The generosity of Portarlington Golf Club members hit record highs on Friday night.

With the club’s ever-popular Community Raffle coinciding with Good Friday, administration manager Jackie Durbidge decided the money raised should benefit the Royal Children’s Hospital’s annual appeal.

“We help out a lot of great causes and community groups with our raffle each week, but the Good Friday Appeal for the kids was the perfect link for us last week,” Jackie said.

“We knew that our members and their guests are always generous, but they took it to the next level when it came to the kids’ hospital.”

With a couple of just straight-out donations thrown in, the money raised by the raffle was an extraordinary $3165 in just over three hours.

Hearty applause rang out around the club when the amount was made public on the night, just hours after the Portarlington CFA raised an extraordinary $8000-plus by rattling tins around town during the day.

“It’s a great testament to our community spirit that, even when things are a bit rough with petrol and everything else, that we still have it in our hearts to raise that much money,” said Jackie, who also paid tribute to the generous sponsors of the raffle.

“We didn’t even really have to ask and our friends at White Fisheries, Oxley Estate and PFD Foods just pitched in to make the prize pool even sweeter.

“It just gave everyone a great feeling to have played their part for a great cause.”