China golf

Saturday

Since I had change my depature to today, I had to have an early tee time. I played on a public course near Conroe, less than 30 minutes away.

This was the Wedgewood course and from the back tees has a slope of 130 and a rating over its par - ie quite hard.

My original time was 9-30 on my own, but I actually hit off just after 9, since there were no other bookings when I checked in. The starter pointed out the green and said this was one of the few holes where you could actually see the green from the tee. (Par 3s excepted) he was pretty right as many holes had doglegs whent over a hill or both. There was also a lot of water about, creeks, lakes and so forth.

I had driven off, right down the fairway and was on my way to the ball when I realised I hadn't taken a photo. I drove back for that and a pair had arrived and we joined up. They said they weren't very good but as there were 3s and 4s in front it didn't really make the round any slower.  We did fall a bit behind and a single caught up to us on the 5th. The others were happy to let him through so I joined him and we played as 2 pairs. We soon caught up to the group in front and were waiting almost all of the time after that. Interestingly, the 2 I started with never quite caught up to us.

I was starting to look at the time after about 12 holes. I was hoping to finish no later than 1-30 and preferably earlier. In the end, It was just before 1 when we got to the 18th tee. The group in front was still waiting as the group in front of them had not even played their second shots. I decide this was enough and skipped the hole, leaving the carpark at 1.

 Unfortunately, about the 14th hole, after showing some photo to my partner, I dropped my camera and it hit the cart path. It never turned back on so I used the iphone for the rest of the round.

The course was indeed challenging. I lost a couple of balls, found a few so pretty even. Because of the doglegs etc, many of the views from the tees were relatively uninteresting and it wasn't till later that you got the view of the lakes , bunker,s elevation changes, swales etc that made the course and the pictures interesting. Quite often the best view was looking back from the green.

I mainly had bogeys with a few pars and some bad holes, so would not have broken 90 if I'd finished the round. I did however play from the longest, hardest tees.

The earlier finish meant I was back at the hotel, showered and packed by 2pm. This gave me time to see Tony and Lisa one last time. They had returned from their Porsche club trip and hour earlier after being delayed a day due to a flat tyre. I took some birthday cake and a few left over items.

I was back in the hotel in time for the limo pick up and in fact we left a bit earlier than scheduled. No locked keys in car incidents this time.

Despite getting into the lounge in Orlando the United people didn't class my ticket as an acceptable criteria for entry. They did tell me I would have access in LA - big deal I was expecting that anyway.

I headed for the lounge and found that there was free internet anyway so was able to do a few things there. It was quiet and I realised I was 1 gate too far. There were still plenty of people in the boarding queue but obviously it had started some time earlier.

The first class in the US is more or less the same as business class within Australia. 2 seats instead of 3 and we did get a meal, and drinks. I had a bloody mary and 2 whisky/cokes.There was a film but this plane did not have individual screen as in the flight to Houston and I wasn't really interested in it. I watched some stuff on the ipad, had a bit of a nap and the time passed quickly enough.

The NZ lounge in LA was fine. It did take a while to get there since I had to change from terminal 7 to 2. There is a shuttle bus which I took. I have been through LA 4 or 5 times and never realised it was available and always walked.

The Business class seats on this flight were in the herring bone pattern - ie diagonal - so everyone has aisle access. Cathay has a similar layout but different seats. Once we were airborne I tried to get it to lean back and was surprised to find it didn't go that far. The Cathay beds just recline all the way back to flat. NZ has a different approach with the seat back folding forward to complete the flat bed with the foot rest at one end. This eliminates the problem of dips and joins between sections when the chair is folded backwards.

We had a nice meal, a few more drinks and I watched a number episodes of Episodes. This comedy was on OZ TV but I missed the first series and saw only some of the second.  I watched the first 6 episodes and then changed to the bed layout about 1am LA time (3am Houston, 10pm Auckland).  I had a solid 5 hours before I woke. After that I dozed a bit, watched more episodes and so forth till they turned the lights on for breakfast. One of the stewards reset the seat configuration and asked why I hadn't used the mattress. I thought it was an extra thick doona.

We had a delayed take off because a couple of unfortunates lost their passports and weren't allowed on and their bags had to be off loaded. Consequently we were late in with some people missing their connections. Since I have 6 hours, this is not an issue for me.
 I had a look for a replacement camera in the duty free but it seems you can get one on line in Oz for much less..