in Danville's warehouse district

If you like antiques, you could have yourself a rectangular spasm in Lou's Antique Mall at 231 Main Street, Danville, VA. It's located in what appears to be a typical, mid-size retail store on a downtown street corner, but what you get is a three-story labyrinth of goods from countless ages past, of varying quality and prices. I am admittedly not so much an aficionado of antiques and such, yet I couldn't help but be sucked in by the sheer quantity of wares both familiar to me from my youth and just outright neat/fascinating/weird. Now, some of the items I saw were priced way beyond what I would have ever considered paying, but the proprietor was friendly and attentive, and even insistent that we not pay full price for whatever items caught our eye. I did end up leaving with at least one Christmas present that I think will be quite meaningful for the recipient. And finding that, I must admit, meant the world to me.

And geocaches? Danville is full of them; in fact, there's one at the farmer's market directly across the street from Brewed Awakening — "The Crossing," (GC1BR2C), and another, "The Forgotten Door," (GC5PKJ2) which is particularly memorable for me (story here), just two blocks away. My favorite recollection of the book fest was talking to a rather striking and most assuredly engaging young lady who turned out to be the local library's book acquisition manager, who is also, of all things, a geocacher. As fate would have it, there just happens to be highly challenging geocache — which I have not yet found — inside the library where she works. We enjoyed trading a few stories about books, writing, local history, and geocaching, though, when I suggested she might be able to shed some light on the location of the cache, she went close-mouthed as if her lips had been sewn together with barbed wire. However — ha! — I have years of experience, well over eight-thousand caches to my credit, and more than a passing familiarity with the cache's setting. Make no mistake, I will surmount this geocaching challenge, and our reticent young book acquisitions manager shall bear witness, this I promise.

It was a good day.

All set up and rarin' to go

The local turkey buzzard population must have known something was up because,
just about the time the book fest opened, the scavengers began circling.

Doing the necessary devaluing of the book

Rudolph (apparently, the sun had filtered into the alley sufficiently to scorch one's nose) and ye old
geocaching horror writer at Golden Leaf Bistro, celebrating an excellent book festival

Still life with flowers, a brusque sign, and razor wire

The Reason We've Never Gone Back to the Moon...

Since its release in 2011, I've read very little positive about Apollo 18, another found-footage science fiction/horror thriller à la The Blair Witch Project, Cloverfield, et. al., but its premise struck me as appealing enough, so I figured I'd eventually give it a look. This evening, eventually came to be, and, while the film is no masterpiece, I am inclined to be a little kinder to it than most reviewers. If the title isn't enough to give it away, it's about an "undocumented" Apollo moon mission following the last official moon shot (Apollo 17 in 1972). The movie is cobbled together from videos ostensibly shot by the crew on its ill-fated mission, and while I tend to look down my nose (way the hell down my nose, as a matter of fact) at endless, dizzying shaky-cam footage, there are enough steady shots and suggestive, weird images to make the visual experience generally palatable.

There be spoilers ahead.

Three astronauts — Mission Commander Nate Walker (Lloyd Owen), Captain Ben Anderson (Warren Christie), and Lieutenant Colonel John Grey (Ryan Robbins) — are sent to the moon on a top-secret mission to place DEW (Distant Early Warning) devices on the lunar surface to detect possible attacks from space by the Soviet Union. Once the Apollo spacecraft, named Freedom, achieves lunar orbit, astronauts Walker and Anderson descend to the surface in the Lunar Excursion Module Liberty, while astronaut Grey remains in orbit aboard the command module. Walker and Anderson venture outside their spacecraft, plant the American flag, place their sensors, and collect some lunar rock samples. During their subsequent communications with Earth, they hear strange sounds over the radio, which they believe to be interference from the transmitters they have placed. Then they find one of their rock samples, which had been stowed away, on the floor of the cabin. On their next outing, in their lunar rover, Walker and Anderson discover human footprints — which lead them to the remains of cosmonaut and a Russian lunar lander. They report their discovery to Mission Control, which orders them to continue their mission as planned.

