Eric Falls Off at Ledges

Written on 9-19-25.

   When we went to back nine, we tied the first five holes.  He chose to have a beer to help him relax again.  It worked the last time at Grandote (barely), but it didn’t work this time.  He did scare me a little, however.

We got bogeys on the first two holes, double bogeys on the third, and two more bogeys until I finally broke through.  Here’s how I won the match on hole #15.

The back nine was shorter, but it became tighter.  Many of the greens were smaller and elevated.  I would compare it to Riverview with their two contrasting sides.  

Hole #5 was only 281 yards from the whites, but it was...

split into three parts: the teeing ground, the fairway, and the green.  In between those parts were the desert rough and marshy, tall grass areas.  I had the honors from the front nine still, and I used my utility club.  A 200-yard shot would suffice to get me to the fairway without going too far.  Unfortunately, I pulled it, and it bounced off of the cart path (which we couldn’t see from our vantage point) and disappeared!

Now, Eric had the advantage.  Instead of hitting a smooth shot out to the fairway, however, he hit well behind his golf ball, and it dove like a wounded bird to the tall grassy area below.  He chose to hit again from the teeing ground, and he managed to get one out to the left of the fairway on a hill.

We looked for my ball without success, but he and I chose where I would drop.  It wasn’t bad at all.  I was in rough left of the cart path and about 100 yards from the green.  I was hitting three, and he was hitting four.  Now, it was back in my favor.

He scuffed his next shot, and it rolled into thick, tall grasses never to be found.  I think the beer was affecting him now.  I managed to get my approach short and just off the green with my pitching wedge. The hole was on the lower tier, and my ball looked like it could either roll back into the bunker or kick forward onto the green and get close the hole.  It ended up staying in the middle.    

He hit his sixth shot onto the top tier, and he managed to get his ball into the hole with only two putts.  His first putt was amazing.  He managed to get it to trickle to the top of the hill and then it rolled down to within four feet.

My putt wasn’t easy either.  I had to play 15-20 feet of break due the slope.  It stopped past the hole about ten feet away.  I made the next putt for a bogey, so that was how I won all the pushed points for the back nine.

He had no way of catching me, so we played one more hole together before he stopped completely.  It was getting dark, so we drove past hole #17 to get to hole #18.  He was done, so I played hole #18 by myself.  I was getting tired, too, and I got a double.

When we got to the parking lot, the cart girl brought my readers back to us as we were about to leave.  Then the cart guy brought me my new range finder!  Geesh!  We tipped them $10.00 and went on our way.  

Eric bought two beers, and I think he finished the second one while I played hole 18.  I helped guide him back to our campground (he was safe to drive), and that ended our adventure at Ledges.