East Neuk News

Kind of a funny moment for your humble blogger, as out of the corner of my eye I'm watching an ESPN Livecast of the Yankees in extra innings in Anaheim, not that the outcome isn't inevitable.  It's just that I'm not usually watching baseball at, checking watch, 6:04 a.m.    Twice in the last couple of days I've seen two locals in NYY swag, a common occurence here.  In both cases I had a chance to inform the parties that, in New York in the summer of our discontent, no one is wearing their Yankee swag.  Too triggering, as the kids like to say..

When last we visited, Employee No. 2 and I were en route to the Craighead for our first round at Crail, on Gil Hanse's Craighead Links.  Our dueling weather forecasts were undecided on precipitation, though both made clear that it would be howling out there.... The flags were billowing as we arrived:

But that sky doesn't seem so threatening, eh?

The waterproofs stayed in the bag, as skies were pretty much like that all day.  A good thing for your humble blogger, as my sunglasses are much preferable in heavy winds, as it's hard enough playing the required shots, now give it a go with your eyes teared up from the wind :

 

The whitecaps still in evidence on the Firth:

The theme of the day was the wind.  Projected to be in the mid-20's with gusts up into the mid 30's, I can only say that it felt like a gale.  On my second shot on the first hole, a gust at the top of my backswing rocked me back on my heels, whereas on a subsequent tee box the billowing of my pants created a little strobe-like effect.   

I try not to bore you with too many details of my own golf, but this was a fun day as long as expectations remained reasonable.  I've long said that on each links the pro should post a sign with that day's par based upon conditions, on this day bogeys were very much pars.  And that's exactly how I got around on the first nine, all well-earned bogeys with the exception of two pars on the three-shotters.  The first of these was downwind, so no issue, but the par on No. 8, which was directly into the fan, was quite satisfyingly.

That worked quite well right up until when it didn't, but fortunately comedy ensued....  Well, fortunate for my readers, in any event.  We make our way to the 13th, a nice little Par-3 tucked in against the cliff overlook the Firth of Forth (though it's essentially the North Sea here).  Here's what it looked like:

You can see the effects of the wind on my pants, but it's howling directly right-to-left.  Those of you that are familiar with my game know that I typically draw the ball, and I'll even add for Bobby D.'s amusement that this tee box is no more level than our own 15th tee, box, in this case the ball being above my feet.  If you can pick out the ball in the photo, it appears to be on a perfect line right of the bunker, yet ended up in the Firth (and it wasn't particularly close).  As did the next one....

After we stopped laughing, I tried to discern how I could play the hole in a medal competition, and didn't come up with much.  I think I'd have to play a nine-iron (I hit seven) out towards that ball washer on the 14th hole tee box, though the second shot would be one of those terrifying links shots, a soft pitch off the rock hard turf (though conditions are softer than usual) over the bunker and good luck holding the green straight downwind.... 

The 14th wasn't a whole lot easier... This is an unlinksy shot, where Hanse tries to suck the player into a forced carry.  One can use the contours, but straight into that wind it's a tough slog:

Pace of play wasn't great (in that wind its' to be expected), though we enjoyed the twosome in front of us, a father with his young son that had a swing to die for.  When I complimented the father on his son's game, he responded that the youngster had never been out in anything like that day's wind..... We were pretty knackered by that point, Theresa had been struggling all day and, since I had just obviously hit the wall, we walked in.... partly because it allowed us to catch the last three sets of the Wimbledon final.

I took some short videos to try to show you the wind:

The pins here are far wider and more substantial than at home, for the obvious reason....

Monday we headed to the Balcomie Links, again with an uncertain weather forecast.  It was pretty clear that we would get wet at some point, that point being on the first tee:

The bucket hats have gotten more use already this trip than in our five prior trips combined.....By way of contrast, notice how much greener it is than last year, which looked like this:

Quite the dramatic difference in how it plays....

The young man in the golf shop thought we'd stay dry, though the starter correctly intuited that we'd be dealing with squalls all day, one strategically timed as we'll see below.  But Theresa wasn't the only one digging out her rain hat:

That's a bunker guarding the first green, where I unfortunately dumped my wedge.  A good effort from the bunker, though I missed the ensuing twelve-footer.