The next day, the astronauts wake to find their flag missing. Realizing something is terribly wrong, they begin preparation to take off and return to space to rendezvous with the Freedom, but something violently assaults the landing craft and damages it so they can't take off. Outside, they discover the tracks of some non-human entity — and Walker suffers an attack by a spider-like creature inside his spacesuit. Anderson rescues him, but Walker is now infected by an unknown organism that spreads through his system, making him paranoid and irrational. In a violent rage, he smashes the onboard oxygen system. Hoping to find an oxygen supply aboard the Russian lander, they set out in the rover, but Walker again becomes violent and wrecks the vehicle. Anderson realizes the arthropod-like aliens camouflage themselves as rocks, and he is surrounded by them. He manages to reach the Russian lander, but Walker again attacks and attempts to smash the lander's window with a hammer. This time, though, the alien creatures swarm over him and kill him, allowing Anderson to take off and go into orbit.

Unfortuately, as he soon discovers, the lander is filled with lunar rocks....

Before the launch: astronauts Anderson (Warren Christie), Grey (Ryan Robbins), and Walker (Lloyd Owen)

Lunar rover and astronaut on the surface of the moon

The film necessarily focuses on the three astronauts, with Anderson as the primary protagonist. The actors do a capable enough job, and as their faces are not necessarily familiar to the public at large, they convey a sense of verisimilitude that more recognizable actors probably would not. They look and act more or less as one might expect real astronauts to look and act, and Anderson in particular comes off as a sympathetic character. With a blend of actual footage from lunar missions and well-crafted sets — from the claustrophobic spacecraft interiors to panoramic expanses of lunar surface — there is a genuine sense of remote isolation. While the sets and scenery come off as quite realistic, inside the lander, the characters move and operate as if in normal earth gravity, belying the actual location filming; on occasion, however, the use of odd camera angles and quick cutting helps insinuate the effect of reduced gravity.

To get around the absence of sound in a vacuum — without resorting to the totally unrealistic trope of outer space being an ultimately noisy place — the soundtrack often provides low, surreal thumping, bumping, whooshing sounds, simulating the kind of noises the astronauts might hear within the confines of their spacesuits while operating in a void. In addition, the alien noises that emanate from the radio set have an organic, insect-like quality that early on betray the fact that there's something happening beyond mere electronic interference.

The creatures themselves appear mostly as strangely deformed rocks that move. Quick cuts and mere suggestions of something moving at the edge of one's perception work to build a bit of suspense. Eventually, once the creatures appear in earnest, they're still a bit vague — obviously crab- or spider-like, but the camera's eye never quite gives you the full picture. Not a bad way to present them, all in all. There's never any explanation or even supposition of what these things are, which, within the scope of the story, is the way to go. Unfortunately, it's revealed that the government has sent the astronauts up as human guinea pigs, on a mission not unlike the Nostromo's in Alien. It's a tired device, and I suspect the story might have worked better if the mission had been all about detecting Soviet missiles, with the creatures being discovered in the process, instead of the mission being a secret attempt to gain superiority over the Russians by way of capturing and controlling dangerous alien life forms.

One of the criticisms I'd seen that I quite agree with is that, though the film runs less than 90 minutes, it seems much longer. Yes, it does. While much of the drama is effective and the sensory effects produce the desired results, the varying camera angles, the dizzying transitions, the indistinct images, and confusing cuts also tend to produce fatigue. I recently reviewed Troll Hunter, which includes found footage, but it also provides a much smoother viewing experience, with less chaotic camera work, making for a less fatiguing and more appealing movie. If Apollo 18 had gone that route, I expect it would have been better received.

Nope, it's not all that it ought to have been, but Apollo 18 does offer more, drama- and production-wise, than it gets credit for. I'd give it a solid three out of five Damned Rodan's Dirty Firetinis.

The remains of a Russian cosmonaut, whose mysterious fate soon becomes all too clear

The Russian lunar lander, whose spider-like contours provide an appealing visual irony

There's something inside Astronaut's Walker's space helmet....

An interesting — moving — rock formation, wot?

