Okay, our team didn't win the Pawleys Plantation Independence Day After Scramble. After making five birdies and a net ace on the first nine, we only made four on the back, plus a bogey, to finish a few strokes out of the money. As for #13, the peninsula par 3 with the tiny green, all you had to do today to almost guarantee a birdie was to stay on the green. From 67 yards, three of us made it, and my son's ball nestled just four feet from the blue flag (the others, of course, were red and white). We made the putt.
That was far from the wackiest of golf holes today. Every one of the 18
featured some creative wrinkle except for #5 where the instructions were "Carts on path at all times...Penalty is disqualification." The 5th hole at Pawleys has been cart-path-only for the last six years at least, and ropes prevent transgressions anyway.
Each hole featured a name today: #1, a par 5 of under 500 yards, for example, was named "Tyranny." Each team was compelled to play one shot from a bunker. Our team's drive was in position for a 185-yard approach to the pin but, instead, we took aim at the far end of the 180-yard bunker that runs along the right side of the fairway up to the green. We made birdie after blasting to 15 feet. On #2, a brutally long par 4, we were each offered a mulligan if we wearing clothing with the colors red, white and blue. We all were attired properly, and after I hit a five wood to 45 feet past the pin, we used our mulligans to attempt eight putts. None went in, and we settled for par.
Other craziness created by head pro Riley Kinlaw and his staff included mandatory putts with a driver on one hole, the requirement of a second shot on a short par 4 with the longest iron in your bag, and no woods or hybrids permitted on another par 4.
But where one hand taketh away, another hand giveth, and we played holes in which we were permitted to throw our ball from where our tee shot wound up, the ability to tee the ball up on any shot on the par 5 14th, the freedom to move your ball up to the 150-yard and 100-yard markers on two holes if your drives wound up short of them, no penalty strokes on the tough, marsh-surrounded par 3 17th, and a tee box from the 200-yard marker on the short par 4 12th.
Not exactly golf the way it was meant to be played, but a lot of fun.
At the Pawleys Plantation team scramble event today, the almost-island 13th green featured three pin positions. Each team could choose which one they played to -- assuming one team member's ball made the tiny green.