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Today, was our first day of golf in Ireland—ever. I booked a round at The K Club, short for The Kildare Club, a resort with both a north course and a south course. This club is actually what started my plans for the trip because I often look at the calendar and wonder, what’s going on in the area or country that we’ll be visiting, and then plan our trip to coincide with the event. This is why we’ve been to the Ladies Scottish Open three times and were in the UK in 2017 when Jordan Speith won the British Open. The camaraderie was magnificent that year. When the LET played at Gullane one year, we sat next to Jenny Shin, having dinner at the Old Clubhouse. I peaked in the next room and Laurie Davies waved to me. Later, I walked out of the ladies room with Catriona Matthew—these are memorable moments!  And in 2019, after watching the Ladies British Open on a dry day, we met Cheyenne Knight at a nearby course playing a conciliatory round with her dad after being washed out of contention on the day before. We had lunch together that day and became fast friends. We travel for many reasons and meeting new people is certainly one of them.

This time, I called the K Club and asked if we could play the course the day after the ladies played. The shop attendant advised me that we could play the course—while the ladies were here because there are two courses. In fact, since they would be playing the South course, we could play where the Ryder Cup played, the North Course. Then, when finished, we could go watch the LET finish on the last day and be there for the winner. So that’s what we did. (See below for lots of pictures of the course, if you’re interested .)

The colourful part of the game, besides so many of our wonderful shots, none on camera— was our caddie and our playing partners. Our caddie was a middle aged man (60ish) named Niall. What a character. At once point he said that he was still single and if I knew anyone, to advertise him as “An elderly man with a soft cough.”  That just cracked me up.  And he carried both our bags, ran between us to guide our shots, was perfectly pleasant all day, and helped us score. 

Our playing partners, Richard and Matthew, we mid-thirties, and not consistent golfers at all. They duffed every other shot, which is fine—but on one hole they had a bit of fun. Matthew was 50 feet from the pin and Richard had just holed out. Seeing the impossible shot of buddy, he lay his putter down as a helping club (highly illegal) and gave Matthew the nod. After careful measuring, Matthew made a mighty stroke. The ball raced toward the hole, hit the club in just the right spot and went right into the hole!  I took a photo of the set up— what fun!  (But don’t try that at your course—two stroke penalty for you and your friend must retake the shot.)

After the game, we went over to the LET game and had a great time watching terrific play in a country fair kind of atmosphere. We walked through the gauntlet of games and prizes (no sheep or Irish dancing though) before getting to the course. The prize money for this one was just $450k total. It’s a very small game and yet the parking lot was full and there were kids everywhere. We even got ice cream!

Good way to end our first game in Ireland!

For those who want to see the whole course, see below:

Our review of the K Club is that it is a beautiful course, but has a lot of water that comes into play on 10-14 holes. The water is also constructed with blind inlets so even when you think you’ve made it over, you don’t realize that your ball is gone until you get there. Beautiful course, lots of water. With a few rounds, it would be become familiar. Very nice caddie.