Community Dead Zones, Iron Furnaces, and Others

Old Rodan and a pair of Rob zombies

This morning, the original Team Old Fart — Old Rodan, Robbin (a.k.a. Yoda Rob), and Robert (a.k.a. Old Rob, Bloody Rob, Robgso, et. al.) — headed out into the wilds of Stokes County for a day of geocaching in some of North Carolina's most scenic rural surroundings. We picked up a modest ten caches, but today, quality exceeded quantity by a long shot. We experienced lonely, shadow-laden graveyards; the remains of a 19th-century iron furnace; a hidden walkway beneath an old stone bridge, featuring a cache aptly called "Welcome to Jurassic Park" (GC61H34); the ruins of an abandoned prison farm; and the village of Danbury, which is rich in Civil War history, raided by Union General George Stoneman in March of 1865.

"Community Dead Zone #1" (GC2YCZC): a picturesque little graveyard tucked away from civilization — such as it is, out here in the sticks — where you will find the graves of mass murderer Charlie D. Lawson and his wife and children, whom he shot dead in the year 1929. The story is thus (excerpted from Wikipedia):

"Charles Davis Lawson (May 10, 1886–December 25, 1929) was a Stokes County tobacco farmer who is remembered for having committed one of the most notorious mass murders in the state's history. On Christmas Day, 1929, Lawson killed his 37-year-old wife, Fannie, and their children Marie, 17; Carrie, 12; Maybell; 7, James, 4; Raymond, 2; and Mary Lou, 4 months.

"Lawson began the slaughter with his daughters, Carrie and Maybell, as they were setting out to visit their uncle and aunt. Lawson waited for them with his shotgun behind the tobacco barn, and when they were in range, he shot them. He then placed their bodies in the tobacco barn.

"Next, he returned to the house and shot Fannie, who was sitting on the porch. Inside the house, Marie, upon hearing the gunshot, screamed in terror, while the two small boys, James and Raymond, attempted to find a hiding place. Lawson entered the house, shot Marie, and then found and shot the two boys. Lastly, he killed the baby, Mary Lou. After the murders, he went into the nearby woods, where he finally shot himself. The only survivor was his eldest son, 19 year-old Arthur, who had gone out on an errand.

"Many people had learned of the gruesome event and gathered on the property when the gunshot signaling Lawson's suicide rang out. The bodies of the family members were found with their arms crossed and rocks under their heads. The police officer who found Lawson's body also discovered several letters to his parents, which he had written prior to his killing spree.”

The serene beauty of this old graveyard provided a most inviting contrast to the macabre story of the Lawson murders. While hunting the cache, which is just outside the boundary of the graveyard, I was standing at a spot that, according to my GPS, was one foot from the cache, looking down. Yoda Rob suddenly hollered, "It's there!" and pointed to where I was standing. When I looked up, the cache container smacked me right in the face. How handy — better, I suppose, than encountering a ghost with a ghostly shotgun.

The Lawson family graves

Not far away, we find Moratock Iron Furnace, which was built by Nathaniel Moody and John Pepper in 1843. During the Civil War, iron from the furnace was used to make swords and munitions for the Confederacy, which was cut off from outside sources of iron. In April 1865, Union General George Stoneman destroyed the furnace’s outbuildings, though they were eventually restored to operating condition, and the furnace continued to operate until the 1890s. The Moratock furnace is one of only a handful of iron furnaces that remain intact in North Carolina. There are two nice multi-caches to be found in Moratock park. No ghosts here; just a pair of Rob zombies, who would not stop following me.

Historic Danbury is a small village at the edge of the mountains in Stokes County, with many restored 19th century buildings still in use today. When General Stoneman raided Danbury in 1865, he set up his headquarters in Moody's Tavern in the center of town. Though the building remains in near-pristine condition, the tavern itself has long since closed; I suspect that if restored, it would do a brisk business. We hoofed it from one end of town to the other, gathering clues to the location of the final cache. Once again, we discovered a scenic, historical graveyard that brought much joy to this geocaching writer of all things horrific.

