Pancakes and Petanque in Binalong Bay

é

Boules and crepes

Pancakes and Pétanque runs off the tongue more smoothly than Crêpes and Boules but there is not a lot of difference between either.

I wrote about the people who run the French Crêpes van when they first visited us at a public area at Binalong Bay each  Sunday evening. Sadly we learned soon after, that the Break of Day Council bureaucrats closed them down. We attended a Binalong Bay Ratepayers A.G.M and its attendant general meeting and the issue of the licence to hawk being revoked was raised by moi. The prevailing sentiment of the ratepayers was that the crêpe van and its operators should definitely be allowed back to our little hamlet. It went to the Council meeting the following week soon and the ‘hawker’ won the right to return but not without some opposition by the Mayor, even though he stated at our Ratepayers Meeting that he would look into it and gave us all to believe that he agreed that they should be allowed to operate in Binalong Bay.

Boules novice

Anyway the Council voted and one vote swayed the opinion in the affirmative which was enough to allow them to operate.

So we went down again on Sunday evening and duly ordered our crepes. We met some new neighbours over our crepes and a glass of BYO wine. Once again this is one of the reasons why this informal and inexpensive way to get together is of benefit to the locals.

We followed up our crepes with a game of Pétanque/Boules.

I am a complete newcomer to Boules and after playing the game on Sunday night looked up the rules!

The goal is, while standing with the feet together in a small circle, to throw hollow metal balls as close as possible to a small wooden ball called a cochonnet (jack). The game is normally played on hard dirt or gravel, but can also be played on grass or other surfaces.

The casual form of the game of Pétanque is played by about 17 million people in France, mostly during their summer vacations. Additionally, Pétanque clubs have arisen in cities throughout North America. Pétanque is seen as hip by many newcomers, old and young alike. So there is now a very hip branch in Binalong Bay.

We were given a set of boules by two very good friends for our very respective ‘signficant’ birthdays when back in Brisbane so finally we will be able to get some use out of them and they will be returning on our next road trip to Binalong Bay.

It was a perfect evening and I took  photos of the sun setting in the west. Roz

Our Idyll

Minutes later