Summer Vacation - Catalina Island (part 1)

A while back I wrote about Laura taking up golf. On our weekend trip to Catalina Island, Laura played a round of golf for the very first time. (Up until now she's only hit balls at the driving range). Well we had a great time. We had a Friday morning start time; so it didn't get too hot, and it wasn't too crowded. Here's Laura on the 1st tee box:

Laura was scared to hit the ball off the 1st tee box because she didn't think she could clear the street below and land on the fairway. Well she did! In the picture above you can see further down the 1st fairway, and some sand traps that separate it from the 9th fairway. The palm tree directly behind Laura caught my ball, knocked it straight down, and landed it behind Laura's. So the net result was that Laura actually out drove me.

Oops! This is called a wiff. If we were playing by official golf rules Laura would be charged a stroke here even though she didn't hit the ball. I didn't really want to use this picture. The only other one I took of her swinging at the ball was from a distance further away, and with her back to the camera. I like how she's pictured here between the two trees:

Here we are on one of the fairways. We had to take each other's picture since there was no one playing with us to take our picture together.


My dad taught me how to play golf and he always told me to keep my head down. I used to have trouble keeping my head down. I wish he could see this picture - the ball was long gone and my head was straight down looking at where the ball was sitting.

It's really hard to see them, but there are 3 deer in this next picture. We were playing the fairway to the left when a mother deer and her two does came out of the hills from the right. The three walked right down that cart path and under the tree in the center of the picture.

Unfortunately, the above was the last picture of the roll of film. By the time we got closer to the deer and changed the film, the three went back into the hills.

One more thing about our round of golf. On the hole after we saw the deer I almost hit a hole-in-one! It was a par 3, 142 yards. When Laura and I got to the tee box the foursome ahead of us were still putting out. I told Laura to go ahead and hit because I knew she couldn't reach the green. The group on the green were slower than s**t, so I told Laura to hit again. Finally the group cleared the green, but the twosome on the hole following us were approaching. So I'm feeling pressured to hit quickly. With my 6-iron in hand I stepped up to my ball, hit, and then watched a near-prefect flight. The ball landed in the center of the green and rolled toward the hole. It wasn't until I walked up to the green to see how close to the flag it ended up - about 4 feet away.

Well we had a great time, and I hope that was the first of many rounds of golf that Laura and I will play.