My partner and I were lucky enough to go to the Fellowship Festival at Alexandra Palace. Luckily it is 5 minutes from our house – so we didn’t have the hassle of traveling and a long journey. Our tickets were for the Sunday and as we made our way to the entrance, we saw no one I expected crowds and queues, but nothing!

We collected out tickets, brought a couple of programs and made our way inside. There was a hallway with an art exhibition (people had entered their LOTR artwork into a competition) and two huge rooms to the left and right of the hall, that was it. We went into the main Hall first “The Hall of Fire” Where all the talks were being held and there was Craig Parker and Mark Ferguson mucking about on stage in front of a very small audience! We couldn’t believe how few people were there! We decided to go into the other room to try to find out when the signings started. There were a few stalls selling LOTR merchandise, figures, jewelry, weapons, posters etc. There was a games workshop and places where you could learn Elvish. We had a look about making our way to one end of the room. I nearly died there in front of me was Karl! About 10ft in front of me, just sitting there talking to a fan. Bernard Hill was next to him. You could just walk over; there were no crowds!

I recovered from the shock. My amused partner asked if I wanted to look around a bit more and then go and say hi to him – I said ok! When we got back there were a few more people waiting, I just watched him for a while – a nice way to spend a Sunday!!! I got a few pics too! My partner was talking to the guys on the games workshop stand. Karl looked over and smiled, I thought there was no-way I could meet him – nerves just took over real bad nerves!

It was getting a bit more crowded there were about 20 people waiting for him. (It was nothing like Collectormania last year! There were 2-hour queues and about 500 people there in the queues!) My partner tried to encourage me to meet Karl and asked me again if I wanted to do it – I said no! He queued up and I waited. A man bumped into me and said sorry, I looked up and it was Alan Lee, the artist from LOTR! He was doing a talk on his drawings and was on his way to do it. It was so surreal, there were all these stars just wandering about with everyone else. I watched Karl some more – I noticed he wasn’t hugging anyone, just shaking hands and then posing for photos, but he was really chatty. It was nearly my man’s turn; he was busy shaking Bernard Hill’s hand! I moved out of sight – I knew my partner would call me over and there was no way I could go. I could see him and Karl talking and I saw him turn around to look for me and Karl was looking too!

Anyway my man came away, found me and said Karl said he had to bring me over to him to say hi and I wasn’t to be nervous. I asked what Karl said to him He said Karl was really jokey and witty. He told Karl about me and Stephanie being huge fans of his. Karl signed one pic to Stephanie he wrote “with love from Karl” Then he told Karl about me and that I was too nervous to meet him, he signed my Eomer pic “To Rachel where are you hiding? Love Karl xxxxx” and my glasses pic “For Rachael lots of love Karl xxxx” He said I had the best collection of photos for him to sign and he asked where I had got the glasses pic from. My partner had his photo taken with Karl and Karl admitted being addicted to Smartie’s (sugar coated chocolates) He kept eating them and my man joked that too many would make him fat, Karl laughed and said don’t forget, get Rachael up here. By this time we were in the Hall of fire again, sitting down, I looked at the photos and I noticed Karl has misspelled my name – My man said he told him it was Rachael – I said it didn’t matter! My man said Karl had asked how to spell Stephanie’s name too!

I went to listen to the talk by the artists Alan Lee and John Howe. It was really interesting and then we went to get some lunch, my partner was still going on at me, saying I had to meet Karl! I didn’t eat much and we sat and listened to John Noble talking about being Denethor.

I left my partner when Bernard Hill came on stage to do his talk, (I had to go to the ladies!) I made my way up a grand stairway and into the ladies. When I made my way back downstairs my partner asked where I had been – I told him and said he knew where I was! He said Karl had just walked through the hall, heckled Bernard Hill and stopped in front of my man and asked where I was! He told him where I had gone and Karl said he’d see me later!

Then there was an auction, in aid of an anti bullying campaign. We were in our seats quite near the back and cause there weren’t many people there in the whole place. We were told we could all move near the front – they were the “gold” seats for people who had paid 60 quid for the day – well not many tickets had sold and there were only about 150 fans there! I personally felt a bit guilty in moving to the front – but you can understand why the actors wanted everyone nearer – it must be un-nerving looking out from the stage and seeing so many empty seats! So we all moved to the front near the stage. Craig Parker and Mark Ferguson were hosting the auction with Karl! He was so funny. They were selling a replica of Sting and Karl had it held in front of him at trouser level – it was still in the box and Karl said, “do you want me to get it out” in a really good London accent! Craig said that would be his memorable quote of the festival and did anyone want Karl to get it out!! Mr. Urban took the sword out of the box and put it between Craig’s legs and said it now had its own unique smell and D.N.A! He looked my way a few times did Mr. Urban – I held his gaze for a couple of seconds, knicker elastic melted, but I did it! He is a proper flirt with all ladies though! There was an Elvin wrap and brooch too, and Karl had it wrapped around him and was mincing up and down the stage!

