It is that time of year where office parties reign!  I was invited as a guest to a end of year function yesterday by my brothers company.  It was a function for suppliers and clients.

My brother decided to do something out of the box this year and arranged for a day at the Clay Target shooting range at the Waterhaven Country Estate.  I run an IT company so I offered to sponsor a few gifts.

I have never shot a gun before so decided to take up the challenge and take part.  It was a typically male orientated day so I was one of 2 women.

I left home early that morning to drop kids off at school in a short little summer dress.  The weather did not look fantastic but there was blue sky and I thought the day would improve. By the time I had done the school run, the clouds had come over and rain looked imminent.  So I went back home to change into something more suitable – jeans and a t-shirt!

I arrived with my fellow compatriot as we agreed that us girls would stick together.  We had to travel along a dirt road for quite some time to get there and it had been raining heavily over the last few days so I was rather grateful I drive a 4×4.  Needless to say we took the wrong road and ended up going a little further out than we anticipated and ended up doing some real 4×4’ing.  (So glad I went on that 4×4 course – read blog post here) We eventually figured out we had gone too far and doubled back.

Eventually we arrived at the Waterhaven Estate.  Everyone was there already and socialising.  It was beautiful out there.  There was a “lapa” area and we were welcomed with coffee and muffins.  The bar would be open after lunch.

As pictures tell a thousand words I’m going to go through the day pictorially where possible.

View from the Lapa

One of the shooting ranges

Coffee and Muffins

The Bar

Our minders for the day

I was introduced to our minders and our hosts.  Our hosts were David Tweddell and Cathrene Walton.

We would be broken up into 4 groups, each with a minder.  I had an interesting conversation with David about clay target shooting and he explained quite a few things to me.  Things like it was important to know which eye was dominant.  It so happens I am left eye dominant – meaning it was recommended that I need to close my left eye while aiming (although this doesn’t work for everyone and you do what is best for you).  He also explained the gauges to me and the grams of the shells.  We would be using 12 gauge shotguns and 21 gram shells (hope I got that right).  Apparently 34 grams is typical but the recoil is a lot worse and as I was new at this, we would be using 21 grams.

He then went on to show me how to stand.  Feet apart with the left leg slightly in front – facing forward and leaning forward, giving your body space to move back.  Legs straight.  It was important to have the shotgun tucked into your shoulder and your cheek resting on the shotgun, otherwise the recoil would result in the shotgun hitting you in the face.

So us ladies were allocated 4 clipboards and we had to assemble 4 teams.  Once all done, we started heading out – each team to a different range.

My team (of 3) ended up at the most difficult range first – called “the Wobble”.  The target doesn’t shoot out in the same direction all the time and randomly shoots out wherever. Rather challenging for my first time.

The wobble