Virginia Vacation - Day 6

My brother is an excellent golfer. My father loved to play, and wasn't too bad, either. One of his uncles was, for a time, the pro at the Westchester Country Club. So there is some connection to the game in my family.

I, for whatever reason, don't seem to share that connection, or at least not to the same extent. Which is why I had some trepidation going into this day of the vacation, the day where I annually tee it up with my father in law and the wife's uncle.

The Golden Horseshoe Golf Club in Williamsburg has two championship courses, one designed by Robert Trent Jones, Sr. and the other by his son Rees. We did not play either of those. Instead, we opted for the $29 special to play the Spotswood Course. Which, when you think about it, isn't a bad deal considering it allowed us to play unlimited holes and included carts.

The course itself needs a little work. The 8th hole (which is the subject of the bottom right picture on their web page) may not be draining properly given the level of green slime on the water, and had more sand than grass on its green. Overall, though, it's a perfect course for hackers like us.

We're quite a trio when we go out, considering that the wife's uncle is legally blind and I often play like I am. Seriously, if this were a Cooch golfing recap I'd have had to contact MIT to design a polygon to contain some of my more egregious scores. But as we played on I got into the rhythm of things and even had legitimate par opportunities on occasion. Not that I converted any of them; it's hard to putt when you're more used to doing so while timing the arms of a tiny windmill. On at least two holes I took shots from under trees with a left-handed seven iron that my dad carried around for just such an occasion.

We wound up playing the course three times, as the second time around we zipped through in just about an hour. It sounded like a good idea at the time, but around hole 23 we started to flag, and we more or less played it out to satify honor.

The day ended up pretty much like every other vacation golf day, I enjoyed myself but not so much that I want to play every week. Though we do have a municipal course in town that's fairly cheap...