Sunday 13th March 2011 – Carne Golf Links

Blizzard at Carne By Sam Blackwell We left for Carne (pronounced Cairn) Golf Links at 8:30 in the morning after a filling breakfast of eggs, sausages and fruit at the Sligo Park Hotel. Our driver Kevin treated us to Irish history lessons, jokes and an occasional song as we drove on a gray morning past stunningly green scenery including mountains frosted with snow and an ornate cemetery. The Atlantic appeared through the windshield from time to time, a reminder that wind would be our playing companion today. As we neared the golf course the sun appeared through the clouds, just as ordered, Kevin said. [SinglePic not found] The weather forecast was for a dry and chilly day with wind. We couldn’t have known the scale of the bluster off the ocean that awaited us. Most of us rented golf clubs in Ireland to keep from having to cart them through airports, so our practice swings were the first with these clubs. Rick, Mike and Virgil drove off the first tee in sunshine, their shots diving into a stiff wind.  They departed with their forecaddie Rory. Joe, Michael, Gary and I hit similar shots off the tee, and with the advice of our forecaddie Harry kept our balls in play the first two holes. Then tiny stinging icicles began pelting us, making it almost impossible to look at your ball unless your back was to the wind. But on we soldiered. In the group ahead, Mike skimmed ice off the face of his driver before teeing off and scraped ice off the windshield of his cart. Our hands quickly became wet and numb as the sleet pelted down. We expected the storm would quit eventually, but at the end of the fifth hole Michael mercifully said we should go in. He and other veterans of golf in Ireland said they’d never played in such brutal conditions before. While marching in, we saw the other group’s forecaddie, Rory, running for the clubhouse. When we arrived t he was rubbing his hands and arms, which he said had turned blue. Two members of his group want to continue playing, he told us. “They’re not right in the head,” Harry said. We laughed and guessed which two he meant. Virgil stopped playing on number 8, and Rick and Mike finished the front nine before joining us in the clubhouse. Over rounds of Irish coffee and Guinness we told the stories we would tell again soon in the States about the day Carne and the Irish weather got the best of us.