TEEING IT UP

We are looking forward to our first round of golf today, and have chosen to play at “Batalha”, a 27 hole club, and of the two options for golf on the island, this is the closest one to our hotel in Ribeira Grande. It is about a 20 minute ride to the course, and I have to tell you we are not sold on the routes our car GPS is kicking out for us to follow……..through all the small towns…….skinny one lane roads……I am convinced there is a better route.

We opted for a 5 round golf package that is good at both Batalha, and the other course at Furnas, costing 325Euro, so about $100 CAD/round which is not too bad. The three nines here have very interesting names….”A” “B” and “C”………wonder who thought of that. There are no electric push carts available for rent, so we are dragging the old two wheel trolleys, convinced that we want to walk and not ride…………..first hole on “B” 410 yards……uphill…….steep……into the wind……sea level……oh shit, those are metres not yards………..HELP……. “B” continued almost straight uphill for 4 holes and was a real challenge, but as we know, what goes up, must come down, so the last few holes allowed us to play shots without panting for air. Ok, I exaggerate, but believe me, this was not a walk in the park. “C” was next, and more of the same…….first few holes were uphill all the way, before a couple of lovely downhillers…….longest drives of the day……wedges into the greens. All in all, a very nice golf experience. On the first tee at “C”, a French couple in a golf cart asked if we would mind if they passed us and the group in front as they were obviously playing quickly with the cart…….we said go for it, and they did. Ten minutes later they drove back past us heading for the clubhouse saying their cart couldn’t make it up the hill at #3, so just sayin’. “A” is offline for now due to some fairway fungus or something, and too bad because it is held out as the best of the three. Conditions overall were passable, but not great……..looks like the over seeding program did not go well this year, so lots of dormant Bermuda patches everywhere, but still very playable………greens were in good shape and rolled true. We plan to play here a couple more times, and Furnas for the remaining rounds on our pass.

Following golf we wanted to have a beer at Tuka Tula on the beach, but unfortunately it has closed for a weeks vacation………good thing we had a great time there yesterday……..back to the room balcony at the hotel for apres cocktails……..nice view, waves crashing in, life is good.

Jutta’s first birthday dinner (two days early) is at the Santa Barbara Eco Hotel, and having seen their extensive cocktail list, we decide to head over early for a taste. The bartender/mixologist is great……Jutta pisco sour, Hugh Manhattan rocks, and Sibylle, the smoked rosemary infused G&T (check out the pics). This unfortunately was the best part of the evening. It is very unusual, almost unheard of, when I pick up a menu and find nothing that turns my crank……..this was it! In the end we ordered a grilled rock fish to share, a couple of appies that were supposed to contain sausages (my choice) and some beet/humus/puree with local bread……….the fish was so salty we couldn’t eat it…….I am still looking for the sausages that were supposed to be in the appies, and don’t even talk to me about the puree. Unfortunate, but on the bright side, Jutta still has two more birthday dinners to go!