However, rather sadly for me, this trip cleared out all the caches I had yet to find in and around Danbury. I'd love it if some fine geocacher whose sphere of influence includes this community would populate the area with a few more nice hides so the Old Farts might ride again out that way. Hope shambles eternal.

Moratock Iron Furnace

Yoda Rob and Bloody Rob, inmates at the old prison

The zombies followed me, they did.

Stokes County courthouse in Danbury

Ol' Rodan beating the heat at Moratock Iron Furnace

August Book Festival at Brewed Awakening

Binding Time Café & Bookstore in Martinsville, VA, has moved to Danville, VA, and changed its name to Brewed Awakening — in fact, the new location just opened for business this week. For the past several years, as some of you will recall, Binding Time has put on a regular book festival featuring numerous local authors, including the old dude, and Brewed Awakening will be continuing the tradition. The next festival will be held on Saturday, August 29, from 10 AM till 2 PM, and I'll be on location to sell and sign books (yes, my own; I get fussed at for signing other writers' books). I plan to have copies of The Monarchs, Blue Devil Island, Other Gods, The Gaki, and possibly others on hand, so if you are in traveling distance and possessed of exceptional intestinal fortitude, by all means, stop by. I'd love to see you.

Not only does Brewed Awakening sell books, they serve first-class sandwiches, wraps, and beverages (I'm especially fond of their hazelnut latte). And for you intrepid souls who enjoy geocaching as much as braving Rainey's horrifying books, Danville is a geocaching mecca — in fact, there is a cache ("The Crossing," GC1BR2C) directly across the street from the café. Good books, good refreshments, good geocaching. A regular hat trick, wot?

Mark your calendar and join us.

Brewed Awakening Book Festival 

Saturday, August 29, 10 AM–2 PM

610 Craghead St., Danville, VA 24541
(434) 483-2138

Pirates of the Seven Lakes

For me, the best part of geocaching is getting out on woodland trails; discovering the deepest, darkest, most hidden corners of even the most familiar territory; working out the muscles and refreshing the mind. When I started caching in early 2008, I found that, within just a few miles of home, more trails existed than I could have ever dreamed. Miles and miles and miles of them. In those early days, I hiked almost every day, more fired up about exploring the woods than since I was a wee young 'un, when I was a regular woodland troll (a mischievous one too, I'll have you know). In Greensboro proper, there are thousands of caches, a good percentage of which reside on the trails, and since 2008, I've claimed virtually all of them — with a couple of exceptions.

"Pirates of the Seven Lakes" (GCJ37H) is one of the most notable. It's been out there since long before I started caching (it was placed in 2004, as a matter of fact), and after all these years, I've finally scrawled my moniker on the logsheet in that big ol' ammo can in the woods. In its original incarnation, "Pirates" was a multicache with at least nine separate stages, which included puzzles, brain twisters, and all sorts of logistical nightmares to challenge the hardiest geocacher. It was spread out over many miles and many trails, requiring some ten miles of hiking and visiting trails at each of Greensboro's watershed areas. One stage included a DVD, which you either had to watch on a portable player in the field or take home so you could solve the video puzzle to get the coordinates for the next stage. All these challenges resulted in "Pirates" being rated 5 for overall difficulty and 5 for the terrain challenge — the most difficult ratings possible for a cache. Alas, some years back, the original cache owner moved away or retired from the activity, leaving the stages to languish out in the woods. Some went missing, some were destroyed, and during the past few years, a scant handful of cachers have searched for it, and most of those who found it did so by receiving help from previous finders so they could get past the stages that were no longer viable.

One of the clue puzzles to solve along the way — quite useless out of context.

All this has changed, thanks to my old — and I do mean old — caching buddy Robgso (a.k.a. Robert, the Old Trail Dawg, or sometimes Bloody Rob), who has adopted and restored the cache to functional status.

