2026 NEWS

The charity coffee morning was very well attended and made £316.60 for the Alexia Wilson Trust, a local charity benefiting local people in great need.
We have many wonderful cake makers among us. Some cakes were served with hot drinks and others were taken home.
Books and puzzles were sold and the tombola table was well supported. Linda O’Donovan brought her beautiful hand made clocks, jewellery, key rings and artwork.
Thank you to all those who supported this event, either by coming along, donating goods or manning the kitchen and tables.

On Sunday Morning 29th March some of our regular petanque players took part in our first competitive match against players from other clubs. A great morning, and it was enjoyed by all that took part. Thanks to Trevor Blows who kindly co-ordinated everything for us with the away players and ran the games. He also acted as adjudicator for close calls!

Below is his report on the games.
Dunmow Petanquers v Invitation League select.

The Dunmow group hosted an Essex IPL select team for their first competitive match on the newly refurbished terrain. On a chilly Sunday morning 15 players enjoyed the matches and the chance for some laughs and banter along the way! The result was a 4-2 win for the visitors but sociable sporting petanque was the real winner on the day.
Well done to Rick and Peter for winning their two games.
Thanks to Joy Green for organising the morning.

The games showed the experience gained over the past few years by the Dunmow players. The new surface is helping to improve their standard and there is a promising future for petanque at the club.

A great evening was had by all at our Quiz. Many thanks go to Margo, Michael and their lovely daughter, Camilla for a really good selection of rounds and a lot of fun.
Thank you to the catering team of Sue Wastell, Susie Norman, Mary Attridge, Pat Turner and Marion Bales, who provided a lovely, wholesome Ploughman’s with mints to follow.
Thanks too, to Steve and Sue, serving at the bar and everyone who took part in a very enjoyable evening.

Your Social Committee: Vicky, Jacky & Linda T

Another brilliant evening from Mars Garden, with your support we managed to raise £482.  Special thanks to Mary Attridge, Pat, Camilla and Sue Wastell for stepping in and helping us with the raffle etc and all those that assisted with the clearing away afterwards.  Goes without saying, big thank you to Sue T, Steve T and Ian for manning the bar for us.

The Pétanque renovation work has finally been completed.  It was started just before Christmas and the contractor finished Monday 12^th January after a couple of small unforeseen delays.  A team of volunteers put in a lot of hard work today Wednesday the 14^th to put the finishing touch to the surface. There was lots of shovelling, carrying and barrowing and raking of gravel today for which I thank the following people .

Trevor Blows, Yvonne Game, Peter Norman, Sue Fage, Jim Fage, Colin Marshall, Maureen Marshall and Patrick Aiken

I would also like to thank Rick Broadley for all his hard work getting quotes and requotes and supervising the contractor, and of course to our anonymous donor that helped us with the cost of the renovations and which enabled us to get this project over the line.

A late but very important addition from Susan Fage who wanted to say there is one important person missing from the ‘thank yous’ and that was Joy she is the one that organises and sends emails (even when on holiday) for us pétanque players week in week out and was there working hard with rest of us on Wednesday so to us a very important person to have missed the thank yous! 

We also want to give a big thank you to Stansted Airport for their donation providing over half the money for the renovation.

Here is to many sunny  Wednesday mornings of Pétanque.  Everyone is welcome!

Forty of us gathered on a miserable winters evening for our first social of the year.

The evening commenced with our very own Brucie (Dave Wastell) assisted by his sparkly Dolly Dealer (Sheilagh Pithers). This took us back to Prime Time Saturday evening TV as four couples battled it out in Play Your Cards Right.  Teams from the various tables competed against each other with advice constantly being shouted out from the audience. The final was contested between John & Mo and Tina & Ian M and the eventual winners were Ian Morris and Tina.

After a short interval when we had platters of hot food delivered to the tables from the kitchen followed by a bowl of chocolates.

Then came Mr & Mrs the new game ably run by Graham and Frances Lavender, the questions and presentation were brilliant. We had three very brave couples, Belinda and John Cogswell, Margo and Michael Rogers and Sue Tarbard and Alan Hammond, who were all very entertaining, there was lots of laughter and banter.  The questions were hilarious and there was much laughter. After a few extra rounds it was still a tie between Sue and Alan and Margo and Michael so it was decided to award both teams the prize.

The bar was manned all evening by our trusty bar staff and everyone went home having had a fun filled time.

Thanks to Dave and Sheilagh, Graham and Frances, we really appreciated all your preparation and research, which made the evening so much fun. Also a big thank yo to Ian, Steve and Sue T for manning the bar for us.  Finally a huge thank you to everyone who supported us and our Club.

Thank you all as always for your support.

The Social Committee Vicky, Jacky & Linda T