We have been looking for over 3 months for coverage for the Retreat to Calais event, and we have had no luck to date, since the insurer we used last year still has not gotten coverage for the policy we have used.

We have tried every angle we can think of, from policies covering athletic events, to Horse Shows, and eveything in-between (different reenactment insurors, ect - problem with that one is none of our groups individually have a large enough membership). We even have nixed the idea of bringing our horses this year, to try to reduce the ammount neccessary to purchase event insurance. We can get insurance for the event, but it will cost 4 figures, and Jenn and I do not have the cash to foot that large a bill by ourselves. To date, we have not had enough positive responses from people assuring us they can or will attend, to cover the bill. I've had some commitments for a fact from our group, and two from Greys - obviously Jeff and Charelotte are unlikely to be able to make it given their present (Happy!) circumstances.

The bad news is we can't use the site without insurance - Erik does not want to open himself up to liability. The good news is that he has promised us the use of the site, the same time next year (assuming we can get insurance), as he would really like to see us come back.

So, the question is open for those who planned to attend - can we drum up enough attendees to be able to cover the event costs? Or should we plan on having the event next May? I would really like this to be an annual event, some of our Canadian bretheren expressed interest in attending next season, as they were not ready. At this point, I really need some sort of feedback, either to this thread, or via e-mail. And, we need to move fast if we can have the event at all this season.

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We are in -exactly- the same situation with our event at Bates. And ours is in 2 weeks.

With interest down and a remaining requirement of the site being insurance (and a named insured cert at that), it looks like we'll have to cancel also.

We were insured with OWLHF, but they lost their policy late last summer and sent out minimal notification, then no renewal forms at the end of the year. As I understand it, a few idiots doing incredibly stupid things caused claims from the public which the carrier didn't like, so they cancelled the policy. Again, dopes screwing it up for everybody else.

Overall, I had a feeling the insurance provided by OWLHF was too good to be true, and it turns out is was.

If anyone finds any affordable event insurance, please let us all know about it. It's super tough to do events without insurance given most sites' paranoia of lawsuits these days.

We were covered through YOWLHF too and it doesn't look like Dusty's had any luck and from the looks of it, doesn't appear like he's going to find anything.

We'll keep looking and let you know if we find anything.

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He made a lot of excuses, saying he would have an office set up in a "coupla weeks". But the long and short of it is that he HASN'T NAILED DOWN ANY LIABILITY INSURANCE. Sheesh.

Overall, it seems he's bitten off more than he can chew, and based on the info on "The Good Word", he's not making any headway toward being on top of things. It seems certain, at this point, that we need to look elsewhere.

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The problem still remains that at best will only resolve the situation for 1 event. The long and the short of it I see is that if we want to have 15th century events in the US, that we are currently so small, the only way to leverage coverage like the larger time periods do would be to organize together (like they have) in order to get the coverage. Otherwise, we will eventually all be up shits creek without the proverbial paddle (in the words of Louis XI).

We are in process of organising as an official NPO (State of NH - we can't afford the Federal paperwork process), which will put us in a slightly better position in regards to getting coverage, but the paperwork can't be processed in time.

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I am almost dead-sure they wouldn't be interested in other-era reenactment at Federal sites, the park service seems geared to either traditional camping/hiking use, or to preservation of Historic sites and interpretation of them. Pretty much weapons would be right out.

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