The course:
Firstly, there is none. There was a golf course, but now it's gone. Apparently the new owners didn't place maintaining a golf course high on the agenda and let it get grown over. I didn't find this out until we booked our 2008 Easter holidays at Fairway Lodge intent on reliving my childhood memories of the place. I "borrowed" Johnsy's carry bag (yes, I'll give it back ... one day) and crammed it in the boot with all the family luggage (Renee doesn't pack light). On arrival I put my golf shoes on, threw the carry bag over my shoulder and headed out to the first tee/clothes lines - what? I quickly retreated to the room to hide my clubs and ventured back out onto the course (and I use the word "course" loosely).
The layout is still there and there were even a couple of flags on the "greens". You can't distinguish rough from fairway from green. I don't think there's any recovering the course from this poor state. My back lawn is in better nick and that's saying something.
The course was never long and consisted of seven par 3's and two par 4's from memory. They were all reachable for a mid to low handicapper. They also moved the numbering of the holes around over the years, but my recollection is with the first tee level with the pool. The par 3 2nd hole was very short and very difficult. It was only about 90 metres but the drop from tee to green was also about 90 metres. There was a creek before the green and an apple orchard over the back (out of bounds). It was really difficult to judge how hard/soft to hit your sand wedge here even when you were playing well.
It was never a good course, but it was good fun especially for families on holiday. It's a real pity this course has been left to ruin. I don't think they can justify calling it 'Fairway Resort' anymore, but 'Paddock Resort' doesn't have the same ring I guess. Actually resort is another word they throw around loosely down there.
Here's a couple of recent pictures ..... (not!). Love the golfing attire!
The best shots:
Two events spring to mind from this course. Firstly, this was the location of Mitch's first game of golf when he was 6. He could only hit the ball about 30 metres and after a couple of shots on the first he still had about 30 metres to go. He hit a full shot that carried near the green and rolled up and hit the metal flag. I looked at him in astonishment and he didn't see what all the fuss was. He said to me words along the line of "Isn't that what I'm meant to do?". Bloody kids!
The other memorable event was a pair of drives that Conno hit when we went down there in '89 or so. On the par four 6th at the bottom of the course, Justin hit a drive on the green and sank the eagle putt for some skins. He followed this with a drive up the uphill par four 7th that also finished on the green. He casually rolled this in for consecutive eagles that essentially finished off our match. Bloody Conno!
The worst:
Not a shot as such, but my golf bag throw from the 7th green to the 8th tee as a result of Justin's consecutive eagles was very poor form. I can't take it back, but at least I can now acknowledge that you can't get down on yourself when your opponent does something out of the ordinary.