There was also a poster for auction – signed by the stars there. Craig said he could do Orlando’s autograph – a big X! Then he said he would like to ‘do’ Orlando! Karl and Mark just shook their heads in mock disgust! There was an X-Box for auction with a ROTK game and Craig Parker bid on it and won it! A woman came and sat next to me – I turned to see who it was and it was ‘Rosie Cotton’! She was helping with the auction too. They had Laurence Makoare trying to get people to bid higher too! He was walking about trying to get people to spend lots of cash! There was a battle figure set for auction too and the guys said it was funny they were selling a battle set for an anti-bullying charity! At the end of the auction Craig asked a boy in the front if he had ever bullied anyone, he said he hadn’t and Craig gave him the X-Box and game! Bless him!

Soon after Sarah ‘Rosie’ McLeod, Bruce Hopkins and Cameron ‘farmer maggot’ Rhodes did a talk, there must have been 20 maybe 30 people in the audience. Bruce Hopkins got everyone up on stage and the three of them asked us questions! It was quite funny!

We went back into the other hall, and saw Laurence Makoare doing fight reconstructions And there was a guy being made into an orc by one of the professional make-up artists. I still hadn’t met Karl – I was avoiding it! He was finishing signing, his PA was telling people no more photos – she was scary! I felt sorry for these two girls who she wouldn’t let take a photo of Karl. My partner went over to Karl’s PA. The PA remembered Karl saying to my man to bring me over. She barked “he has to be somewhere in 5 minutes, don’t keep him talking”. Before I could make my getaway Karl saw me and said “Oh hi”. He held his hand out to me and took my hand. He said, “You don’t have to be nervous of me” and smiled. I was so bloody nervous though it was unreal! He asked if I been to a convention before, I said I was at Collectormania last year. He asked if I liked it and I said it was chaotic and that this one was much nicer, really informal. He said, “that’s what we like” and he mentioned he was going to do Collectormania this year, I said I had seen he wasn’t able to do it now and he said he had to cancel as he has a job and he has to work to pay the bills! Then my man - the sod, told Karl that he had spelt my name wrong. He said “Oh no, I am so sorry” I said it didn’t matter and that I knew he was busy, just to leave it as it was. He insisted on changing it. I gave him the photos. He put an ‘a’ in where it should go and said he loved my photos and where did I get the Glasses one from. I said my friend had printed it and sent it to me, he said it was amazing and he didn’t remember having that photo taken! His PA then asked if we could find out where they were from and let the festival’s organizers know. I said I would and Karl said him mum would like one of those ‘glasses’ photos! He was polite, but looked tired bless him! He was still so nice and as my partner said Karl didn’t have to ask him to bring me over, nor did he have to agree to speak to me! He just really seems to genuinely care for his fans.

We went back into the hall and Craig was laying on the stage watching a cartoon on the screen. We sat down, in the second row – most of the seats were empty! I was torturing myself over meeting Karl and how I was a total idiot! Then Karl comes on stage, he is doing a Q & A session, and I am at the front! So I got to listen to him talk for an hour! He was funny. He was calling everyone ‘Love’ and saying how he wanted to work with Johnny Depp. He said his worse haircut was Vaako and best was Kirill. He acted lines from Two Towers and talked about ROTK EE. He said he would like to do a love scene with Kiera Knightley! He said he would love to play a pirate or be an English gangster – like Michael Caine. Most of the questions were about LOTR, he talked about filming it, and his horses and Viggo. He said the scene at the end of TT where he is on the horse with the others watching the Uruk-Hai flee, that it wasn’t him on the horse and it pisses him off that it doesn’t look like him. But the day it was filmed his son was born – bless! He spoke about Doom and said he couldn’t say much – but it was being filmed in Prague. He was asked what his friends and family thought of his career and he said they still think he is a tosser and when he told his dad he was going to be an actor, his dad said he has mispronounced it – he meant to say ‘a doctor’!

The talk finished and he left the stage. We were nearly ready to leave; I had one last look around and walked through the door to the stairway. Karl was there talking to 2 people. I walked past and he said ‘Hi’! I smiled and said hello back – hardly believing it was him! As I said I went to Collectormania last year and there were hundreds of people there, you couldn’t move for screaming teenagers, I was half expecting this to be the same – but it wasn’t, it was a lovely day. Maybe it could have been a little busier. I suppose I felt for the actors giving the talks to very few people, it must have been a little bit strange, but on the plus side, seeing as there were so few of us in the audience I think everyone who wanted to ask a question got a chance – so that was good!

It was one of those things where it all seems so unreal you don’t take it all in while you are there! But I am glad I got to go!