It’s never a bad idea to break the back of a UK winter by relocating to warmer climes, if at all possible, and I’m happy to say my next few blogs will be coming to you from the Canary Islands – that is, if any are forthcoming at all!  But, don’t worry – I’ve left the sister back on home turf holding the fort with her customary aplomb.

I’ve never played golf in the Canaries, which is a great pity because the islands, with their wealth of diverse scenery and terrain, are spectacular.  The most famous home-grown golfers, all professional, come from Gran Canaria – and from the same family.  They are Rafael Cabrera Bello, his brother Miguel and his sister, Emma.

Rafa has been a pro for more than twenty years plying his trade mostly on the DP World tour (formerly known as the European tour), hoovering up four victories in the process as well as a much deserved and coveted berth on the 2016 Ryder Cup team.  He was undefeated in his three matches at Hazeltine but it wasn’t enough to stop the Americans rolling to victory.

He’s a veteran of numerous major championship campaigns and his most successful was a tied fourth place finish at the 2017 Open.  In his most productive years on tour (2016-2018), he notched up three top fives in World Golf Championship events, not a bad return for a wee lad who grew up on a lump of volcanic rock where golf courses were in short supply.  That wee lad, however, remains to this day one of the fittest players in the world of professional golf, his passion for surfing keeping him in tip-top shape.

Miguel, the youngest of the three, has played on the Challenge Tour and is the only one of the siblings I haven’t met but I remember Emma from way back in her amateur days when she was representing her country on the international stage.  It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say her amateur career was glittering, littered as it was with numerous European national titles and representative golf.  She eased seamlessly onto the professional stage in 2008, finishing runner-up in the Rookie of the Year race and then had her best year in 2009.

However, after four seasons of playing full time on tour Emma decided to cut back on her appearances and perhaps she had had enough of the endless travelling that living on a small island necessitates.  Undoubtedly European golf  has been fortunate to enjoy the presence of the Cabrera Bello family, a talented and positive addition to our sport.

So, no golf for me in the Canaries but there is the most wonderful hiking to enjoy and as I still work away at regaining full health and fitness post Covid I was determined to heed all advice to take it easy from the off.  First day in we did a two-hour hike, all uphill for the first hour and then an hour downhill coming home.  When younger, a two-hour hike would have been roughly ninety minutes uphill and then a brief thirty minute skip down the mountain.  These days the downhill bit seems to have grown in difficulty and is booby trapped with loose scree and not the same sure-footedness of my youth.  But it was a nice steady start to things and enough for me even though my better half repeated the same hike later in the day.

On the second day I decided it’d be acceptable to upgrade to a three-and-a-half hour hike, up and over a mountain ridge and down into a famously beautiful gorge to a lovely little, “lost” village.  We’d be passing numerous little hamlets along the way, all with little bars and restaurants, so no need to weigh ourselves down with oodles of provisions, although I do always insist on carrying numerous bottles of water.  The plan was to hike there, have a leisurely lunch and get the bus back to where the car was parked.  At the last minute I threw in a couple of bananas – just in case.  Or as the caddies used to write in our yardage books beside a measurement taken in case of a visit to a water hazard – JICYFU.  I’m sure you can work it out.

Well, the last two letters of that acronym could be used perfectly to describe the hike.  All was fine for the first couple of hours – relentlessly straight uphill (the guidebook described this hike as “easy”!) and we arrived at the first recommended bar.  Shut.  Oh, well, never mind.  We hadn’t far to the next village, so we ate our bananas and moved on.

The next village never appeared – and this wasn’t even the one supposed to be lost.  We were expecting a particular turn in the trail after fifteen minutes but after an hour with nary a sign I had to concede we must have missed it……..and our phone now told us we were three and a half hours from where we were supposed to be.  It was well it was mea culpa because otherwise I’d have killed my hubby.

After five and a half hours in total we found a main road and a bus back to near the car with zero sighting of any open bars or cafes.  It wasn’t quite the gentle start I’d envisaged.

I don’t expect anyone who knows us will be surprised at our appalling lack of sense of direction – even with what I felt was sound preparation.  And no, I hadn’t downloaded any maps because, well you see, it was all so straightforward according to the guidebook.  I don’t recall ever having had that much bother negotiating a golf course.

The scenery, however, was truly spectacular.  Pity I wasn’t quite fit enough to enjoy it.

