Newsflash

Tomorrow I am off to Auckland to help my mother celebrate her 86th birthday!

The Dunedin story will have to be put on hold until my return.

Of course there will be even more stories to tell by then as I am taking my clubs in their little travel case in the hopes of managing to play another couple of rounds.

By all accounts several of the Brothers are keen to take a day off and take me to some of the more scenic and quiet golf clubs around Auckland .

How exciting!

The other news  is that I purchased a couple of second hand clubs today.

I popped into Economy Golf on St. Asaph St just to pick up a couple of new tees as suddenly my supply is low again having snapped several last week.

Well we got talking about Golfer's Elbow and he said was I using Graphite clubs? Cos it would certainly be a good move.

Indeed I have noticed that it is easier for me to use my 3 Iron,which  has a graphite shaft than it is for me to use my blinking 5 Iron with the steel shaft.

What a salesman!

He just happened to have a 3 and a 7 Iron (from the same set) on special today.

I would post a picture of the beauties but they are out in the car and the precipitation is persisting so I  shall leave them there for now.

They are eagerly awaiting the possibility of a small trial tomorrow if the weather permits.

But check out this new tee I purchased:

 

Is this a lipstick? I hear you ask.

No

It is my new Brush Tee!

Ooops, yes I forgot to tell you about that purchase Wilma.




Stay tuned for more adventures on the fairway.....................

 The Highs and the Lows of Dunedin

Hmm!

I have been finding it hard to get up to date with  the  recounting of the Dunedin adventure.
In part this is because it was quite an emotional time for me and I am a little at a loss as to know where to begin my tale.

Obviously there are the golf courses themselves , both the hilly and the flat I could write about.

And certainly if you are only interested in my scores to date I can tell you that in Dunedin,
despite the mizzle and the graupel(yes you may have to get out your dictionary at this point) that in 8 days I managed to play :

7 golf courses

A stirling effort and as my osteopath noted, not surprising that I now have a slight touch of Golfer's Elbow! 

I am now under strict orders to have rest days between games and possibly be prudent enough to only play a couple of times a week until my elbow heals.



I took some LOW roads  to golfing happiness....

..the flattish courses that did not require Leki sticks to clamber up the fairways:

Lower Waitaki

Otakou

Ten and counting- at Twelve Oaks

There was some MIDDLE ground at Waikouaiti with mixed terrain:

 




And of course there were the HIGH roads , the arduous and muddy tracts
of golfing heaven:

Mt Cutten overlooking Port Chalmers

Port Chalmers-perspective is deceiving

St Clair-going up the 12th

Steep Gradient to the flag-Belleknowes 8th

Those of you following this journey  and counting along the courses with me will know  that the overall courses played now number.....

23

 But that is just part of the story......................

















 

The Road Least Travelled 

(and definitely not recommended.)

There were two paths through the forest!

 

 Every picture tells a story.
 So, this looks like a perfectly delightful scene and oh so innocent on a sunny afternoon!
Two roads leading down the hill from the Belleknowes Golf course-one might think perhaps a high road and a low road(and here I am tempted to burst into a wee Scottish song about Loch Lomand.) 


However, looks can be deceiving, especially in the gloaming of a Dunedin twilight.

Leaving Belleknowes

You will recall from the previous entry, that I finished my round of golf just on dark:
























As I headed off down the road from the golf course I happened to see these roads and thought perhaps if I took the left hand one it may lead down to near the top of where the steep footpath commenced, thereby giving me easy access  to where I believed my poor luminous Pinnacle ball rested.


Good idea Ariel!

Driving carefully, as the road seems quite narrow and  darkness is rapidly descending, I edge my car down the left hand path.

Hmm I think" that is quite a drop to my left " but I continue to cautiously advance toward the happy moment of ball retrieval.

The road is becoming narrower and lo! there is a ditch to my right as well as the drop to the left. 

Oh well, once around the next corner I feel sure there will be a small car park in which to turn around after I dash down the hill to grab my ball. 

Around the corner...

 there is another corner and the road seems a little overgrown.

As I negotiate the next corner I gladly note a clearing to the right.

Ah the carpark!

Wrong!

OMG.

And there on my right are those tricky little steps.

I recognize this place and that steep road.

It is the footpath.

Och eye -well I'm here now.

Leaving the headlights on I run off down the path to see if the ball is awaiting my return.

It isn't.

Heading back up toward my car I see just how very narrow this footpath is and just how difficult it is going to be to 

 BACK UP

 negotiating those little corner ,avoiding the steep drop to the left and the ditch to the right.

