Archives ~ Arrival in Bermuda July to December 2005
Archives ~ January to December 2006
January 2007 ~ Life is a Golf Course!`
March 2007 ~ How to play golf
June 2007 ~ Anniversary

 March / April ~ 2007 This month(s) posting is a mixture of Lori's photography (of course) and instruction on how to play golf by myself, a pro in the making!
Pictured above is a view over the 14th green from the 14th tee! As you can see there is quite the dog-leg on the fairway. In the distance is the Blackbeard restaurant and Fort St. Catherine and beside the Fort is a great little stretch of sand with a bar open in the summer called "Beach It." Another good spot to visit, just to the left of this picture, up the coast a bit is Tobacco Bay. Behind us lurks what we've dubbed "The Overlook Hotel" of Steven King's book "The Shining" fame. This abandoned Club Med edifice is surrounded by the public's St. George's Golf Course.

At left is a picture of the final approach to the 14th hole mentioned above. Although I had a better tee shot, Lori had fewer strokes into the cup, as usual. As you can see, a little too much on the pitch to the green and the ball is in the Atlantic.

As I say on every posting to"Life is a Beach", most of Lori's pictures can be viewed in all their glory in a full browser window by double-clicking on them with the mouse.

Although we huddled in the cart through a rain squall just after this picture was taken, the weather was balmy and warm the rest of the day.

Here you see me aiming to pitch the golf ball onto the green.... on a steep downhill slope with sand trap to the right and the ocean beckoning if the ball rolls too far.

Now I would like to give you a few tips on this game of golf. It took me awhile to figure it out, but now I've got it mastered! The trick is not to think of the ball as a silly little thing because it's not! It's intelligent and devious. You have to trick it and you have to show it who's boss! I used to think that it was ridiculous for grown men to chase after a little white ball for hours on end, but now I realize it's a battle of wits, between you and this... this abomination!

For those of you that are still struggling with the game, I'm willing to give a few tips. For example never let "it" know where you really want it to go. Try and trick it and line up your toes for the sand trap! (see picture)

If you roll your mouse over this picture of me so as to enlarge my perfect golf profile in this difficult shot, I'll point out the better points to learn.

First, always wear a large ridiculous floppy hat. It will draw attention away from your secret style, absorb the streaming sweat off your brow and shield others from facial expressions of hatred you have for the adversary.

Secondly; grip the club with all your might. When you make contact with the little so and so you want to teach it a lesson! Swing the club down with all the strength in your arms. As you swing, empty your lungs with a bellow. This helps to alleviate the jarring pain as the club makes contact.

Don't bother trying to figure out what club to use. One will do as well as the next. As you see, I prefer the putter to lambaste the beast!
Always lock your knees and keep them tight together, especially on a downhill slope.

If you follow these simple rules then you'll develop a strong passion for the game as I have.

Now just in case some of you golfers out there disagree with me, you could always follow Lori's example of form.
I must admit, she has a better looking form than I do, but I have to tell you that she lost two balls on this short hole at St. Geroges. Of course the hazard is a 50 foot drop, and one must land the ball on the green or loose it. Or do as I did and climb down the rocks to hit it where it lay. (No ball is going to get the best of me!)

As you can guess, it was an enjoyable day, golfing on the St. Georges Golf Course. Many beautiful viewpoints and challenges.

So that is it for the golf instruction. The rest of this posting consists of Lori's photography, including a few more pictures of golf courses. So she is a fanatic! I can't control her. I can only use what she gives me and golf is her passion these days. When she isn't playing golf, she is taking pictures of different fairways.

In the top header I mention Fort St. Catherine. Above and to the right are more images of this famous fort as you approach it from St. Georges along the beautiful winding costal road.

You can also see the stretch of sand that Club Med wanted to make a "topless beach" but couldn't, due to Bermudian Law which forbids nudity. Rumor has it that this is why they went out of business and left.

While in St. Georges, Lori decided to take some pictures of the local housing and architecture. Many people fail to realize that Bermudian history, and some of it's buildings, go back to the 1600's.

Of course to build in Bermuda and have it last, one must build out of rock and cement to withstand the storms and hurricanes that pass through on a regular basis..

As in most architecture, the doorway is the centerpiece.

Here we see examples of front and back doors. More material for our book; "Doors and Windows on The World "

Now the images above could be on a postcard or a travel advertisement ..... "Welcome to the beautiful islands of Bermuda." Note a little bit of Photoshop use on the "house on island" picture. All Lori did was de-saturate the colours outside the oval to accentuate the little bit of paradise these fortunate owners enjoy.
"Mid Ocean Grand Slam of Golf"
So enough of scenic imagery of historical forts and buildings. Lets get back to what is really beautiful ..... Golf Courses! Below is a panorama of a wide angle picture Lori took of "Mid Ocean Golf Course"
I've utilized a little bit of "Flash" to pan over the image above of the 17th green at the Mid Ocean Club. The big excitement in Bermuda is all about the "Grand Slam" of golf happening this year at this course. It is the tour players championship and famous players such as Tiger Woods will be competing for the title of world's best.
Pictured above are a couple of views of the eighth fairway and the seventh green, also at the Mid Ocean Club. As you can see, it is a very difficult course and one must be very accurate as to ball placement or suffer the consequences. It should be an interesting tournament.
For those of you interested in things other than golf, spring has sprung in Bermuda and the vegetation is in full bloom. At left is my favorite plant ~ Rosemary ~ in bloom. Brush against this shrub and you are enveloped in it's beautiful scent. Here it is grown as hedges. Want some fresh Rosemary on your lamb chops? Just step outside and pick some.

It is also the time for birds to nest. This Kiskadee pair are nesting right outside our apartment in a dead tree above the deck.
Lori took a couple of pictures through our window and then another at night using her flash. To her surprise, when she viewed the image later on her computer, she discovered that she caught the occupant peering out of the nest entrance.

This bird is noisy and aggressive, often waking us up in the mornings. Yellow breasted and striped headed, it's known in American bird books as the Great Kiskadee.  It's near the size of a Kingfisher, somewhat like that bird in actions, even catching small fish. The local variety were imported from Trinidad in 1957 as worker-birds in hope they would be beneficial. Their hoped-for function was to control - by consumption - the Anolis lizards which had incurred a bad reputation from their diet of ladybirds.  But they did nothing to control the lizards.

Above is a rather poor quality picture of me at work that I scanned from a special edition in the local newspaper, entitled "Our Waste"! I guess I'm famous ... sort of. Of much better quality in all respects is the picture of Lori by the window. I'm sure you'll agree. She continues to expand her knowledge of photography and the results are evident.

So here we are at the end of another posting to "Life is a beach"! We'll leave you with a final picture of.... you guessed it ....
A GOLF COURSE!
View of the third hole at the Southampton Princess Golf Course
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