The Balcomie is funky little track, it tops out under 6,000 yards and plays to a men's par of 67-69.  It's one of the weirdest scorecards I've dealt with, as let me use the second hole as an example.  In general, the white tees are usually the back tees, and there are yellow tees for the men and green tees, used for the ladies but also men who want a shorter course.  The second, called Over the Knowe (which I think is a hill), features the North Sea on the right side, is a 493-yard Par-five from those back white tees, but a 451/440 yard Par-4 from the yellow and green tees.  

Very confusing, to me at least, because it obviously plays easier in relation to par from those back tees, though that back tee box has quite awkward angle to the fairway.  Just quite the muddle scorecard to me, but I'll also add that some of those back tee boxes are awkward to get to, given how jammed in everything is.  On the short Par-4 4th, I'd have had to allow the group behind to play to the Par-3 third, then gone to other side of the green to find the white tees.  I took the path of least resistance and played from the yellows, put my wedge in to 5-feet and made the birdie, only to have the bride express her profound sadness that said birdie would be disallowed by the Committee.  Yup, tough crowd....

Things I like about the Balcomie include its similarity to a more famous track just up the road.  It features similar narrow corridors in places, and I also love these marvelously rumpled fairways:

It's just a very beautiful spot overlooking the North Sea:

That's the third green, and here's Theresa hitting off that fourth tee:

On the right you can see a portion of the third green... The white tees are on the side closest to the North Sea, so hopefully you can appreciate how hard it would be to actually play from there.

More eye candy:

One challenge for me this year is how to keep this interesting, given that I blogged so extensively on last year's trip.  You'd be well with your rights to ask, why start now?, though that would be hurtful....  I thought might be fun to explore individual hole, several of which are quite curious, especially on the notoriously quirky Balcomie.

Alas, we're now approaching 9:00 a.m. here, so I'm going to ask you to hold this thought here, and I'll pick up the thread of our day on the Balcomie tomorrow.

I'll just leave you with some additional imagery.  First, from over the weekend, a morning dove we met on the Fife Coastal Path:

Obviously he didn't want to hang with the foreigners....and really, who can blame him?

Lastly, the evening light is still a thing:

Have a great day and I'll hope to pick up our coverage tomorrow from the 5th hole of the Balcomie.

Dateline: Pittenweem, Kingdom of Fife

Good morning from Pittenweem, where your humble blogger has set up shop at the end of our kitchen table, gazing out at the Firth of Forth, which this morning features substantial whitecaps.  More on that in a bit....

The name, unsurprisingly, derives from Gaelic:

The name derives from Pictish and Scottish Gaelic. "Pit-" represents Pictish pett 'place, portion of land', and "-enweem" is Gaelic na h-Uaimh, 'of the Caves' in Gaelic, so "The Place of the Caves", named after St Fillan's cave.

That St. Fillan's is an odd looking thing that we walked by yesterday, with not much to see.  Though admittedly this makes it sound more substantive:

This chamber is St Fillan’s Cave, a natural cavern probably carved by an underground river thousands of years ago. The miracle-working Saint Fillan is believed to have lived in the cave in the 7th century, reading and writing in the gloom with the help of a luminous left arm. Inside, you can visit the stone altar, explore a dead-end passage and see the steep steps creating a former entrance to the cave from above. The cave is still a minor pilgrimage site, with Christian services occasionally held under the rock roof.

This is the entrance:

And one from inside (to be clear, these are photos I've grabbed off the Internet):

Perhaps worth another peek inside....

It was a day planned for settling in, making the rounds of our favorite markets and reacquainting ourselves with The Weem.  Probably just as well that we hadn't planned on playing, as it was quite the gamut of weather conditions.  More on that in a bit, perhaps.

As an organizing principle, we wanted to catch the Bowhouse Markey Day at the opening of 10:00.  Don't know much about the buildings, which were part of the Balcaskie Estate, which of course means nothing to us.  But it features wonderful stone buildings and a delightful courtyard enclosed on three sides for wind protection:

Alas, in another bit of bad travel tradecraft, this is what we were expecting:

Yet this is what we found upon entering the main hall:

Well, that's not at all the same thing, is it?

