La Fête départementale des sports de nature took place at Chateauroux over the Whitsun weekend. The départment being Indre where I play golf rather than Creuse where I live.

Although I take “de nature” to mean outdoor, of the 39 activities listed in the programme one or two seemed intrinsically indoor to me – basketball and judo for instance. Nothing to stop you doing them outdoors I suppose except the weather. And the weather was not kind on any of the three days.

The organisation was impressive. On arrival I reported to reception where I was issued with a natty sleeveless navy blue fleece embroidered with the event’s logo and a badge to wear round my neck. Next step was to collect my individual insulated picnic hamper. This little container held a tasty baguette, a slice of pizza, a brownie, an apple, a banana, an energy bar, a bottle of water and a coke. It’s eminently useful, in fact designed to be attached to your bicycle handlebars and has a transparent sleeve on top to slip your map into. This is the pre GPS model of course.

The setting was super. It was in a large park and the various sports were strung out around a central lake which was the venue for all the watery stuff.

Mind you on the Sunday you could have kayaked your way around the whole park such was the rainfall. That didn’t put off the youngsters who came to whack golf balls into the wild grey yonder. We had about ten mats laid out for people to play from and a sort of bouncy castle as a target. My job was to give basic instruction and supervise the punters. I was thoroughly drenched by the end of the day despite my umbrella.

Golf balls and clubs can be dangerous and in spite of our efforts at maintaining tight control one poor lad got a club full in the face. I believe what happened was that when he ran out of balls he bent down to pinch one from the guy next to him just as he swung his club backwards. He was hurt bad if the noise he made on the way to the ambulance was anything to go by.

The weather on Monday was better in as much as there was less rain but it was cold. Again the punters were not put off and right up to 5.30 when we closed there was an endless stream. By the end we were one of the few activities still running so people kept coming.

It was quite fun despite the weather. All the kids were very enthusiastic and some of them obviously sporty. Others might be better to concentrate on reading.

There were a few adults and one I was given charge of turned out to be a member of the départmental Olympic committee. He was probably not a man whose vote counts for much in allocating the Olympic games to anywhere but my teaching him golf seemed a bit of a cheek. However I suppose I am better qualified to do that than I was to teach the Old Tyme Music Hall chorus to sing and I got through that undetected. Next challenge brain surgery, though I believe that’s already been done.