 Well the challenges of the golf course pale into insignificance  stacked up against the situation I now find myself in.

Carefully,carefully I manage the first few metres and even get around the first corner quite well.

Of course I have to say backing is not the easiest driving challenge for me since all the surgery on my neck - scar tissue makes a full range of movement tricky.

I double bogey it.

I end up in the rough(read ditch)

But fortune smiles on the brave and foolish(sometimes)  

Miraculously, I manage to drive forward and get out of the ditch and  with miniscule surges of power I painstakingly ascend the  hill and am finally back at the real Road.

What a workout. I am pouring with sweat despite the evening chill.

I shall have to admit my foolishness to my friend with whom I am staying as it will make her feel so much better about the previous ditch I was in on this golfing odyssey.

A ditch that she, my caddy, put us in as we headed off on an early morning mission to play

Waitoa Park. 

Now that is Rough!

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

Mystery Object #2

 

Indeed! It is a souvenir from the Dunedin trip.

A beautiful new blue golf towel to contrast nicely with my Blue Shark bag.

The writing on it reads"Scotland .The Home of Golf"

Well there I was in Dunedin-the Edinburgh of the South!
And incidentally, Otago was the first province in New Zealand in which the Royal and Ancient game was played.
So on a cold wet day when no golf could be played I took myself off to the Scottish Shop on George Street to try and find a lovely pair of Tartan socks in the family tartan (either Sinclair for my paternal side or Rose for my maternal side) or perhaps a new scarf.
  Alas such socks do not exist much to my surprise and the scarfs were a tad pricey for my golfing budget. Perhaps a Tam'o'shanter then? But none to be had in the correct tartans.

Then I saw these golf towels-a fitting and affordable souvenir and a much needed replacement for my lovely St Andrews one which had become a casualty of the arduous terrain of the Belleknowes Golf Club.


Let me explain.....

On the 4th day of June,with the full moon due to rise on Queens Birthday Monday, I took myself off to the 9 hole golf course situated in the Green Belt of Dunedin city.
Belleknowes in fact is the closest course to the original site of the Dunedin Golf Club,the first to be established in New Zealand(1871)
My scrapbook records the  words-"super challenging and like nothing I have played before! A full body workout just getting up and down the course."
My golf book notes that 'a tin hat would be desirable on a busy day' as this is a very short course with many criss-crossing fairways. Luckily it is 4pm on a holiday Monday so it is not super busy and with the shortest day not far away I will need to keep moving to complete the round in the daylight.

For some reason I thought this course would be easy after the arduous Port Chalmers course I had played the day before.

 But this is Dunedin we are talking about.
It is a hilly place! 
No long,wide flat fairways with a few dips and hollows as we experience in Canterbury.
No gentle rising slopes up to the greens.Nope we are talking serious hill climbs here.


So ..........

The most challenging holes for me were the 7th and 8th.


To get to the tee box of the 7th involved dragging my trundler over a road and down a set of awkward steps:

 
Then down a long steep path. 

 

My drive then had to clear a deep gulley but the downward slope certainly helped the ball to carry and I made the green in one miraculous shot.

The Green in One

But if you walk down a big hill you have to walk back up it.

The 8th was gruelling!
The slope gradient so great that at one point as I pushed my trundler up the hill with the handle totally parallel to the ground I trip over my own golf towel,ripping it right off the chain attaching it to my trundler and falling into the mud myself in the process!


And that was the tragic demise of the lovely St. Andrews souvenir golf towel.

Upward to the 8th!

 
When I finally holed out on the 8th I turned to see the full moon rising over Dunedin city.
Perfect!

Mostly I played my Dunedin games in the late afternoons so was often finishing my round just as the magic colours of twilight played on the hills and water.Sometimes I quite forgot the game and just became immersed in the beauties surrounding me and took endless photos trying to capture the magic.
Mark Twain supposedly said that golf ruins a completely good walk but not so for me when I play at my preferred pace! I get to play a round of golf AND see all the birds stars and moon I desire.
However,occasionally this distractedness leads to unforeseen consequences!

Take this innocent attempt at an Arty shot:

Luminous ball and Moon

I was so busy trying to line up the moon and the luminous ball for this shot that I had to play the 9th in much faded light.Not only that but having dragged the trundler back up the steep path and the steps and across the road I discovered that I had forgotten to put the ball back in my pocket and my luminous Pinnacle is now lost somewhere between the 8th and 9th.

Bugger!

And just how all this led to me taking a precarious road least travelled will have to wait until the next installment!