Turns out that those market weekends are only on the second week of each calendar month, which we will unfortunately miss.  Avoiding the Pittenweem Arts Festival is great, but comes with a cost....

They were still installing the show, which featuring four artists, which for us was just perfect.  And, unusually, we even liked the work:

We are very excited to be once again hosting the Space To Breathe Art Exhibition and Festival at Bowhouse. This three-week-long exhibition will showcase incredible phototrophy and artwork from renowned artists like Andy Goldsworthy, Susan Derges, Harry Cory Wright, and Alexander Lindsay Photography.

Some samples:

Theresa knew of Andy Goldsworthy's work, and we spent quite a bit of time speaking with Alex Lindsay:

Alex's own website has some even better phots of the installation at the Bowhouse:

Quite unexpected, but travel is like a box of chocolate....

We did hit the butchery, though even there there was an oddity, as they had little beef on offer, despite huge racks on display.  Something about the five-day curing period that didn't make much sense, though our pork loin proved pretty tasty.

While the weather cooperated, we took our first walk over to the tidal pool, which wasn't doing much business:

When Theresa went for her morning swims last year, there were quite a few hearty souls, though disproportionately distaff.  Later in the day we met an older couple, the wife being a Pittenweem native.  Apparently, the Pittenweem fishing industrial complex was dominated by the Bowman and Hughes clans, and the wife was related to both.  Sounds like the Montagues and the Capulets, though we didn't pry further.

We were over there:

I got it slightly wrong in a prior post, as that structure on top of the hill is public restrooms, the shelter being to the left.  There's an open area past there which currently has a smallish playground, and she told us it used to have a grand pavilion covering most of it, which blew away in the Gale of '68.  OK, I'm easily amused, but how hard must the wind blow for it to be memorialized thusly?

Gale damage was extensive in central Scotland, and Glasgow was particularly badly hit with gusts exceeding 90 knots in many places. Also 250,000 houses were damaged in Scotland, leaving more than 2,000 people homeless. 20 people died across central Scotland, 9 in Glasgow alone.

One aspect of the tidal pool that amuses us is how folks change out of their bathing costumes after swimming.  Some bare all, though the more interesting folks have a delightful choreography of using towels to cover their costume changing, much of which is here:

Apparently there used to be a series of ten or more changing rooms, the ladies being here and the gents on the other side of the pool.  Not sure if those were a victim of the '68 storm, or just fell into disrepair.

We were outside as allowed by the rapidly changing weather, enjoying the coastal path:

Several bits of rain blew through, though we were rewarded for that with the rainbow that wouldn't leave:

We did catch the ladies Wimbledon final, but when there was a window between storms I ventured up to our small sitting area off the upstairs bedrooms, drying off the chairs and table:

That's easily my favorite spot in the house, the issue being how much use we'll get out of it with Scottish weather being so....well, Scottish.  Of course, I had no sooner settled myself here when it began to drizzle.  But I was quite content to sit through it, and when the sun occasionally broke through it became surprisingly hot and muggy.

The plan was to grill and cook, the former of which went reasonably well, the latter was a struggle:

The fire starters were courtesy of John, the "coal" purchase by an engaging vendor at the Ardross Farm Shop in Elie, there being a long story about saving trees in Perth or some such thing.  But ignition was achieved:

Best of all, it didn't resume raining until everything was off the grill.

Even better, the rainbow endured until our after-dinner walk:

On our walk home, low tide allowed an infrequent stroll on the beach, although no sea glass was found:

Today the golf resumes, although it'll be wild.  The wind is howling, as evidenced by those whitecaps on the Firth.  The BBC speaks of strong winds and rain, whereas the Met Office is raising our hopes with their false optimism.  Their chances of rain are capped at 10%, though they quantify the wind at mid-20'a mph, gusting into the mid-30's.  I do believe that's enough to affect the flight of a golf ball, though we'll be testing that hypothesis.

We're on the Craighead today, and we'll have more on that tomorrow I suspect.

See you then.

