Lawn Bowls

A few weeks ago, when the weather was a bit warmer and our days were a little bit longer, we had our first "go" at lawn bowls. To me, lawn bowls seem like a combination of bocce ball, shuffleboard, and actual bowling. Typically, you will find older Aussie gentleman (and women, but more often men) out at the local bowling club, and they are usually wearing tracksuits that look like they might have been made in the 90's. Pretty much every Australian town seems to have a place for lawn bowls.

Lawn bowl leagues can be quite serious, or it can be a fun activity for a buck's day (bachelor party), hen's do (bachelorette party), a birthday party, fund raiser, or any social gathering. During these non-league lawn bowls, the bowling is generally done barefoot, so the game is often referred to as "barefoot bowls". One of our friends organized barefoot bowls for his birthday, so obviously we were keen to try this new sport!

We played our barefoot bowls at the Port Melbourne Bowling Club, which, according to the sign below, was established in 1883!

This lovely older gentleman (I wish I could remember his name!) was quite serious about teaching us the basics, and once our short briefing was finished, we were free to play for a few hours.

It is my understanding that barefoot bowls rarely take place without the consumption of a few drinks, so of course we were compliant with that during the course of the day! Similar to bocce, the goal is to roll the ball as close as you can to the small white/yellow ball (the "jack" or the "kitty") at the end of the course. The "bowl" (ball) that ends up closest is the winner. Like shuffleboard, if you roll the ball too hard, it will fall off the end of course and you will not have a chance to be closest to the jack. The ball is actually not completely round like a bowling ball, as it has an "edge" that travels along the grass. Bowling is done in a sweeping sort of motion and there is a gentle curve of the ball due to it not being completely round.

We got a few early pointers from a man with experience!

Erik's first bowl looks pretty good!

Birthday boy!

Switching ends of the course

I was bowling entirely too hard during our first few games, and my ball was always going off the course. I was treating lawn bowls too much like duckpin bowling, and rolling with a lot of force. However, after I learned to take a little bit off of each roll, I improved and was quite happy with my performance. This was to the dismay of Erik, since in the first few games we were playing as partners, but by the time I had improved we were playing boys versus girls and I was winning some points!

Please note the man in the pink dress in the background. That is a buck's party!

Barefoot bowls was a great way spend a beautiful Autumn day, and I would definitely be up for playing again in the future!