36 of 70: Mill Woods Golf Club, Edmonton, AB

Opening hole, water on left, out of bounds on right, a daunting first shot.

After more than a week of daily thunder storms, on Wednesday July 25th, Brenda and I hoped for a break in the weather pattern and headed to the Mill Woods Golf Club on Edmonton's south side.

Mill Woods is a popular public golf course, well maintained and well worth playing. It is a fairly long course, playing at 6778 yards from the back and 5872 from the front, which in today's standards is considered too long for the red tees. However, as Brenda was the first to concede, under normal conditions, one can expect a fair amount of roll. However, this year has been far from normal and the fairways are quite wet. The only distance you get is all in the air. The pace of play was far too slow, there were some tournament players still on the course and the group immediately ahead seemed to move like a bale of turtles.

The weather had been threatening right from the outset but we still hoped for a full round. With the slow pace, it started to drizzle as early as the fourth or fifth hole. On the par 3 seventh, it rained in earnest but cleared for the eighth giving us a faint ray of hope. We could hear claps of thunder getting nearer and nearer but there was no lightning in sight. We took our drives and approach shots on the 9th hole but by then it started to rain cats and dogs so we picked up our balls and ran for cover in the clubhouse. We were granted a rain check, no questions asked. We are pleased to see that Mill Woods is run professionally and courteously. Now there was a good side to the downtime we experienced on the golf course as Brenda was able to hunt a hawk with her magic zoom and get a couple of good pictures. Here is my favorite one.