
Building a Boules CourtOur favorite movie is Peter Mayle's “A Year in Provence”; I think we have seen it about 10 times (the only movie we have ever purchased to own). In the movie they play the game of
boules, or petanque, as is is also called, and we just had to try it.
We found a great set of boules balls on ebay and decided we needed a court to play on. The big project of this year.
In our back yard, which is relatively flat, we had a flower garden that was being taken over by weeds. We figured this would be a good spot for the court. The first step was transplanting all the flowers, then cutting the weeds down with a mower. Lumber was cut with the saw mill, and a load of gravel was ordered. The court measures 13' by 38' and the bottom is covered with a weed blocking ground cloth.

We built the frame, got it level and started hauling in gravel (a skid steer worked real well for this part). Our court took about 12 yards of gravel. After the gravel was all in place we raked it as smooth as possible.

Already we have spend many hours playing boules, now we need to teach the game to a few friends!