And no, I wasn't fined for a drunken invasion (for some reason the 'new teachers' headline seems to printed in the smallest font possible).
The first week and a bit of work so far has been neither here nor there. Kids are as expected - no better or worse than the average kid. Senior kids are good, with behaviour deteriorating steadily until hitting the Yr 9 threshold, before a moderate increase in teacher respect shown by Yr 8.
The ice-cream sampling goes on unabated. Double Chocolate wasn't bad (6/10), but didn't really stand up to the better stuff you'd find in a Sera Lee or Connoisseur punnet. Boysenberry was disappointing (not enough boysenberry, 4/10), but this week I have taken the bold step of sampling Blue Lagoon. The aqua colour is quite beautiful, but the flavour itself is nowhere near as distinct or exciting. I think it’s supposed to be a bubblegum flavour, but it’s actually closer to the banana flavour I sampled in week one. Still, it's not without its charm. 6/10
I have now played my first game at Hokitika Golf Course. Green fees are a reasonable $20, and hire a half set of clubs added a further $15 to the cost. The course is well kept, and most importantly, quiet. There was not a single other golfer on the course during my round of 18.
Both Mount Cook and Mt Tasman are supposed to be clearly visible from the course, providing a spectacular backdrop to the round. Unfortunately low cloud obscured the mountains (which it has the majority of days I've been in Hokitika).
The rather fierce westerly blowing across the course proved problematic. Whilst the wind, which was compounded by the open, links style course effected ball flight severely, the more troublesome problem was that every flag on the course had been blown over. This added the dimension of where is the green on this hole? Most holes the green wasn't visible/obvious from the tee, and often not even obvious from the 2nd shot. Local knowledge of the course would appear to be essential. All in all a good round though, especially since after watching numerous youtube videos I hit a few straight drives today – gone, at least sometimes, was the horrible slice.
Good stuff dude, I'm still waiting on my front cover spread.
ReplyDeleteJust one request - would you mind uploading the images in a medium size? I'd like to be able to open them in a separate window. I know, me me me...
The local paper looks like an interesting read. Interestingly, the Hokitika Guardian is also a mythical Polynesian seamonster. Legend tells that his tentacles are 70 feet long and that he drags canoes full of men to an agonizing death in the briny depths of the Pacific.
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