If there’s such a thing as road lag, this blog writer has it.  She hasn’t been near a plane for ages, let alone a long-haul flight, so jet lag is out of the question but she’s had enough of roads for a while, well, a day or two at least.

It all started on Monday past, with a trip to Suffolk that included an overnight stay in Haverhill, just outside Cambridge, a detour to Stock in Essex, with Thorpeness Golf Club and Hotel the final destination.  There was no need to put the satnav on because I knew the route to Haverhill (M6, A14, a bit of M11, then the B whatever, with the sign to Haverhill being the giveaway) but….distracted by a very slow driver who decided to change lanes at the last minute I missed the road to the M6 and ended up heading for the M40.  Caramba.  Very, very poor road craft on my part, admittedly and it got worse.

Suffice it to say, I ended up having the most convoluted journey imaginable, in the rain, in the dark, through interminable roadworks of the years-long variety near Cambridge.  The next day, amazingly enough, the trip was relatively trouble free and despite having to negotiate the A12 and various Sizewell C and National Grid mega works, I even managed to arrive at my destination in daylight…Result.

The occasion was the third reunion of the founders of the LET, plus the odd bod (me) who’s known most of them for decades and is still in awe of all they’ve done and are still doing.  There’s lots of reminiscing and even more laughter and it’s a great reminder that these women really were pioneers and today’s players, who take it as a given that a professional career is possible, owe them a great debt of gratitude.

On Wednesday the weather was perfect for golf and I ventured out in elite company to play the James Braid course described by Peter Alliss as “a hidden gem in Suffolk”.  It was a delight, human sized, thought-provoking but not intimidating (especially on a glorious day with only a hint of breeze) and in remarkably good condition after a wet winter.

Lang, aka Christine Langford, director of golf at Thorpeness, organiser supreme and the holder of the trophy (see featured pic at the top, fingers crossed), made a stout defence of her title, amassing 34 points barely three months after a hip operation; I managed 33 points (or was it 31?), demonstrating an unexpected mastery of the Texas wedge* from unusual positions; but we – and everyone else – had to give best to our playing partner Bridget Cooper, who won the comp with an impressive 39 points.

At the presentation, Bridget, an Essex girl, recalled winning £50 on her first outing as a professional and splurging it all on a yellow leather jacket at her local market.  She still has it but confessed that she’d only worn it a couple of times!  Her latest trophy (TOFT – the old farts trophy) was originally won by Lang way back in 1979, when Carlsberg were the main sponsors of the fledgling tour.

Now, I wasn’t going to do this but couldn’t resist flicking through the early tour handbooks and came across this pic in what was the WPGA’s 1983 official handbook.  Brace yourself, Bridget.

And here are the results from the tour’s first year.

The enjoyment of the game has endured over the decades but so have its frustrations and as Lang, Bridget and I were making our way down the hill to the 6th green we heard a very familiar four-letter word from the 7th tee.  One of our number (hark at me!  But I was playing in the same comp) had dumped her tee shot into the water and her partners were starting to double up.

Forewarned is forearmed and my threeball all made sure we cleared the water – I took my driver for a hole that says it’s a mere 127 yards and creamed it, well left of the target and well beyond it, on a path, with some sloping, raggedy terrain between me and the pin.  Time for a belt with the trusty TW.  I missed the putt for a par but it’s the sort of hole I’d take a four at every time.

Space, or the lack thereof, saves you from any more details of the golf (4-irons to five feet, that sort of thing; in my dreams) and means that my journey home is reduced to a few sentences.  Thorpeness to Lichfield can, apparently, be done in less than three and a half hours without stops.  I left at 1021 and got home at 1639, admittedly with two stops!

There were lots of diggers and people in orange jumpsuits in the middle of Leiston (no distance from Thorpeness) and a ROAD CLOSED sign with no discernible diversion.  Ah, I’ll try the 1119 to Saxmundham.  More ROAD CLOSED signs with no indication of where exactly it was closed or where we should go instead.

I stopped at what turned out to be a very nice caff in Rendham, had coffee and cake with a load of lycra-clad cyclists and considered my options; bought some local honey from the beekeepers who run the cafe; then headed back on to the narrow Suffolk roads that turn you inside out…

 

*for the non golfers this is the practice of using the putter from off the green, often from a considerable distance.