SAMEDI
The 34th annual Le rallye national Ain-Jura took place this weekend in l'Ain and in the neighboring département of Jura. Ce rallye is a professional car rally race with eight timed stages that snake through four different villages in the Ain-Jura départements (with other rallyes hosted in different départements throughtout the spring and summer). R and I drove to the stage in the next village over, perched ourselves at the public viewing area, and watched the race cars queue at the start. In addition to professional drivers with their professional cars, the rally also permits enthusiasts (non-professional, but trained amateurs) to register and race on the course.
Since La Tribune devoted only a few lines to the event, R and I were surprised to find such a well organized, well attended event. Among the hundred plus cars, there were Porsches, souped up Subarus (which apparently have won lots of professional races), VWs, Renaults, BMWs, and more. Living in a small town, we were bound to bump into people we knew. At the rallye we saw one of our neighbors' grandson and the horse farmer who had brought les chevaux over to our house last night.
There are four horses in total, all male and ivory-colored. When they arrived I took a break from my weeding to fed them a treat of hard, crusty bread. Apparently the horses had been grazing up in the mountains for a few weeks, and when the farmer and his helper brought them down, they had not eaten for a few hours and were hungry. The farmer said they'd be able to eat all the grass from our property in 7-10 days. We haven't mowed the hilly parts of the property this year, in anticipation of their arrival, so the entire front part has tall grass ready for munching. It is quite a sight seeing these beautiful animals from my kitchen window.
DIMANCHE
R read something online regarding an open house at a local shooting club. We left the house around 11am and thought we'd spend a few hours at the open house before heading to Fort l'Ecluse for le vide grenier, a big flea market, but it literally translates to "empty attic".
The purpose of the shooting club's open house? It wasn't to attract new members as we initially thought. It was to give the community a chance to learn about the club, meet its members, and learn about different types of guns and how to properly shoot them. Thought of MS today, as she recently fired some guns up in Cooperstown, NY. Up til today I had gone through my adult life without ever touching a gun, or even hearing it discharge. Today's open house was the perfect opportunity for R and I to learn how to shoot one. A bit anxious, I watched some others learn to shoot first, including a woman in her 40s who was learning to use a .22 rifle.
For 1.5€, you get 5 bullets for the .22 rifle. One of the club members gave us a demonstration on how to shoot a rifle, which is different than shooting a handgun. He showed us the proper stance, how to align the sites on the rifle to the target, and how to squeeze the trigger.
I did two test shots sans bullets before the instructor loaded the rifle. For extra safety, I put in ear plugs and noise-deafening headphones. My heart started beating faster with anticipation as I took my stance—I had to remind myself to continue breathing. Holding the rifle braced closely to my right shoulder, I steadied the rifle with my left hand. With my left eye closed, I aligned my sites to the target, then I breathed and squeezed the trigger. The noise was loud but not horrible and there was no recoil.
I fired that first shot..and then a few more. In between shots, the instructor showed me where the bullets landed so I could re-adjust the alignment of my target. In total, I shot 10 bullets, with 7 of them landing on the paper target. To my surprise (because I felt like I was super shaky), the instructor said I had a steady hand and trigger finger. The 5 bullets that landed were clustered along the middle of the target, but a little too low of the bullseye. It was more than I expected and I was pleased I hit the paper target more than half of the time. R tried the same rifle and did great. Throughout the day, a man dressed in military garb fired a cannon that made such a big boom that my heart felt like it jumped to my throat. Afterwards, we had lunch prepared by the club members for only 5€ a person. Ridiculously cheap and good...homemade terrine, crusty baguette, jambon, rice with vegetables, apple tart, vegetable salad, red wine and at the end, some moonshine made with local prunes. At 80 proof, a small sip warms your throat instantly. Everyone was really friendly and we even met a member Ludivic who had spent 7 years in NYC in the restaurant business.
After lunch I watched while R learned how to shoot a .38 Magnum, a .22 Revolver, and two .45 rifles that sparked fire when they discharged. All of them exploded with power and a loud boom and some recoil. Some interesting observations:
- There were quite a few women at the open house learning to shoot for the first time
- Everyone starts laughing after the trigger is pulled...I guess it's a release of tension while waiting for the gun to fire. Does that make them "trigger happy"?
- With parental permission, children as young as 13 can learn how to shoot
- Even though boxes of bullets were right next to each of the guns, everyone was responsible and followed the "rules" which was basically, don't touch anything and don't point the gun at anything except the paper target
- There were some really intricately carved and beautiful guns in the club's collection
- There are guns that can shoot a rider and his horse from separate barrels in the same gun.
FOOTNOTES
France is organized into a hundred département, or administrative zones. R and I live in L'Ain, a département numerically signified as 01. More on départements, perfectures, cantons in a future post.
Hope everyone had a bon week-end. Do you have World Cup fever? Did you watch the US vs England game and were amazed by the 1-1 result? Do you have Celtics fever?
