Done and dusted

So there it is. In a little over a year I’ve had the pleasure of bashing my way around every 18 hole golf course in the country. Oh, I have no doubt that as soon as the book is published someone will say “What about XYZ course?” And if that someone is you, don’t expect any thanks from me. I have trawled the country to the best of my ability and come up with 349 golf courses, from the exquisite to the downright embarrassing. If I have missed a course, I hope it’s of the latter variety.

The book has been delivered to the publisher and I have to thank my wife for a huge amount of work over the closing week. Formatting, fonts, formulae, flags and footnotes are not my strength, and I’m more likely to throw a few other choice f words into the mix. Fortunately, Fiona sorted it all out and worked through the night to get the book into an appropriate state for Con at Collins Press. 380 pages of A4, bundled into a box and stuffed in the post. It all seemed like a very tame end.

Actually I still have a couple of photographs to take for the book.

There will be colour photographs of the 18 best holes in the country, 1 through 18. I’ve had a very entertaining time trying to create the best par 72 that includes four par threes and four par fives, and doesn’t have more than one hole from any course. I have no doubt it will cause some amusement among the golfing cognoscenti, but that’s the advantage of a book that is subjective. These are my 18 best holes.

So I’m heading up to Royal Portrush when the weather improves to take a photo of one of the holes. Most of the courses have been able to supply me with photographs, but Royal Portrush got a computer virus that wiped a lot of their files. A bit unfortunate that it’s so far from Wexford, but at least I can take my wife away for a night and pay her back for her efforts. As for her year of patience and understanding while I drove around the country, I guess that will take a slightly more impressive effort.

[Photo: Scrabo Golf Course, Washington Ireland Program Golf Event, September 2008. WIP Board member Bob Van Heuvelen, Kevin Markham, WIP Ireland Director Jonathan Chesney and WIP Alum Nick Burke]