Well, there's more to say about the
Forest of Arden shoot than there is to show. It was quite the wettest
shoot that the webmaster has been on, although seasoned campaigners
avow it wasn't as bad as the inaugural Windrush shoot. The rain started
somewhere up the M40 and continued until well after the much delayed
start. It then continued at intervals all day, giving a break of a
solid couple of hours in the afternoon and resuming just in time for
the prizegiving. Early arrivals were mired in the car park even
before they had turned off their engines. There were a lot of no-shows
due to the weather and some noble souls even turned up, paid their
£6.00 and declared they were going home only to realize they
couldn't get out of the car park and so might as well stay and get wet
like the rest of us. Even before we were led out to our targets, it was
clear that the overall colour of the day was going to be BROWN!.
On a good day the course would have been a challenge with steep climbs
up high earth banks, but with the rain it was more like open day
with the Commandos! Very rapidly the cut steps crumbled and
descents became treacherous. The webmaster, not reknown for stability
even on a good day, went over three times. Fortunately his fall was
broken on all occasions by the nice, soft MUD!.
Martin, in an un-characteristic senior moment, forgot to bring a
waterproof, but fortunately managed to borrow a spare off someone (see
footnote below). Ian didn't have a great time with his group. Ask him
yourself why - no reason to risk slander here! The course took its
toll on Mark and George's shafts. Both ended up shooting the last few
targets with a single arrow. At the last target Mark found someone
else's arrow and used that!
But the writer would like to add a personal footnote which is that when
the chips are down archers pull together. After a long and tiring
day, everyone got stuck in to help push cars out of the swamp
and get them on their way.
