The Southern Golf Circuit!

Len has found a lot of country golf courses on the circuit route that we are doing from Lumsden before we head up to Queenstown and we have played golf every day this week! Sunday was at Te Anau and Monday at Lumsden where our last blog ended.
Tuesday we played at Dipton, a 9 hole very hilly, slanted course which we both found very tiring especially by the time we had played 18 holes. It was quite well maintained however, all by volunteers, (as with a lot of the nine hole courses) and they have a fairly new club house. Tuesday was their Ladies Day and there were only 6 ladies playing but they all stopped for a chat when our fairways came close together.
That afternoon the weather deteriorated and it was raining steadily as we headed for Winton and the golf course there which has a small official camp site in the parking area with electricity, water, shower & toilets and a washing machine available, all for the charge of $15 a night. There was already a caravan parked and another motorhome with a couple from Nelson who were on the road for 3 months.
Wednesday is their Ladies Day which starts at 10.00am so we were up early to tee off just before 8.15 so we could be on the 10th tee before they started, which we managed to do. The rain was constant and the wind blew the new umbrella which I won at Tuatapere inside out. Then as we were teeing off on about the 17th the wind blew our trundlers over and Lens umbrella went flying right over the creek behind getting caught on the far bank just before the road. He had to run along the creek for over a 100 metres before there was a place to cross so he could retrieve it which luckily he was able to do before it flew into the windscreen of a passing car.
On the way back he found that Norma, who we played golf with at the Tuatapere tournament, was in the group of ladies behind us so we were able to have a good chat afterwards.

Worst house in the worst street!

Later on that afternoon we moved on to the little depressed town of Mataura which has had a lot of job losses recently with the closing down of the sheep division of the freezing works. It has an extremely wide main road and lots of houses on it that seem quite derelict - there are some nicely looked after ones over the river but we thought the whole town had rather a sad feel about it. We parked in the RSA carpark beside the river, as they welcome overnight motorhomers, and felt better about the people and the town after joining a few locals for a drink in the Club. They were very friendly and chatty and the welcoming barmaid, Tina, insisted on giving us a dozen farm eggs when we left!

Whoops - there it goes again!

Today we played at the Mataura Course, in the rain again and with wind gusts up to 70kmph - again the umbrella blew inside out but it is still usable. The Mataura and Winton courses are apparently the hardest courses in Southland although we liked their flatness. If you think that our handicaps are improving with all this golf you would be wrong! We both went quite a way out, partly because you don't know where the hazards are on the different courses and the greens are all so different. Len has started to reduce his handicap again whereas I'm a little slower to recover but I have to say that I am hitting the ball much better so surely I will see some improvement soon. I did have a good game today considering the conditions!

Pretty, aren't they?

Tonight we are parked at the RSA in Gore and will play our 6th consecutive game tomorrow. Gore is a nice town and we had a little wander round before dinner especially to look at some of the older buildings.