Royal Dornoch, An Appreciation

Good morning, dear Reader, from Pittenweem.  For those with us last year, we are on the north side of the Firth of Forth, looking south to East Lothian villages such as North Berwick and Gullane.  The latter is home to the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers (d/b/a Muirfield, and the former is where the Scottish Open is being held as we speak.

Our trip down from the Highlands took some three hours, closer to four if we include the leg to Inverness Airport to collect our rental car.  I had heard a dire forecast for that Scottish Open, though we had only off and on rain, yanno, just enough to realize how badly the car's wipers function.  Oh well, at least we're not in a locale that typically gest much rain....

Amusingly, our driver on the trip from Edinburgh to the Strath posited an interesting theory, to wit, that it's actually Ireland that gets all that rain, on account of its exposure to the Atlantic Ocean.  Scotland just gets tarred unfairly due to its geographic proximity....  Yeah, that's the ticket.

We had a delightful dinner at The Dory Bistro, which by day is an art gallery located down on the harbor.  Last year, we steered clear of it until the Pittenweem Arts Festival had concluded, but ate there on our final evening in country and we'll be back with Elsie and John next week.  We walked down in dryish weather, prepared for an after-dinner stroll to the Pittenweem Tidal Pool, but the brolly was necessary for the walk home.  This is the weather to which we nodded off:

Right now, as it approaches 7:00 a.m., it's dry and seemingly pleasant, with small patches of blue to be found.  But both the Met Office and BBC are promising a rough day, each hinting at the possibility of thunder and lightning, which is rare in these parts (though we did get a bit last year).  If there's a silver lining, Sunday looks a wee bit better than it did previously for our first trip to Crail Golfing Society.

We've also put in our first Old Course Daily Ballot entry for Monday, so we'll keep you posted on that process.  

We'll talk some more of Pittenweem, but our thoughts today remain further north.  If today's post carried a dateline, it would be this:

That photo is from a prior trip, but always nice to be welcomed back.... We trundled up facing a fairly dire weather forecast, although the last version thereof improved slightly, indicating that we'd have just enough time to reach the ninth tee, as far out from the clubhouse as one gets, before the fun might start...

You could draw whatever conclusions you wanted from the sky, which featured blue patches amidst those dark, foreboding clouds:

There were actually two choppers there, quite the clever means of dealing with Dornoch's perpetual parking shortage.  We were on No. 15 or 16 when we heard them take off, heading back to Loch Lomond for dinner according to John.  

One doesn't take ball-washers for granted over here, but the tartan towel is a nice touch:

If only I could identify the clan whose tartan is used, though my guess would be Sutherland.  Amusingly, there is an app for that, this Tartan finder, although in this case I think we need a reverse model, a Tartan Shazam if you will.

Your humble blogger began his day and trip en fuego, rolling in a twelve-footer for birdie on the opener and making par on the iconic second hole:

The old joke is to ask what the hardest shot at Dornoch is, the answer being the second to the second (the joke being that it's a Par-3).  In this case it was a learning experience, as in proper links conditions one doesn't carry the ball past the front of the green.  After a warm and dry May and early June, it's been wet for weeks and the balls are simply not releasing as they typically do.  We're green this year, not brown.

Last year our day at Dornoch ended in tragedy on the twelfth hole, at least for tours truly.   Lost in that drama was that I was hitting the ball so poorly that day that I subsequently joked that the hand injury was a relief, as it saved me further clanking those irons.  

We got as far as the seventh hole before getting wet, but it got a bit ugly there for a while....  The rain started without sufficient warning to allow preparation, by the time I got my rain pants on I was already soaked.  But the bigger problem is that it just came down awfully hard for 20-25 minutes, and while we waited it out under the brolleys for a couple of minutes, the group behind us continued to play on.  