Over the years, I had tentatively arranged to head out after "Pirates" with one group or another, but, for whatever reason, no solid plans ever came together. On at least two or three occasions, I had given the first stage a fair look, yet I just couldn't spy the bloody thing — despite knowing, both from the hint on the cache page and from anecdotal evidence, that I was searching the correct location. Ah, the frustration! When it came to my attention that several of the stages lay in disrepair, for the longest time I ended up just ignoring the cache altogether. However, in recent days, ye old Trail Dawg divulged to me that, because this cache is such an old classic, he was committed to fixing the wayward waypoints rather than archiving the whole sheboygan. At last, I figured, I would be able to take my shot at it. Sure enough, last week, Bloody Rob placed a cache in the woods on his birthday (which he does every year), and my outing to claim it took me to the Nat Greene Trail up at Lake Brandt. So — just on a whim — I gave stage 1 of "Pirates" another look. And this time — holy freaking banana oil — there was the container, plain as day, right where it's always been, in excellent condition. So, on the spot, I decided I'd start working on this cache — but over more than a single trip because I prefer to maximize my opportunities for hiking, what with so few local trail hides to go after anymore. For the past few days, I've picked up a stage or two, steadily working my way toward acquiring the final coordinates. At last... done. And this afternoon, I headed out to the trail head, made the near two-mile hike to the final, and, after a relatively brief search, found that great big ol' ammo can. But Sweet Freaking Yuggoth, the humidity! Old Rodan was one sweaty, melty, drippy mess while signing the log. But... by what ethereal dances, by what eternal streams... "Pirates of the Seven Lakes" was at long last conquered.

Buddha tree along the greenway,
near Owl's Roost

Now, to be fair, what was once a near-unthinkable monster in the woods is now more a straightforward multi, with only a couple of field puzzles — perfect for the more simple-minded among us to conquer. While I've no doubt the original experience was a masterpiece of geocaching engineering, this incarnation represents everything I love about caching: getting away from my damn computer (I'm on one most of the waking hours of my life) and out into the woods, exercising my muscles as much as or more than my brain, and stalking that elusive goal until I have conquered the rotten old bastard with the cheapest of ink pens. This one may no longer be a true 5/5, but it is a 5x favorite for this old caching dude. This one is la bombe surprise.

Curiously, while I was unaware of it at the time, several years ago — 2008 or 2009 — I had actually had a run-in with a stage of "Pirates." I was out on the Laurel Bluff Trail, searching for an appealing location to hide a cache of my own, and after much exploration of the woods, I found what I considered a perfect spot — only to a discover, rather to my chagrin, there was already a cache container in that spot. Since it wasn't listed anywhere on the geocaching.com site, I knew it had to be a hidden stage for some multi or puzzle cache, but I had no way of determining which one it was, for the container was empty and unlabeled. The other day, as I was following my GPS to the coordinates to stage 4 on the Laurel Bluff Trail, I knew immediately where I was going to be heading: yes, the very spot in which I had found that empty container all those years ago. This time, the container there contained exactly what it was supposed to contain, and once I worked out the necessary information from the clues it gave me, I was able to reach the next stage — in a secret place I cannot reveal here.

Completing "Pirates" was kind of like revisiting some of my earliest, most exciting days of geocaching, particularly since I haven't been out on some of the watershed trails for way too many moons. "Invigorating" is the word.

That's a really good word.

Saw lots of these out along the trail, no doubt placed by John Many Jars.

That would be some gigantic fungus among us.

Pleasant scenery along the Owl's Roost Trail

Trollhunter

On a whim, I decided to check out Trollhunter, a 2010 Norwegian horror-comedy offering, presented as a found-footage faux documentary. Happily, because the movie makers in the film itself are reasonably accomplished, we don't have a lot of herky-jerky shaky-cam bullshit, à la The Blair Witch Project or Cloverfield. The movie is directed by André Øvredal and stars Otto Jespersen as Hans the troll hunter, Tomas Alf Larsen as camera operator Kalle, Johanna Mørck as boom operator Johanna, Glenn Erland Tosterud as director Thomas, and Urmila Berg-Domaas as camera operator Malica. I'm not at all familiar with any of these folks, though several members of the cast are apparently noted comedians in Norway.

