I was looking at some of the latest golf-related stories the other day when I came across this article: ‘Should You Play Golf on Christmas Day?”
It quickly took me back decades when my brother, Steve and I used to play golf on Christmas Day, and in those years when we were first getting into the deep end in playing golf.
We grew-up in the lower North Shore region of Sydney. Our father, Terry, was the first in the family to play golf. He joined the 9-hole Castlecove Country Club course, about a 10-minute drive from the family home.
He’s played golf nearly every Saturday morning until he could no longer play, and capped in grabbing a hole-in-one at the second hole during a Saturday competition at Castlecove, and the very next day after he had officially retired from his job.
The first hole at Castlecove CC – Photograph taken on Christmas Day 2019 – Image by Bernie McGiure – GolfByTourMiss
The Castlecove CC clubhouse overlooking the first tee and the ninth hole and green immediately in front of the photograph. (Photograph – Castlecove CC)
Either myself or my brother Steve would drop him at the club early in the morning and then after his phone call around lunchtime we’d drive back to pick him up. However, as the years went on it was getting later and later into the afternoon when we’d get those ‘come and get me’ calls.
Not knowing then what I do know now, I wondered why it was taking my father and his band of fellow ‘Folly Golfers‘, and the name they had on their bright blue shirts, so long to play 18 holes but realising that it was all due to the dreaded 19th hole – the longest and the hardest hole in golf (smiling).
Anyway, Steve and I got hooked on the game so much so, in early 1979 we joined good friends in forming our own social golf club, ‘The Laurels‘ and when not playing formally once a month, we’d find ourselves playing Castlecove and so many other local Sydney golf courses as often as we could.
I had my first ace at the third hole at Castlecove playing on one of those early mornings ‘be fore the pro arrived’ tee-offs.
Castlecove’s 3rd hole – My first of two career aces. Photograph – Castlecove CC
Christmas Day ‘down under’ is at the height of summer so there was no issue with the weather. We’d head off to church like good Christian lads and get back home to enjoy exchanging gifts ahead of sitting down for an always extra special family Christmas dinner .. ah, they were great days!
With dinner over mid-afternoon it was time for the older folks to relax, enjoy a few more Chrissie drinks and for Santa (my father) to grab a bit of shut-eye.
No, not for Steve and I as we’d grab the clubs, jump in the car and head off to Castlecove for a quick nine holes.
Not my brother Steve but good friend Paul Scully who lives overlooking the fourth tee at Castlecove CC. Suffice to say there’s been a few times that a game at Castlecove CC has not progressed past the third green. Christmas greens, Paul.
It was also the only time of the year the club, and like so many golf clubs I’m sure the world over, that would not be open, and also unlike many clubs there were no boundary gates, no fences or the like where the golf course proper could be locked.
This ‘openness’ was much the same all over Sydney and so vastly different, particularly in France where we have been based now for a few years, as once they lock the gates they stay locked until formally opened the next morning. And the courses are fully-fenced not to keep out ‘non-paying golfers’ but wandering wild pigs who do serious damage to the fairways and greens.
No such concern at Castlecove as you’d just drive -up, put the clubs on your pull trolley and walk straight onto the tee.
But hang on! The more we decided to head off on Christmas Day afternoon to squeeze-in nine-holes, the more there were others undertaking the same. It got that way, you were being greeted by the sight of two, three, four groups waiting to tee-up.
It seemed everyone wanted to play on Christmas Day.
Of course, given it was Christmas Day the clubhouse was closed and there was also no club pro willing to give-up his/her time to collect a few green fees, nor did the club members feel the need to play.
But for those like my brother Steve and I, and maybe two other close friends to help make-up a four ball, it was probably one of the best nine-holes of the year.
And here is where I am putting my hands-up, as there was no honesty box for the payment of green fees nor was there any sign advising you could not play.
I’m sure Castlecove CC, and like many clubs, must have known what was taking place but I guess they simply turned a Christmas Day blind eye.
Besides it was the season for giving and yes, it gave us much pleasure and still does recalling those Christmas Day games of golf.
FOOTNOTE ..
Ted sitting beside a ‘piece’ of St. Andrews now embedded in a plaque at the Castlecove CC – Image Bernie McGuire – GolfByTourMiss
Twenty-year ago, my parents visited me in Scotland, and we ventured from Crail where I then living the short drive into St. Andrews, naturally to visit the Old Course.
There was a largish stone lying at the bottom of the burn close to the famed Swilcan Bridge that crosses the burn on the 18th hole.
With the help of a one of the ball retrievers the stone was ‘recovered’ and brought back to Sydney by my father, and is now mounted in a special ‘Home of Golf’ plaque on a footbridge as you make your way to the 4th green at Castlecove CC.
