I was up in plenty of time for breakfast on Scotty's birthday. The continental option was limited & I had some all bran as opposed to corn flakes. The cooked menu was impressive though as it was all prices individually even down to slices of toast. I went for scrambled eggs two slices of toast & two beef sausages.
After breakfast Scotty & I popped over to the country club to see what the golf situation was after the last two days of rain. The course was playable & we were the first out of the day at 10:15. They had to remove the rope fences from around the greens so we could start. The course was designed by Peter Matcovich who is a former South African golfer, & now designs courses all over the world. This was only Scotty's second game of golf ever. I hadn't played since September when I played terribly & lost 12 balls. Needless to say the first few holes we hacked around, much to the groundsman's dismay. At the second when I finally produced a good approach to the green it hopped left into a bunker, when if it had hopped right it would have rolled down the hill to the pin. Scotty wasn't hitting the ball very far but he was keeping it straight. Whereas I had lost two balls by the end of the third hole. At the 475metre par 4 fourth I managed some golf. After being just short of the green in two I mis*** a chip but came away with the most respectable score of the day so far a bogey. At the fifth we both felt the pressure. Many local women were gathering firewood from the fairway. They all moved into the rough to allow us to tee off. Sure enough I looped mine 30yards up & left, not even clearing the water. Scotty made a good connection but also went left. Non of us troubled the women (as usual) or the fairway. The par 3 sixth represented our best golfing hole. Scotty hit his best drive of the day with a rescue club but bounced through the back but he was able to get down for a 5. As seen from my photo I neatly placed a 5iron on the green & sunk the subsequent long putt for birdie. Golf is great when it goes well, utterly frustrating the rest of the time.
When we finished playing we half expected Cristel to be waiting with beers & lunch. She had opted to go the the main restaurant for lunch not knowing what time we would be done. Scotty & I sat outside on the terrace by the fountain watching anyone else out playing. For lunch we had some toasted sandwiches & beers, a perfect combination post golf.
With the sun still shining we opted to go sit by the pool. There was quite a bit of cloud cover just over our area though. Watching the clouds I witnessed a phenomenon which occurs daily but had never witnessed before. Just after the clouds had moved past the sun from our perspective on the ground, they dissipated. Frustrating from our point of view as if the pool had been 1000yards to the right we would have been in the sun all afternoon. Just as we were thinking of heading in, Cristel finished work for the day & bullied us into going in to the freezing pool. This was not a pleasing experience but we grabbed some beers & made it look warm for the photos.
There had been no hot water in our rooms since we arrived due to main power being off. Malawi is in a state of national emergency at the moment due to the amount of rain that as fallen since I arrived. Major roads have collapsed as well as cuts to power lines & other infrastructure. Great timing for a driving tour of Malawi! I called reception to ask if we could take a warm shower in the country club as I noticed their locker room showers were working before we played. Reception informed me that the clubhouse no longer had hot water & to give them sometime to think of a solution. Half an hour later they called back with an amazing solution. They upgraded both of us to cottages that had their own living area, satellite TV & most importantly hot water. A very good response we all agreed. This allowed us after dinner at 20:00, (their last sitting), to go sit in Scotty's lounge with some wine & play some board games. The only interruption to the evening came when power went out. Luckily my I phone torch came in handy & Scotty effected some repairs to the fuse box outside. This allowed us to finish off the evening watching scary movie 5 before calling an end to a most enjoyable day.