The Mountain – Monument and Alpine

Our tee time is at 7:00 am at the Alpine (that’s all they had), so we’re unable to get breakfast before our first round (Mountain for breakfast doesn’t start until 7:00 am, and it’s also not near the course). Pretzels and frosted mini wheats from the Highlands, and beer for me! It’s only 50 degrees on our way to the course. Nice! Head to the driving range – don’t have a lot of swings left, but as Pete says “need to loosen the scar tissue.”  I would say ouch when I hit, but it doesn’t hurt. There just isn’t any swing speed left!

On tee times at the Mountain, because it takes 10 + minutes to ride up the mountain, the tee times are really from when they let you leave the clubhouse, not your tee time. At the pro shop, we’re told that we’re the second tee time, after a 6:30 am tee time (single), so we can go early if we want. We do. Up the mountain we go, even beating the starter up there. We see a doe and her babies on our way up the road. They stop and watch us.

Momma and babies on the way up the Mountain

#1 Alpine

#2 green Alpine (bridge takes you to #3 tee box)

#2 Pond, Alpine

#3, Alpine

"Evil, par 3, #11, Alpine. Green is diabolical.

Tom easily has a Shazzam putt on #11 (three putt) -- it's fast and fast and slopes. Yes, he three putts.

#1, Monument, par 5

#2, Monument

Cool looking bird and barn.

Monument

Alpine is my favorite of the two mountain courses. And I get off to a rocky start on #1 with a double, but then par the second hole (short tee shot, with second shot over a pond) – they have redone the bridge (established in 1972). And then birdie #3 – par 3, and yes, due to lack of swing speed, have turned my 7 wood into a multipurpose, multidimensional club and almost knock it in.

The great thing about morning golf – is well morning golf. But, at Boyne, it also means playing golf with all of the grounds crew. And they have lots of ground crew! Mowing, blowing, working on bunkers. All out. Even a dog is out riding around. One of the disadvantages about morning resort golf is that there aren’t any cart “people” (OK, all are girls and women on this trip). Meaning: no beer. And we drink beer on this trip – wherever we want and whenever we want. We’re wondering if Jerrie Lee will be on the Mountain this year like the past few years.

Alpine

Brown   7056 yards

Purple   6865 yards

Orange 6491 yards

Blue       6239 yards

Green   6035 yards

Silver     5062 yards

We finish up at the Alpine at 10:30 am (definitely under 3.5 hour round). Our next tee time isn’t until 3:30 pm. Breakfast at the Mountain ends at 10:00 am, so we check at the Pro Shop about getting out on the Monument early – they have shotgun tournament. But they check and send us right off and up the mountain.

This afternoon is barefoot golf day. We start out and play #1 (railroad tie par 5 – awesomeness) and #2. On #3, the head pro playing in the tournament ahead of us says that we’re actually in the middle of the tournament and we should turn around and restart our round. Why not? Pete says he’s going to count his two pars anyway (unless he gets birdie, we joke). He keeps his two pars, but I take my new scores: bogey, birdie!

Monument

Brown   7003 yards

Purple   6645 yards

Orange 6171 yards

Blue       6019 yards

Green   5698 yards

Silver     4892 yards

Yes, Jerrie Lee is still at the Mountain -- and even remembers us. She's a flirt and "takes to" Paul this year (I think she thinks Tom and I are a couple because we're matching colors -- again -- this day).

Because they let us off early on both courses, we’re done by 4:00 pm and head to the cabin to clean up before going to dinner. Everett’s had Prime Rib Friday and Pete has been talking about it all day – if you speak up on this trip, you often get what you want. Prime Rib Friday it is. Before that, we sit out on the patio and enjoy the cooler weather – Tony’s has texted me that “It’s hotter than Satan’s fiery red ass.” I probably didn’t do him favors by taking a picture of the car console showing 50s… I tweet about wanting a Forest Dunes tee marker and Don tweets back that “he’s on it.” I tweet about seeing Jerrie Lee on the cart and Boyne Golf tweets back about her being a #mountainlegend. This is the first year that I’ve done much on Facebook (checking in) and Twitter (actually tweeting on the course) and it’s been a bit amusing. I’m typically only on social media when I’m on my laptop, not on my phone. I don’t think I’ve ever checked in so much since I got on FB!

Walking stick (missing a leg) at the cabin.

My new coozie from FD.

The awful showerhead (referenced in earlier blog) at Boyne.

Prime Rib Friday was good to me and Pete – and Paul and Tom were able to get what they wanted off the menu (Paul did want me to keep coming back to get more fresh horseradish from the bar that was really sinus cleansing). Jordan, our waiter, was so, so, so nice and smiley. In fact, everyone was smiley and nice all week (except for a couple of older women who shall remain nameless).

Back to the cabin for another early night. I’m already packed up and ready to go for the most part. Load up the mini van at 630 am (probably earlier since this group is always ready to go early) to check out and head out.