The story begins with a trio of college students-slash-aspiring moviemakers out to make a documentary film about a suspected poacher named Hans (Otto Jespersen). The students attempt to interview the man, but he rebuffs them. However, late one night, they follow him into the deep forest, where they see flashing lights and hear a strange roaring sound. Hans comes running back, screaming "Troll!" An unseen creature attacks and bites Thomas, leaving him in pain but not seriously injured. The students soon find their vehicle destroyed by some unknown force. Hans takes them back to their campsite at the edge of the forest, where he informs them that he is a trollhunter. At first, the students are skeptical, but Hans allows them to accompany him on his outings as long as they do exactly as he says. He inquires if any of them are Christian, to which they all reply that they are not. This is most important, Hans tells them, for trolls are attracted by the blood of Christians. Still disbelieving, they proceed into the forest with Hans, only to witness a giant, three-headed troll for themselves. He turns it to stone by using a flash gun that emits ultraviolet light to simulate sunlight, which — as everyone should know — is lethal to trolls.

Hans reveals that he is an agent of the Norwegian Troll Security Service, a branch of the government dedicated to keeping the troll population under control. Recently, the trolls have begun emerging from their own territory in the forests and infringing on human centers of population, resulting in several deaths. It is Hans's job to determine what has happened to alter the trolls' behavior. Using live goats on a bridge as bait, Hans manages to extract a blood sample from a bridge troll via a gigantic syringe. He sends the blood sample to be analyzed but the results will take several days.

The students accompany Hans on an excursion to a farm, which appears to have been devastated by trolls, and from here they manage to follow several of the creatures to an abandoned mine. However, the trolls trap them inside due to Kalle, the cameraman, actually being a Christian. The trolls kill him, and Hans, Thomas, and Johanna barely escape with their lives.

A Muslim woman name Malica arrives to replace Kalle as the camera operator. Thomas, however, becomes seriously ill, and they now learn from the troll blood sample that the trolls have rabies, and Thomas has been infected.

A gigantic, 200-foot troll called a Jontar now emerges from the forest, and Hans attempts to kill it with a powerful rocket that can turn the creature to stone. As the students attempt to flee, Thomas collapses from the rabies infection, and the camera captures a truck coming toward them on the highway. The film proper ends, but an epilogue reveals that none of the students who filmed the footage — found by the truck driver — were ever heard from again.

I had no idea what to expect from this movie, and I'm happy to say I found it delightful. It's a fine mix of eerie atmosphere, beautiful visuals, and tongue-in-cheek comedy. The CGI trolls are whimsical, yet at the same time impressive in their size and ferocity, especially the huge creature called the Jontar. The actors are all capable enough, and I was quite taken with Otto Jespersen's deadpan portrayal of Hans, which serves to add an entirely new layer of whimsy to the story. The Troll Security Service is presented just as if it were any other state bureaucracy, the trolls just another element of nature for which the Norwegian authorities must be responsible.

The substantial amount of utterly gorgeous Norwegian scenery captured on film helps make this movie visually stunning. The nighttime scenes in the woods, in particular, generate an ominous atmosphere perfect for scale of the trolls. Certain scenes are filmed using night-vision lenses, and the stark, green-tinged images interspersed with the naturally lit scenes heighten the tension and the sense of being right there on the spot.

Trollhunter isn't perfect. While not an overly long film (103 minutes), it does seem to carry on longer than necessary, mostly due to some drawn-out scenes with personnel from the Troll Security Service. The found-footage angle works pretty well in this one, so much due to the fact you aren't distracted by the frenetic camera work (despite the story not being so bad, I never want to watch Cloverfield again; the overuse of the shaky-cam was not effective but stupid). All in all, Trollhunter is a mighty fun sampling of Norwegian humor and storytelling. Visit it for yourself.

L–R: Glenn Erland Tosterud as Thomas, Tomas Alf Larsen as Kalle, Johanna Mørck as Johanna,
Otto Jespersen as Hans

"I turn to stone when you are gone, I turn to stone."

"Who's that trap-trapping over my bridge? Oh... that would be me."

Jontar...big!