At the weekend Peter and I went to the International Polo Test, with our friends Tony and Beth, which has become somewhat of a standing fixture in our calendar for the season. I missed out last year, so was happy to be able to go back to NZ for the weekend to attend as well as to help with some of the final arrangements at Willowbrook for the upcoming wedding, such as planting a few last plants, hanging some crystals on chandeliers, and rearranging furniture. My mother and her husband Terry Urban, a professional photographer and jade artist, came up as well and started to take some of the promotional photos for our new website which will go live at the end of this month.
The weather was not the best, but at least the showers were very brief and few. The curtain raiser match in the morning was the NZ North Island Team vs the NZ South Island team. The South Island team had a glorious win.
After several glasses of champagne and a lovely buffet lunch the international test kicked off.
Above: The NZ Team
James Woods, Glenn Sherrif, John Paul Clarkson (Cptn), Tom Hunt
Below: The Argentine Team
Paco O'Dwyer, Michel del Carril, [Manager], Juan Britos, Pablo Llorente
For the first few chukkas the teams were neck in neck, but then NZ started to give away too many penalties, and slowly the Argentines edged ahead.
By half time I think it was about 7/5 to the visitors. We all toddled out to stomp the divots, although the turf was in such excellent condition that we were actually hard-pressed to find any.
Above: Me and my friend Beth, who's 80 this month. Such a hoot!
Below: Doppelganger of my dear friend & devoted blog follower Fran
Above and Below: Everyone was having fun at half time.
Soon they were back to the serious business at hand...
By the end of the 6th chukka the visitors had declared themselves the winners, the final score 13/11 to The Argentine. Terribly hospitable I think of us, I mean, they had come all this way...!
Looks like a great day out!
ReplyDelete