Columns

Eye on the Ball: Going south for a golfing getaway

BOB DeSTEFANO
BOB DeSTEFANO

It’s October, which means golfers start looking for warmer weather to enjoy their game. This year was no exception — the 27th straight year that a group of 12 to 20 Island guys have extended their season by going to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

Why Myrtle Beach? Well, this is a town that’s frequently called the “Golf Capital of the World,” with over 100 public courses, an average high temperature of 76 degrees in October and over 1,900 restaurants and 460 hotels that cater to golfers. It’s about as reasonable as anywhere you can go for a golfing vacation. We can play the best, stay in the best and eat in the best for much less than any place I know. In other words, for a golfer, this is heaven.

The primary reason I enjoy this venture each October is simple. One of the regrets people have is they’ve lost touch with many of their old friends. Our October trip keeps us in touch, along with adding some new friends every year.

With the courses being so competitive with one another, in the early years we found it difficult to pick courses. After 27 trips, we narrowed the courses down to a few of what we consider the best. We always play these few but also try to change at least one every year. For instance, we always play the Dunes, a golf course that is everybody’s favorite — don’t miss it. We also always play Grande Dunes, a fairly new course that is a pleasant place in every way to spend the day.

Tidewater Golf Club is played because of its unbelievable beauty; the only downside is that on many days the course is too wet to drive golf carts on the fairway, making for a tough 36 holes. On our last day, we always try to play the Fazio course at Barefoot Landing.

Golf is unlike many sports when it comes to the age of the athlete. This year we had 23-year-old Russell Holmes and your 75-year-old columnist enjoying the competition. History shows us that only two people, David Doyle and Bob Feinstein, were at the first event and have never missed since. Garth Griffin was in that group until he missed this year for the first time because of scheduled knee surgery.

Golf is a great melting pot of all nationalities, businesses, professions and wealth. Our group includes doctors, lawyers, financiers, policeman, entrepreneurs, restaurateurs, golf professionals, you name it. The main thread that binds us all together is our attachment to Shelter Island.

To make golf more fun for everyone, we give each player the choice of the tees they want to play. We then adjust the handicaps accordingly. Every round we play for points for our victories in the different team formats, along with points for individual birdies. All to find out who will win and get their name engraved on the coveted Lamson Bowl, named for Newton Lamson. Daniel Fabe has his name on the bowl for the third year in a row.

A few years back, we added one of our most exciting formats, the Ryder Cup. Last year’s winner and runner-up become captains and they pick teams a month before we head south. We are then separated into two groups and matched against each other in diverse nine-hole formats to find the winning team.

This year Russell Holmes and Daniel Fabe were the captains and the victory went to Daniel’s team, the “Starfish.” Next year, they are already trash-talking about Bob DeStefano Jr.’s unnamed team going against Daniel’s “Starfish.” Junior beat out Jim Cronin for second place by getting an extra point awarded for a competitive game of  musical chairs.

We are not the only Island group to enjoy this fall getaway. Twelve years ago, Ken Lewis and Matt Mobius decided to do the same thing with yet another collection of Island guys. Their group is a little younger than ours but they are doing basically the same trip. We like to call them the JV team and as you read this, 16 of them are all enjoying golf in Myrtle Beach. It would be fun to have a season that we are there on one of the same days so we can battle each other. Maybe, just maybe, the JV might be able to defeat the varsity.

While the majority of the guys fly down, I always go by car, usually with three other players and the baggage of a few more. Sometimes we even play a round of golf on the way down and on the way back. All I can say is when I finally get back to the Island, I am as beat down and tired as I am at any time in my life. Beat down or not, I have already signed up for next year simply because I always make the same statement: “For one solid week, I can’t recall one minute that I wasn’t happy.”

Instead of getting too old and saying, “I wish I had…,” I hope this little synopsis of our trip will make some of you get together with both your old and new friends and go have a ball.