Tee Tattler

Happy false spring from the Illinois Valley Golf Course!
First some news from our annual Bandon Dunes golf trip. We took a nice group of guys and one lady from I.V. and met up on the Wednesday before the Super Bowl. John Sloan, Jason Gill, Scott and Sue Kern, Todd Johan and I met up with Paul Miller and his buddy from Utah, Dave Hastings. Dave had a large beach rental on the south side of Bandon. Nearby, D’Lynn and Troy Roach and D’Lynn’s long time girlfriend, Mattie, met up with Mattie’s father and uncle who had flown in from Texas.
We all met up for a little billiards at a quaint little bar in Olde Towne Bandon to catch up. We had an early tee time at Bandon Dunes’ Trails course so we got back to the beach house fairly early. The Trails was very beautiful with very little misty rain and the course was in marvelous condition. Its beach sand and salt grasses led up onto the ancient Dunes that are now deep, dark forests.
The course has very large, dark blue ponds surrounded by huge firs and cedars. The signature hole teebox sits on a high point, overlooking a 270 degree view of the entire property and the Pacific Ocean. This is the spot that “Shorty” Dow, the late caretaker of the original ranch that has become Bandon Dunes Golf Resort, brought Mike Keiser as the coup de gras of the tour of the ranch, convincing Keiser that this was “the place.”
After Trails, we met up at The Punch bowl, a 5 acre practice putting greens, all set up with 36 little tee markers and holes for a little wagering fun and putting practice. Later that evening we crowded into The Wheelhouse Restaurant and shared steak, seafood and some nice red wine. Since we had a late tee time the following day, we went back to the billiards table and stayed out late, meeting some new fellow golfers and a few locals.
We then met at Bandon Crossings for a pre-Dunes’ mini tournament and we were welcomed by Rex Denham and a large group of old friends from the Eureka area and another group from Portland. The day was lovely with scattered sunshine and no rain, although it never got above 43 degrees. Rex set us up on the very front tee boxes so I was able to drive two of the par fours, which made it pretty fun. Later that evening, John and I met up at Rex’s beach house for a nice BBQ, put on by Petey and Eric, a couple fishermen from Eureka. This was a really nice spread with dozens of fancy finger foods, BBQ steaks and a bunch of ocean dishes. We chatted late into the evening and finally made it back to our beach house to find our housemates still up.
Tee time the next day was not to be until after noon, so we stayed up very late, reminiscing and planning new adventures. John and I were not able to stay the entire week this year so we bid our farewells with lots of hugging and backslapping. We both had a bit of a cough on the way home and ended up with a case of the flu the following day, the bad one that circulated town, accompanied with fever and a total sapping of all our energy. Jason called me on Saturday night and it turns out that a bunch of the guys also got the flu and a number of them were unable to finish the week and went home with raincheck vouchers. All in all, it was a very nice time, too bad about the flu though.
In other exciting news, we were finally able to get a skins group out on Wednesday and Friday evenings. The course is amazingly firm and dry but for a couple of soggy places in which a high shot will plug into the soft fairway, becoming lost forever. We were also able to mow all of the greens and approaches and most of the teeboxes. I brought my little mower down and mowed the practice green and me and Greyson fertilized it on Sunday afternoon. We then went down to the maintenance shop to see if we could get the big Jacobsen mower started and I turned the battery on and pushed the starter button and it turned over. I was just about to hit the starter button again when I heard Grey letting out a huge howl. As I turned, I saw him pulling his foot off of a board next to the side of the shed and could see a few nails sticking out of the board- that of course ended my work on getting the mower going. He’s fine, just barely punctured the skin and we could hardly find the hole in his foot so all is well.
*Next tournament is St. Patrick’s Day, two-person scramble March 15 – tee time 9:30 a.m., $60 per player gets you 18 holes of golf with cart, prizes and a corned beef dinner from Taylor’s following.
*And remember, kids 17 and younger always play for free!