RIVERHURST, Sask. – There are shrieks of excitement, but no yells urging on sweepers, no ice other than in the drinks at this curling bonspiel.
The last weekend in March in Riverhurst is saved for the annual mini-curling tournament. For 10 years this southern Saskatchewan village nestled by Lake Diefenbaker has held a fund raiser that often coincides with the springtime softening of the ice bridge over the lake.
The village doubles its 155-person population for the three-day event that draws district women and sometimes their children and grandchildren. The men don’t play. They help in the lunch counter and carry the tables out of storage to be used for the mock curling play.
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The reason for their exclusion is based in the tournament’s origin as a project of the Riverhust women’s curling group.
The village rink was torn down after it was weakened by a plow wind in 1989. The skating rink was rebuilt but not the curling side. The local women’s curling league came up with the idea of the tournament to raise funds for local projects and for recreation since their own facility was gone.
One of the organizers, Elaine Gunsch, said 32 teams of four people entered this year’s tournament. Some came from as far away as North Battleford, Sask., and Saskatoon and Medicine Hat, Alta. This year they raised $2,500. In past years money has gone to the local hospital, the first responders group, the skating rink and recreation board.
Rules of the game
The game is not really curling. It is more an adapted form of shuffleboard. Two wooden tables set up in the community hall form the playing surface with painted hog lines, hacks and house rings. The rocks are heavy-weighted metal miniatures with cup holder hooks attached. The rock must be delivered off the fingertips on the hooks, not the solid body of the two-inch sphere, or else the rock is removed from play. No side-bumpers are allowed, or else the rock is removed. It takes an hour for eight people to play 10 ends.
Donna Miner, the last president of the local women’s curling league, said the tournament is a good game because “it’s all pure luck. You never get good at it. Our oldest curler was 93. She loved it because she could do it.”
Marie Summers provides another reason this version of curling is a hit: “You’re never stiff the next day.”
The Riverhurst women add fun to their tournament with themes and costumes. This year the Beatles, Minnie Pearl, Kiss and the Village People arrived to match the music theme.
