Arrowhead Golf Club: Tournament with the Grand Strand Golf Directors

Canon ball start at 8:30 with Frank, Nate and Craig on my team for the 20th Annual GSGDA Charity Challenge. I was in for a treat, as I could see by passing the first couple holes driving out to our starting hole 6 on the Lakes 9.

Sandy and I (still with the glare from the mist
of the beach on my camera lens...)

The crowd listening to the instructions

Frank, myself, Nate and Craig
before we tee off on our first hole to birdie 

Ahh, over too soon, already on hour last hole to play today 

NC birdie posing for me...

Leaderboard: Winning team shot a 53 (we scored a 63)

And, because it was soo nice today, we go out again
and play another 9 holes... well 10 actually,
as we drew and needed an extra hole to win the cash!

A long day, with a perfect finish: winning some cash and then joining Sandy for dinner at her local bar.

A day at Myrtle BEACH that ended with moonrise watching

A lot of wind here on the Atlantic, every half hour or so, you need to rid your beach towel of the sand. Reading a magazine at the beach is a bit difficult, so I just watched the waves and surfer Justin catch some later in the afternoon, when the high tide came in.

Instead of sunset watching (over land on the east cost), this is the place for moonrise watching over the sea. Glad I stayed out on the beach late to see this.

National Golf Club - King's North... for free!!

There is no such thing as a free lunch... but there is free golf. Thank you Sandy for organizing my first free rounds of golf on this trip!

King's North at The National is a place to play. In good shape, beautiful layout and flowers everywhere. Plenty of water and bunkers. I was advised that they had moved the tee boxes forward. The ladies backward tees are 5662 long. Checking the tee boxes yardage though, I teed of from where they put the men's regular tees (as said, they had been moved forward). A 45 and 48 added up to my 93 today  with 37 putts (and no GPS). Scored 2 snowmen today also.

One on the much talked about par 5 hole 6 "The Gambler": go around on the safe right side or play to the island fairway on the left and try to reach the green in two. To carry to the island from my tees, I needed 137 yards. The island looked quite big, so I chose driver. But that was too much, my ball rolled of somewhere at the end on the right side. My next shot I hit with a 5 iron, but caught it fat and landed in the water short of the green. Ok, back to safety on the right side then and a pitch and chip to the green and one putt... Very cool hole. Certainly one of the most interesting ones I have ever played.

Barefoot Love and talking about my trip to the local Golf community at the Legends Resort

Five days without golf. I was really keen to play today! After all, this is Myrtle Beach, the US Golf Capital. Barefoot is a big resort here in North Myrtle Beach with 4 courses: Norman, Dye, Fazio and Love (the one I played). Oh, but the humidity just sat there in the air and today even the locals were complaining about the humidity. Around noon, a nice breeze started to make it a bit more bearable... Staying hydrated is key here. Looking at the score cards of many courses here, the ladies tees seem quite short. Also here, I decided to play again from the ladies' backward tees (they are the same as the men's regular tees). A 94 with 35 putts in high humidity and heat at sea level, where I am losing a couple yards on all shots made me happy today.

At the 19th it was nice and cool, and I met members John and Ernie who came out here today only for lunch (too hot to play they said...). What a great sport this is, I always meet nice people everywhere I have been around the world now. Maybe I will go back here and play a round with them if my schedule allows for it. Or, go and see Ernie dance salsa at Carlos'n Charlie's tomorrow night.

Next stop at the condo's pool and then for dinner I was invited to come to Legends Resorts to meet up with Sandy and the Grand Strand Golf Directors who played their Monthly there. I gave a little impromptu speech on stage about my golf trip around the world and will also be interviewed later this week. Everyone is so friendly here. Great southern hospitality. The challenge for the days to come is to pick where I want to play all the free rounds of golf I was offered. Love it here. Saturday, I am playing in the annual best ball on one of the National teams at Arrowhead Country Club. Really looking forward to that. This will be my first tournament on the tour!

