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A five-hour belly laugh
By Ian Cobb/e-KNOW
“In the mood for some cold beer on a cold day?”
The clerk at the Fairmont Hot Springs grocery store was just making idle chit chat as he rang up my purchase – a whack of cold cans of beer – on a chilly Jan. 14 morning.
“Well, it’s only right seeing as how I am going golfing,” I replied truthfully.
The clerk’s face defined quizzical. “Golfing?” He laughed, nervously… searching my face for a sign of ‘just kidding.’
“You’re seriously going golfing? Where?”
I told him I was taking part in the 16th annual Kinsmen Club of Windermere Valley’s Snow Golf Tournament, carved madly and somewhat maliciously into the ice and snow of Lake Windermere’s Taynton Bay.
“You must love golf,” the clerk observed.
“No. This is the only time I golf,” I said, noting it is a traditional annual event.
Every year, save the one where it was canceled due to requiring scuba gear to find one’s ball, Larry Pettit, Mike Stevens, Bram Rossman (plus others) and I have ventured out onto the ice for a grand game of ‘where the hell did my ball go? Anyone see?’
Each year the lake conditions are different, as is course designer and event organizer Steve Kuffler’s course.
This year it was like walking in thick sand for five or six hours straight, hacking and prodding hopefully into shin-deep snow hoping to find your orange or black or pink or blue coloured balls. But it’s all for a good cause; the fine cast of the Kinsmen Club making some money to invest in community needs.
Along with the bustling White Way, the Snow Golf Tournament makes Lake Windermere and Kinsmen Beach a fun and happening place. Many thanks to the Kinsmen Club for staging another five-hour belly laugh.
The club is hosting it’s annual Fishing Derby on Jan. 28.
Photos by Ian Cobb
