Two members of the touring party arrived early to shoot at Raglan in the Queensland Rifle Association Championships and write:

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The match rifle tourist’s thesaurus was compiled by SaladDodger on the long drive from Coonabarabran back to Brisbane:

Yesterday’s inclement weather over, today was bright, warm, sunny. . . and windy.  The course of fire was 2 sighters and 15 to count at 1100, 1200 and 1500 yards.  Some had trouble at 1100 yards as the range at Coonabarabran required several minutes less elevation than the Belmont range, and there was a tricky fishtailing wind.  The Coolabah (presented by Phil Bain) is a trophy for ‘international pairs’ (one Aussie and one Brit) so we were all taking interest in our partners’ scores.  Many pairs seemed to be virtually out of the race even before we started shooting at 1500 yards, the event we had all come so far to participate in – sadly including Phil himself due to a trigger failure which forced him to retire.

Those of us who managed to get to the range on Saturday afternoon for a first practice were treated to the rare chance to be the first to fire on a new range. Set in rolling farmland this is a stunning new range with firing points back to 1,500 yards – the longest in the Southern hemisphere we are told. We had some concerns that the new firing points, which had not yet been grassed, were going to be a bit dusty and hard to get the front rests to settle in. As it turned out, this was not to be a problem.

Those of us that enjoyed the very generous hospitality of Tom’s parents in law set off on the long drive to Coonabarabran, some rather less tired and emotional than they deserved. The journey itself was uneventful taking some 6 hours, though it did provide the opportunity for us to take a look at some beautiful countryside, there-by scratching the surface of the country. One of the more alert passengers spotted some Emus in a field the size of a small county.

With the Woomera Match and post-Match afternoon tea (comprising beer and a comprehensive selection of snacks but no tea) completed, the Team met for a commiseratory dinner (at an “English pub”) before saying goodbye to those not travelling on to Coonabarabran (Ted Hobbs, Tim Kidner, Will Meldrum, John Pugsley, Tom Smith).

After a few showers on earlier days, today the heavens finally opened and gave Brisbane the rain it has been awaiting for six years.  Since most of the rain here comes in short heavy showers, the Aussies simply stop shooting when it rains (to prevent the cardboard targets getting waterlogged) and start again when it stops.

So the day of the woomera arrived.  It was wet at dawn and 19 degrees so, given the rain on Wednesday, looked like it could be a rain affected match with the prospect of gazebos being erected to protect the firers.  After all, this is Queensland and as James Freebairn says "when it rains here, it doesn't muck about, it just gets right on with it!"

Tuesday 20th April -- day 4 of the Australian MR Championships and the final day of the individual competition consisting of a single 20 round shoot at 1200 yards. Conditions were cloudy and cool at the start with light winds and scoring was high.