Petanque Wallingford

Another visit to The Bear. Only 6 of us this time - holidays are beginning to take their toll. The Bird was still there, this time just watching from the fence.  It didn't come down for a visit.  

23rd May WSP car park - and this was so different to the puddle time - the weather has been much hotter so the pistes have dried up and present very different playing challenges. 
 

Wednesday 16th May saw everyone in the Car Park at WSP. So pleasant when it's warmer.  8 players turned out so they played doublettes. One member had a lovely set of brand new Boules Bleu. We were all most envious.  The newest newcomer shows promise to be a good shooter.

And so on to Thursday, 17th with a visit to the Bear at Home in North Moreton.  When they play there the Pub's petanque piste is used.  Part of it is very good, but the bottom part has been used for bonfires so the ground is 'dead'. Good practice! The Aunt Sally* pitch is also used. Both pitches go uphill, or downhill, depending where you are standing. Everyone likes playing on the Aunt Sally pitch as the downward direction is nice for plombé and the uphill, which includes the pole, has some interesting opportunities.

*Aunt Sally is a game, similar to skittles, played in Oxfordshire (and a few other English Counties. It involves putting a 'dolly' on a pole, and then hurling chunks of wood at it to try to knock it off. If you hit the dolly you score a point. If you hit the pole, you don't. It also appears to involve a lot of noise because the blackboard used for scoring has 'NEIGHBOURS!' chalked on it.  We use the blackboard for our scoring too, and we try to keep our noise down! This is also where the bird likes to sit ... see below.

One of our players (C) arrived with her camera. T noticed C staring at the blackboard for a long time.  Funny that, she thought, the score is not that interesting.  When she got back down to that end she saw that C was in fact looking at a collared dove sitting on the pole supporting the board. G also saw the bird and invited it to sit on his hand.  After a while it flew off and sat on T's head! T looks a bit anxious - it could have left her a lucky present ...

It eventually flew back to its perch in the tree and everyone played some more. But it was determined to join in and flew out and sat on P's head
   

G went to remove it and it sat on his head!  

 
Much fun was had by all.  Perhaps it will still be there next week.

We have a few exciting events planned. One is our own Funday: a weekend in Late June/Early July - depending on everyone's availability, for play, food and prizes! We need to know if you plan to be on holiday, etc, so we can make arrangements for a suitable day.

The other two are more public
- the Wallingford Carnival 16th June - we will have a 'Presence Gazebo'  in the square; or on the Kinecroft IF WE GET a patch on the Kinecroft to play. 
- the Bunkfest - 31August-2nd September -  we hope to have a 'Presence Gazebo' somewhere, and if we can get a patch, perhaps we can play again for people to watch.

PLEASE let me know if you think you will be around on the days, so if we do get a playing space on the Kinecroft, we can draw up playing schedules so we have someone playing all day, for people to watch and hopefully sign up to join us. 

In any event, we look forward to seeing you on Wednesdays to practice what Loren has taught us and to get in trim for possible forthcoming events!
We look forward to seeing you. 

We all met on Wednesday 2nd May - 11 of us (much nicer weather, at last!). We started off with an introduction to the official rules and court etiquette. We delivered our boules to the cochonnet to ascertain teams and set to on two courts playing in earnest. And what a lot of fun we had.  Some of use played like demons and other like demon apprentices - but we had some good practice 'reading' the terrain! One team had a really difficult court with hills and valleys and grassy patches and some large puddles - good for washing the boules if you landed in one ...

We are all looking forward to some more games  (one tomorrow night) to hone our skills for our first Funday.  So watch this space! Looking forward to Wednesday night.