Outside, a thunderstorm was in preparation, but that is a good thing here tonight, as now the forecast is a couple days of cooler temperatures.

It is all about golf, but I had to cancel my tee time

... so the phone rang at 02:00. But, I had fallen asleep and by the time I got to it, it was too late. So I went outside and checked if the delivery guy was there. But no sight of him. I heard the phone again at around 03:00... and again, as it only rang a couple of times, I was too late to pick it up. Note, the phone is in the kitchen, Carmen in the bed and trying to catch some sleep (difficult endeavor - clubless!=sleepless?) Yes, maybe this time. There was a truck outside. But they were loading something onto it (strange hour of night to do so) and drove away. Hmm, frustrated, I went back to bed.

When I called US Airways baggage services, they were very apologetic, but could not reach the delivery guys... Finally at 11:00 I got another call. He would be here in 10 minutes. At 11:45 the delivery guy calls again and said he was outside. So I hung up and went outside... BUT THERE IS NO ONE! Hmm, hopefully he would call again. He did, claiming he was outside, well as I checked he wasn't and finally he looked at this map and admitted he was in the wrong neighborhood. 12:10 - I have my clubs :)

No clubs, no game. My morning tee time at Barefoot Love needed to be cancelled. Will try to play it tomorrow instead. Today, there was just one more thing to do really. Move condos. The one I checked into was not very clean at all and half of the things in it did not work. New condo (neat inside also not just outside), new luck and after the move still some time to go and practice at Myrtlewood Golf Course, which is part of the resort I am staying at.

Bunker and chipping practice half
way between Miami and New York

US Airways owes me a day... at least

It is best to keep this here short. The day was too long as it is. The plane for the flight to Charlotte had a mechanical problem and therefore a delay of more than an hour. Which meant I was going to miss my connection. US Airways staff was extremely unfriendly and as I was approaching the desk, the gate agent yelled at me: "do not approach us, go back to the waiting area NOW and let us do our job!" Hmm, I hadn't even asked my question yet and never got to ask it later either. After calling connection destinations in what seemed to be alphabetical order to come approach the desk, the flight was ready to board before they got to M as in Myrtle Beach and I just hoped they would have a connection for me...

No real food on this 3h flight, guessed that would be the case and thus had already picked up a salad for lunch while waiting for the flight. I did make the next connection, but my golf bag didn't. Arrgh, I hate waiting for my luggage and then not get it. Baggage services here do not call international numbers, so, I was given a number to call to leave my condo's number once I got it and also given a promise that my bag would be delivered today.

Wishful thinking! Finally at at 23:15, delivery called and said, they would deliver my clubs within an hour. So I waited up... (cont'd tomorrow :))

Filling up on the way to the airport

All bags still with me on the way to the terminal

DFW and Lake Grapevine on the way to Charlotte

Patrizio's, chilling in the pool and movies night

No golf... not until Myrtle beach. Why? Well, for one, I want to spend some time with my non-golfing Dallas friends and two, sadly, my fingers hurt, when I get up in the morning. Guessing, it is old age (=arthritis maybe?) or what they call "golf fingers". Or maybe a combination thereof. A bit of a break will do me good before I go to the golf capital of the US next week.

Just booked my condo and a golf package today with Sandy, after I had tried for quite some time do this online on a website that would not let me complete a booking. She is a lovely lady that was very patient with me on the phone (connection was so bad that it must have broken up 6 times) and tried to find the best deal for me. Cannot wait. Seven rounds of golf on beautiful courses for just USD 304.


After a big lunch at Patrizio's where Cat and I were joined by Kevin and David, we headed to "The Coutry". Noeha invited us all for another round of swimming in her pool, great nibbles and a movie later with fresh popcorn. Yummie. That makes me almost as happy as a piece of red meat. A good last day of chilling in hot big D.