Here are a couple of snaps from before the deluge:

It's quite the beautiful property, but what separates it from other links are two features, first the rather significant elevation changes.  Here's an overly long explanation thereof from Golf Club Atlas:

There are three linked geological formations on which RDGC is built. All are linksland, i.e. land that now or once was ‘linked’ to the sea, but they have different characteristics, based on their elevation and their age. The highest, oldest ground is that on which sit the clubhouse, the first two holes, the 3rd tee, the 5th tee, the 7th, the tee and upper fairway of the 8th, the 16th green, the tee and upper fairway of the 17th, and the final hole. It is slightly harder and more compact than the ground on the lower levels, but still good springy links turf, with fine grasses and wispy rough. That the land is a bit different, however, is clear from some agronomical observations. For one, it is only on this plateau that heather can be found, most notably on the left hand side of the 7th. For another, the grass on this plateau is sometimes subject to a disease which brings rise on the 8th and 17th fairways to one of my top 10 golfing signs-‘Beware of Slime!’

The second plateau is a small one, but fundamental to the greatness of Dornoch. It comprises the 3rd fairway and green, the 4th, the 5th and 11th greens, the right hand bail out areas for the 12th and 14th fairways, and the world famous 14th green. This plateau, the result perhaps of some mini-ice age at some time, gives a vertical texture to the course which allows for the use of subtle and not so subtle elevation changes between holes, and also gives character to the holes themselves. The view from the 3rd tee to the lower plateau is incomparable. The 4th hole, which requires a drive of both length and precision to stay on the middle plateau and offer a shot to the green. The incredibly complex and fascinating 4th green complex. The great 5th green. The great 11th green. Foxy.

The great 17th green. Enough said.

The final plateau is that land which now links the course to the sea. The 5th fairway. The lower 8th fairway and green. The 9th, 10th, 11th (sans green), 12th, 13th, 14th (sans green), 15th, 16th tee and lower 17th fairway. This is rolling dunesland, at or near sea level. It is shifting land–even in the 24 years I have known it, the features have changed. It is endangered land. The seas encroaches on the 9th and 11th fairways and on the 16th tee, requiring periodic shoring up with large boulders and rip rap. Environmental activists in Scotland cite the land around the Dornoch Firth as one of the first places which will be reclaimed by the sea, if and when global warming occurs. It is a beautiful, but fragile place.

I only wish I had read this before going out to play, because it's a little hard to follow.  But the weakness of a traditional out-and-back links is that you'll play a long series of holes either into or against the wind.  This is mitigated at Dornoch by slight changes in direction, but also by incorporating elevation changes as well, as the 5th and 7th tee boxes are up on that highest ridge line, but they routed that 17th hole as a U-turn.  

This is that fifth tee box, though lower because it's from the ladies' tees:

It was brutal there for a bit, as water was temporarily pooling.  I had asked Theresa to take a photo of me on one of the tees, and she took some of Ross, who hit first.  Thought you might enjoy seeing our varying costume choices, one being quite different from the other three:

By this time the heaviest rains were behind us, though we certainly hadn't dried out and weren't at all sure that we'd be dry to the clubhouse.  We were actually lucky in a couple of ways, there wasn't much wind and it was sufficiently warm that the rain gloves were viable.  Just a few degrees cooler and my hands would have been icicles.

Last year's hand injury happened on the twelfth hole, and old habits die hard.  here's a view of what faces the player on his second shot (assuming a good drive):

It's a shortish Par-5 that sweeps from left-to-right, and those folks are on the green.  Obviously, given the shape of the hole, one's miss should be right, and last year I blocked my second to the right, just clearing that bunker and settling between two large tufts of grass.  So, what do you think your humble blogger did on his second shot this time?  Yup, sprayed it even further right, though this time without gouging an inch of skin off my right hand.....  I'm not the quickest learner, but I did realize after the fact that I should be laying up short of that bunker, as it's still only a wedge in.

The other unique feature of Dornoch is the extent to which the greens are pushed up like Donald Ross greens, unsurprising since Ross grew up and learned the game in Dornoch, before moving to the U.S.  Most links greens sit at fairway level, allowing for the run-up shot. That joke above about the second hole encapsulates this point, that when you miss a Dornoch green, especially when hole high, you're likely to face a nearly impossible shot.  I don't have a perfect photo to demonstrate this, but here's one from the side of that second green:

The picture is unfortunately too dark, but some of these side banks have longer grass than the fairway cut, and you'll not run the ball up easily.  Forced to pitch the ball from a tight fairway lie, you'll understand why it's the hardest shot at Dornoch.  Alas, the next one might not be any easier...

