That’s how long its been since I last walked an 18 hole golf course...But now the counting can stop because I did it! I walked 18 holes today and pushed/pulled a pull cart too! I did have a bit of help from Richard on some of the hills, but it felt so good to FINALLY do it, and know I can do it!
Today we played Arrowsmith Golf & Country Club a 20 km drive south in Qualicum Bay, just off the Coastal Highway. We had an 11:15 tee time and arrived to find the parking lot was almost full!
I had booked our tee time online and with a pull cart rentals for each of us, it was $68 For golf today. We didn’t end up being paired with anyone today. The course was a par 61, 2 par 5’s, 3 par 4’s and the rest par 3’s. It was nice to work on my irons today since I normally would play more woods and hybrids. The work we did at Bridgewater with my friend Fran, before we left Fort Erie (when I couldn’t play a full 18 holes in September), sure paid off today as I was only 4 over for the round! No birdies either....just 4 bogeys.
Richard wouldn’t participate in the crazy picture taking on the first tee, so I did instead!
The course wasn’t wet and had a nice easy to walk layout. Our pace of play was good too in just over 3 hours 25 minutes.
We finished our round and the patio was quite full at +6C and sunny. The tables were nicely social distanced though and I went inside and ordered us some lunch. Salmon and chicken bowls on rice with veggies. Delicious! It was Happy Hour, so of course I ordered Richard a 9 oz “pail” of white wine for $7!
It really does blow our minds that we can sit out in +6C on a patio (and everyone else is doing it too) and we are not cold! I played most of the round with just a polar fleece, a down vest, with no jacket or toque.
The golf course has quite the nice Christmas spirit decorating for Christmas today while we golfed and collecting non perishable food donations in Christmas hampers for families in need.
I thought the choice of using a golf course tractor for Santa’s sleigh was ingenious! Since the golf courses are usually closed back in Ontario, there is usually no need for outdoor Christmas decorations!
All in all we enjoyed our day at Arrowsmith and would go back to play again. Richard needs a little work on his irons and this is a good course for irons.
This morning before we left for golf I saw Richard outside speaking to someone and wondered who was he talking to? I know Richard will speak to the wall or anyone who walks by, but we were trying to leave for golf, so didn’t know what was going on. We had seen a Ford F-150 and a trailer pull up in front of Newman at the boat launch. Apparently the husband and wife (who are “Clammers”) are finished for the season and were taking their fishing boat out of the water, which had been docked at the small marina at Lighthouse RV Park. The woman who Richard was speaking to said that with so many restaurants closed or doing reduced amounts of meals, there wasn’t the demand for clams right now so they were going to winterize their boat and take a break from clamming. She mentioned to Richard that there was an excellent seafood restaurant right across the water from us in Deep Bay that was run by another husband and wife fisherman team and they were only open for dinner at 6pm every night.
As we were very curious about this seafood restaurant, on the way back from golf we decided to take the turn off to Deep Bay, from the Coastal Highway to see what Deep Bay was all about and to try to find the seafood restaurant.
The restaurant is closed until the New Year unfortunately so we will have to check it out in January. It looks like a little gem though and was rated a “Trip Advisor Traveller’s Choice“ award ranked with the top 10% of restaurants worldwide. We will definitely have to go try their seafood when they are open! It is these little out of the way spots that we love to discover so I guess its ok that Richard talks to everyone he meets! He’s doing reconnaissance!!
Deep Bay is a sleepy little town. Not much going on in Deep Bay but seaside houses, a few RV parks, the marina and Ship & Shore restaurant.
Directly across from Deep Bay is our RV park. We could see this spit of land across from Newman but weren’t sure if it was an island, or attached to the mainland. Now we know its Deep Bay.
Driving down the spit of land on Deep Bay we were able to get a good glimpse of the very small island called Chrome Island which is between Denman and Hornby Island.
Chrome Island is the site of a Light Station in the Salish Sea/Georgia Strait in Baynes Sound. It was originally called Yellow Rock because of the light coloured sandstone rock that glows golden in the setting sun. The widest variety of petroglyphs on the West Coast were found carved on Chrome Island, into the sandstone. The island is still an operating light station to this day staffed with a light house keeper.
Another view of the Coast Mountains over on the mainland of B.C. Photo was taken around 4pm and today the sun set at 4:20pm. A perfect “golden hour” shot!
And tomorrow we golf at another new golf course! We are determined not to sit still and to get our steps in every day! It makes for great sleeping too after doing so much exercise every day! We are sleeping amazing here!
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