Tuesday February 13, 2007
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Round Four and Five - Terra Lago Golf Course, Indio, CA
Scorecards 

We have died and gone to heaven. We got to play both the North and South courses today. These are two superb layouts on what amounts to being piles of rocks. This golf course used to be called Landmark when it host the Skins Games from 1999 to 2002.

Here is the wrap up of day five. Well we learned a lesson today. No matter how warm it is a the resort, take you jacket to the golf course if you play east of highway 10. We left this morning around 7:30 for our 8:52 round. It was a little cool but very sunny. I put on shorts and left all forms of wind breaking gear in the room thinking it would only get warmer.

Everything was fine until we got to the course (after getting a bit lost due to construction, which is never-ending in the Palm Springs area). As we stepped out of the car, the wind was howling and the air was VERY crisp. The woman in the proshop was very accommodating. She delayed our tee-off time so we could catch breakfast and she lent me a sweatshirt from the lost and found (NE Patriots shirt). The reason she could delay our time we found out later was that many people had cancelled their starting times because these courses are hard to play in the wind and it was nippy for the retired people here. As I drove up to the starter without wind wear, without us saying a word, he said you guys are from Canada. It started out cold but by the 4th hole, I could remove my sweatshirt. Damn Patriots! (I went 5-over in that shirt).

Anyway, we played that first 18 by ourselves with the course almost to ourselves. The wind died down a bit but later picked up again as we played the North course in the afternoon. Just to give you an example of the wind. Our on board GPS system has a drive measuring feature. I hit a drive into the wind that travelled 180 yards into the wind. I hit another with the wind that went 278. On the 6th hole 191 yard par 3. I hit driver to 7 feet from the pin (missed the birdie).

Another lesson learned: Don't give back the sweatshirt after 18 when you are going back for another 18 that will finish after sunset. We froze as soon as the sun disappeared behind the mountains. We managed to finish the round but it was dard by the time we got to the car.

I will explain the picture below. First of all, let me tell you that pictures do not do justice to any of the scenery around here. The main background is the par 3 6th hole on the north course. What you don't see on this picture (taken from the very back tees) is the elevation change. The green is well below the tees. The bottom right picture is the common site of Ron picking his ball out of the sagebrush (I think that's what it's called). The bottom left is an example of the wildlife around. I did get my camera out in time to catch a Red Hawk that landed about 10 feet from us looking for prey or the road runners that keep crossing the fairways in from of us. Why the picture of the box car you ask? There is a small canal that runs through the golf course. They used two of these old box cars as bridges for the cart to cross. They are obviously sturdy enough and it's neat driving though them.