John suggested laying up short on both this hole as well as the sixth, and there's merit to that for some players.  Ross and I both agreed that it especially makes sense on the second, which is the much longer shot and offers a nice, flat landing area.  I don't see it on No. 6, but that hole has been livinf rent-free in my head for some time:

That's a pic I grabbed from the Internet, but you're landing your golf ball on the hood of a Pontiac.  Last year I pushed my tee ball right of that bunker, pitched it across the green into one of those bunkers on the left, then put my bunker shot right where my tee ball had landed.  Ross later told me that I had played the correct shot, as you simply cannot either putt the ball up the bank or chip it into the bank, but that was small solace.

This year I discovered a workaround.... I hooked a 7-iron so deep into the gorse that we didn't even look for it.... I then put my second shot on the back fringe and made the putt for what Ross called an "Easy four," a score you would take any day of the week.  Or at least I would....

My game went south as we trudged back, as did the bride's.  John seemed to have been strengthened by the rain, though, and took all of our money, as he seems to do all too frequently.  But no one got hurt, which is more the standard these days, so we have that going for us.  It's quite the magical place, and we are so grateful to John and Ross for the opportunity, including persevering on what was a difficult day out there.  

We have plans to host Ross at the Balcomie next week to return his hospitality.  Dornoch is not now taking applications for new Overseas Members, having been overwhelmed like so many during the pandemic.  But when and if that changes, Employee No. 2 and I hope to be early in the queue.  

I'll leave you here with the final thought that the sun has been breaking through over the Firth of Forth, quite the contrast with the afternoon's dire forecast:

That's the view from outside our kitchen looking west towards St. Monans and the Tidal Pool.  You can make out the Fife Coastal Path winding up the hill towards that shelter.  

Exit question:  While the weather forecasts indicate a drying towards dinner time, can we trust it enough to fire up the grill?

Dornoch Update

We came, we saw and we got soaked..... And it was still quite glorious.

I will attempt to blog our day at Royal Dornoch, but this morning is a bit busy.  It's our departure day, when we pack up all our worldly possessions and trundle down to Pittenweem.  That entails John ferrying us to Inverness to grab our rental car, then a 3+ hour drive down to the Kingdom of Fife.

Once we get settled in the house, tomorrow morning should be quiet (not to mention quite nasty, weather-wise), so I'll use that time to share some of our Dornoch experiences and photos.

See you then?

Dateline: Strathpeffer, Ross and Cromarty, Highlands, Scotland

Bit of pretension in that dateline for a place we mostly refer to as the Strath, a Victorian spa village popular after the discovery of sulphurous springs there in the 1700's.  As in much of Scotland, development was linked to the extension of the rail lines to Dingwall in the 1860's and then a spur from the Kyle of Lochalsh to Strathpeffer in the 1880's.  The spa hospital burned in 1946, and sulphur isn't what it used to be, so the Strath is now a quaint village of 1,469 souls featuring distinctive Victorian architecture, as well as a golf course with this unique claim:

There is a scenic golf course, which boasts the longest drop from tee to green of any course in Scotland.

It does that drop (and rise) several times, so not for the faint of heart....

Wednesday presented in grim fashion, grey with rain that was heavyish at times and a forecast that proved eerily prescient.  Last year we took a long walk back through the hills with Elsie and their son Ross and his family, wife Dace and son Sebastian, who was carried a good bit of the way.  The walk was designed to end at Coul House, a beautiful county house hotel where we enjoyed a delightful light lunch and coffee.

In view of the weather, we eschewed the physical exercise and simply drove there for a coffee.  This doesn't do it justice, but it's quite a lovely spot:

With a break in the weather, we took a wee walk to Rogie Falls:

The water is brown on account of peat:

Peat is an accumulation of partially decayed vegetation or organic matter. It is unique to natural areas called peatlands, bogs, mires, moors, or muskegs.

Once used for heat, it's now being replaced by offshore wind farms, and the big issue in the Highlands these days being the intrusive transmission lines through these bucolic glens.  But that's an issue for another time.

