I woke up at 6, an hour before what I’d set the alarm for. Checked my phone — did the Broncos beat the Steelers last night? Yes. Email from Mom? Yes. Email from Tim? Yes. And the next thing we get a FaceTime call from Tim — it’s 10 at night back home, but 6am here. Well, I was up anyway. So after a short visit with Tim and Alex, who have moved into our house, I got out of bed and made coffee. We have a 7:49 tee time at the Metropolitan Golf Course today.

We emptied some of the pockets in our golf bags and headed out. It’s not quite 1km to the golf course if we walk through Green Point Park, past the big World Cup soccer stadium.

The temperature was comfortable, but you sensed it would warm up quite a bit yet. We checked in at the clubhouse, Sue had a muffin, and then we were introduced to our playing partner, Charlie, from Scotland. And then off we went to Tee #1.

The Metropolitan Golf Club is actually only a 9-hole course, but you play 18 holes by going around twice, the second time using alternate tee blocks and greens right behind or beside the ones you used for the first time around.

I dribbled my tee shot almost to the ladies tee. “That’s okay. Take a mulligan,” said the Montrealers in the foursome right behind us.

But after a couple of holes things started to fall into place. Not all our shots were long and straight, but most were. And putting was pretty good, too.

We golfed the loop that made up the first 6 holes of each 9, and then we went back under the road and past the clubhouse to play the last 3 holes on the other side of the road. And each time we passed the clubhouse I had to stop and buy another blue Powerade.

By the time we’d walked (and carried our clubs) for 18 holes the sun was directly above us and it was quite warm, although the occasional sea breeze kept things manageable. But my feet were killing me and it was high time for lunch. Charlie said this was his last golf game here — he is flying home on the weekend — so he gave us all the new balls that he had not shot into the water hazards. We asked Basil, the starter, if he would store our clubs in the club storage (for members), which he did. Then we ordered lunch from the club grille. The cheese burger I ordered had neither cheese nor burger, not even a hamburger bun (they were out), but the cook substituted a slab of grilled chicken, laid it on a couple pieces of bread, put it into a plate of fries, and parked it next to my big cold Namibian beer. So that all worked out okay.

We walked home, stopping to buy a loaf of bread along the way. Back home we changed, drank a few gallons of water, then promptly both fell asleep on the couch. Meddach-schlop.

Around 5pm we felt sufficiently refreshed to sit up and look at our devices again. Man, what did we do before the internets? Happy hour on the balcony, watching all the cars go by. Another shower and a bit of suntan lotion (Sue thinks it works retroactively as well) to make my nose a little less red — I got a bit too much sun at the golf course today!

At 8 we went out for supper around the corner to a fancy burger joint. Food and service is just so great here! Sue had ribs and a salad and a glass of nice red wine, I had a burger and a huge beer…

Back home we plopped ourselves onto our couch and got the Netflix started up again. Narcos, episode 3. Let’s see if we can stay awake for another hour…