Tūrangi Bowling Club goes from strength to strength

Tūrangi Bowling Club life member Ray Foster (left), Leila McLeod, club president Mac McDonald, and members Raymond Brown and Terry Downs. The new green being laid is in the background. Photo / Dan Hutchinson

It has been two years of fundraising, but members of the Tūrangi Bowling Club can now sit back and watch their new green being laid out.

They won’t be sitting still for long, though, with plans underway to renovate the clubrooms, including a new deck and bi-fold doors out the front, overlooking the greens.

Member Leila McLeod said the club got right down to just seven members a few years ago but that had now risen to 81, with 48 social members and 33 active bowlers.

Life member Ray Foster was at the opening of the original club facilities in 1967, moving to the town along with many other Ministry of Works workers, once the Mangakino power station was complete.

The central part of the clubrooms was the original building, with extensions added at either end since then. And one green has become two.

In its heyday there were about 120 members.

Foster said it was a social hub then too, and an important part of a town that had a population of 9000 people in the 1970s.

Club president Mac McDonald said the main green had not been replaced since 2001 and the seams were starting to open up, so it would be good to test their skills on the new surface once it was complete in a few weeks.

“I’ll probably have to get new bowls now.”

McLeod said they would be having a Matariki Competition on July 14-15, the first of its kind in New Zealand.

“We’ve already got 14 teams registered. Four more and it will be a full green.”

She said the next stage in the upgrade programme would be a renovation of the clubrooms.

The green replacement cost $300,000. Club secretary Poa Spence said the project “has been a long time coming” and they were excited to see it finally underway.

McLeod said there were several factors behind the resurgence of the club, including the efforts of Spence, past and present presidents and members, and also adding more activities like indoor bowls, pool, cards and darts events. It also claims to be the “cheapest watering hole in town”.

Everyone involved with running the club is a volunteer and the club’s patron is 94-year-old Leila Madsen.