Yesterday we noted that the weather forecast called for a clearing at time suitable for our planned BBQ?  Well, if you can't believe a weatherman, what can we believe in these crazy times?  But, sure enough, this was our sky as John fired up the grill:

And what a barbie it is:

Quite the thing, though I won't need to eat again until we get down to Fife....  

The meal ended with the back half of the pudding (that term is used for desserts in general):

No clinical definition can do it justice, of course:

Banoffee pie is a British dessert pie made from bananas, whipped cream and a thick caramel sauce (made from boiled condensed milk, or dulce de leche), combined either on a buttery biscuit base or one made from crumbled biscuits and butter. Some versions of the recipe include chocolate, coffee or both. Its name, sometimes spelled "banoffi", is a portmanteau combining the words "banana" and "toffee"

It's simply divine, and I'm not even that much of a pudding guy.... Let's just leave it that banoffee pie is proof of the existence of a benevolent deity.

What might our plans be for today?  Well, here it gets exciting for your humble blogger.  The morning is looking scary nice, we don't trust blue skies in these parts.  But this was the view an hour ago from Elsie's kitchen window

Even a bit brighter right now...

Ross, Dace and Sebi are headed our way, and we shall be trundling North To The Links of....well, that place.  That reference is to this classic piece of the Master from 1964, unfortunately no longer available online, though we do have this wee summary:

THE SPORTING SCENE about a golfing holiday in Scotland, & brief account of the early days of the game. A little over a century ago the traditional feather-stuffed golf ball, in use for over 400 years, was replaced by a ball made of gutta-percha. Up to that time golf had been played almost exclusively in Scotland, but the new harder, more durable ball changed this. Golf became a universal pastime, currently pursued by some 15 million devotees. Scotland has nevertheless continued to be regarded as the golf country. There are many visitors each year to its celebrated championship courses. They are: Prestwick, Troon, Ailsa, Gullan No. 1, Muirfield, North Berwick, St. Andrews and Carnoustie. On his recent tour the writer visited some of the comparatively unknown courses with his friend, Sam McKinlay, editor of the Glasgow Evening Times. Their destination was Dornoch, far up in the north. On the way they played at Nairn and the little course at Golspie. The writer thinks very highly of Dornoch and describes it with enthusiasm.

Yes, Herbert Warren Wind thinks highly of Dornoch in the sense that I think highly of...well, banoffee pie.  I did reread the piece before leaving home and Employee No. 2 did as well.

I did just grab a quick peak at the Met Office weather forecast and, well, what was I thinking?  Good thing we weren't planning a BBQ for tonight.....So grateful for all the effort, especially since Ross had a brutal work schedule yesterday and a zero dark thirty airport run, so fingers are firmly crossed..... 

Tomorrow we head down to Fife.

Arrival

Just a quick note to assure everyone that we have arrived safely and without incident.  I haven't yet snapped my first photo, but Elsie and John have welcomed us with their typical warmth and grace, quite the thing after a long journey.  And just when I thought I couldn't eat another bite, out comes the banoffee pie.....  

While last year's trip featured warm and dry weather, it appears that Scottish weather is regressing to its mean....  it's grey and wet (though at least not cold), so our plans for a good walk to burn off breaky are currently under review.  Especially as John just informed us that at the current temperature it's likely to be "midgy" out there.... Didn't know it could be used as an adjective (Spellcheck apparently didn't know that either), so who says old dogs can't learn new tricks.  

Forecast for tomorrow isn't any better, alas.  The only good news to be found in the forecast is that it is projected to be dry after 5:00 p.m. today, when John plans to fire up the BBQ.  I have been conscripted to hold the brolley over John if it's wet, though that might require a step ladder.... Actually, strike the "might".

I was somewhat tempted to blog yesterday's Senate hearing.  The hearing itself seemed to mostly be prima donnas bloviating, but there were some gems in the associated document dump that are worth your time.  There's fun to be had in there, most notably in Yasir Al-Rumayyan's rather pitiful application for Augusta National membership.  I guess he didn't hear about the first rule of Fight Club.....

I'll be back with more over the next few days.