No room at the Inn

As I mentioned yesterday, we were evacuated from Myrtle Beach and are currently in Winston Salem.  Unfortunately there is no availability for us during the weekend so we are moving tomorrow to Greensboro, North Carolina.  This is fine with us as it brings us a little closer to Morgantown where we are staying on Sunday night.

Today we played golf at Oak Hollow Golf Club which was in Highpoint.  We were pleasantly surprised when they gave us the senior's rate and were required to pay only $24 including cart fee's. We weren't too sure what to expect but found that the course was really scenic and quite challenging. The weather was slightly cooler and we experienced some wind as well.  We all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and would definitely play here again.

The golf course flowed around Oak Hallow Lake

This was a very hilly and undulating golf course.

This was the "Blue" Tee box! Fortunately for the boys it was shut down while a Heron laid on it's nest with eggs.

We ended our evening with dinner at a restaurant called Milners.  The food was amazing and we all enjoyed our meal.

We are now relaxing in our room after doing our "golf prizes" and looking forward to another fun day tomorrow.

Blog update

Hello family and friends, I appear to have been experiencing problems with my blog where it wasn't sending out my updates.  I have made some adjustments and hopefully you are now receiving them again.

We are having fun, although no longer staying in Myrtle Beach as we were evacuated today.  We are staying in Winston Salem, North Carolina and plan to spend a few days here.

Our vacation has been really fun, the weather has been beautiful and the golf has been terrific.  We were sad to leave, but look forward to new adventures here in North Carolina.

If you want to catch up on my previous posts, they can be found here.

http://ralphandgrace.blogspot.com/

Evacuation Day

After packing early this morning we decided to drive to The Thistle to see if they would honor our rain check for another year. The receipt we had from last year was barely legible and the Golf team at the condo suggested that they might not honor it next year because it was so faded.  When we got to the golf course they offered for us to golf today.  We agreed and played an enjoyable round. Afterwards they helped us plan an alternate route to Winston Salem, NC via the back roads.  It was nice because we avoided alot of traffic.  We have another round of golf booked here in Winston Salem at a golf course called  Oak Hollow Golf and Country Club.  We're looking forward to seeing what this course looks like.  At least the temperature is still nice and warm here.

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Myrtle Beach exodus

We got the memo this morning.  Time to pack up and go because of the impending Hurricane Matthew that's on it's way.  Our rounds of golf are cancelled and our bags are packed.  We are now joining the million people that are making their exodus inland.  This wasn't quite what we expecyed but we recognize the need to be safe.

Pawley's Plantation - a change is coming

Today we woke up to warnings about an impending weather change.  Hurricane Matthew is on it's way and has the locals quite concerned.  We can appreciate that, especially after experiencing one last year.  By Friday the hurricane is predicted to make landfall.  Wouldn't you know it, this is the day that we're playing our raincheck from last year.  I guess we'll see what happens.

Today we were told to expect an increase of wind and the weather station even predicted hourly how fast to expect it.  Sure enough by noon we were feeling a noticeable change in the weather.  You know how you can just tell when a storm is coming... it's on it's way for sure. The wind has picked up and some rain is in the forecast.  There are strong riptides right now and many warnings not to enter the water.

Our first alligator swimming by

Our golf was fun.  We have played this course a few times before so we know what to expect.

You play over the marsh and have a lovely view of the birds that are looking for fish.  It's really quite nice.

The ocean has changed it's direction.  Earlier in the week the waves were flowing to our left, but now they are flowing to the right.   I went out to see the sunset which goes down behind our condo.

Can you find Lawrence in the bright orange t shirt!!

The Granddaddy course

Today, we played Pine Lakes which is the oldest course in Myrtle Beach. It was developed in 1927 and is a favorite of the locals.  It was a nice course, although we enjoyed Founders Club more.

The day was beautiful with really warm temperatures.  The humidity was quite high as well.  So far this has been the warmest week that we have experienced since coming down to golf.

Teresa was today's winner.  The competition today was "Protect your ball" and she was able to keep it safe until the 11th hole.  Not surprising - I lost my ball on the 1st hole although my driving has been good.  I simply had a bad bounce and off it went into the pond.  Ralph sadly lost his ball as well on the 1st hole.  It had gone straight but was nowhere to be found.  We suspect that it got plugged somewhere in the soft soil.  That is something that we all noticed today was how wet the course was. Lawrence almost lost his ball on a par 3 experiencing the same problem but Ralph was able to find it for him.

This afternoon was spent quietly relaxing.  Ralph is working (as Sears had problems over the weekend) and we took advantage of the beautiful weather that we have been blessed with.

This evening we enjoyed some amazing pizza at the Mellow Mushroom and then celebrated Teresa's win.  She was the winner of the "Protect your Ball" competition.  Congratulations Teresa.

A day of rest

This year, Ralph and I are sleeping in the room at the back of the condo.  This room has no windows so it is quite dark.  As a result both Ralph and I slept later than normal and missed getting up to see the sunrise.  Oh well, it was pretty overcast and Teresa shared that she had seen lightening earlier in the morning so I suspect that there wasn't much to see.

We went to Faith Presbyterian church this morning.  We've been there several times and really enjoy listening to the Minister and always feel very welcome here.

After church we spent the afternoon walking along the beach, enjoying the ocean, relaxing and watching dolphins swim by.  We also saw plenty of fish jumping out of the water.

We even went swimming in the ocean and played in the waves.  What a perfect day!

We shared a home cooked meal and had a quiet evening.  We're golfing at Pine Lakes on Monday and the course is only about 5 minutes away from our condo so we won't feel rushed in the morning.

We enjoyed a nice dinner together at the Condo.  Afterward Ralph and I went down to the ocean and enjoyed the the sunset.

Later we did our first awards night.  Ralph was the winner of the competition on Saturday. This competition was the total score for 3 randomly selected holes.  Congratulations Ralph.