Lightning Ridge - Jean beats Mal - just!

We drove four hours this morning from Surat to Lightning Ridge. Mal had rung last night to get our names down for a 2pm Sunday start.

The club is just seven minutes' walk from the caravan park so we got our bowls and set off up the road. We arrived and were surprised by such a large club in a little town.

We walked inside and saw how large it was. Several areas.

We went outside to see there are two greens. One is grass.

It's the 'Bert Cooper Green'.

The second green is synthetic - flat carpet under permanent cover.

It's called the 'Ben Kennedy Green'.

It's the first green we've seen that has fans inside the cover.

Apparently the green and the cover resulted from a Government grant.

We sat down for a chat with John. He's on an off-road trek from Adelaide. There he's a member of Henley club.

Around 1:45, Adam, who was filling in for the Bowls Coordinator, got the list and collected our money.

There were only twelve bowlers - they all sat around outside to wait for the start.

There were three games of pairs. We played fourteen ends of three-bowl.

Jean and Vicki played together.

They played against Mal and Gordon. Mal and Jean skipped because Gordon was a bit uncertain and Vicki has only been playing a year.

Jean worked out line and weight pretty quickly

But Mal said his radar was off again. He was often narrow and short. Mal wasn't happy when he scored his first shot on end five. He exclaimed "Seven start!"

Jean kept taking their shots out.

Jean was tickled by a little bird that was running across the top of the cover.

Jean and Vicki were ahead the whole game, The highest margin was seven. In the end we both won seven ends. Mal and Gordon caught up and only lost by two. Jean said to Mal "If you'd had 21 ends you'd have got it!"

Lightning Ridge - poor Mal had a little loss after a big comeback.