Day 36 - Saturday, September 24 - Montana << Index

Anticipated: Play golf at Plentywood Golf Club in Plentywood, Montana.

Travel:   Itinerary: Leave the Didkowski's for 10:00AM tee time at Plentywood Golf Club. After golf, drive to a Medicine Hat, Alberta motel. casino   States/Provinces Played:

Web: Plentywood Golf Club - Plentywood, MT

Actual: (Photos and text)

Click on the photos below to enlarge Sign – Welcome to Montana The club staff and members who welcomed us when we arrived. L to R: Valerie Bensen, Danny Buckalew, Norman Lee, Jim, Joe Nistler and Kevin Ordahl Jim and Pat at the Plentywood Golf entrance sign Jim and Pat at the welcoming sign (Jim and Pat Healey) Scenes from the golf course

After a substantial breakfast we bid goodbye to Jean and Maurice and headed west for our 36th day of golf in Plentywood, Montana. We took route 18 West to route 6 South across the border to Plentywood. We arrived at Plentywood Golf Club and as we drove into the parking lot we were astounded to see a large sign saying “Welcome Golfers, Jim and Pat Healey” directly in front of the first tee. We were met in the pro shop by a welcoming committee composed of Norman Lee, the Pro Shop Manager; Valerie Bensen, the pro shop attendant; Danny Buckalew, the greens superintendent; and Joe Nistler, a reporter from the Sheridan County News. A few minutes later Kevin Ordahl, a board member joined us. We had donuts and coffee with them as we talked about our journey. After a short while, we took some pictures, both inside and out (in front of the welcoming sign). Norm and Danny took us for a quick tour of the course. This was very thoughtful of them because it gave us some familiarity of the course before actually playing it. We teed off at 11:30 AM and finished our round at 2:00 PM. There were a few people in front of us, but they played as fast or faster than we, and we were not held up at all. Plentywood Country Club is about 80 years old. It had sand greens until 1972 when they were replaced by grass greens. The golf course is in excellent shape, both fairways and greens. There didn’t appear to be a bad lie anywhere on the fairways. The aprons (approaches to the greens) were immaculate and almost “green-like”. Several times we putted from the aprons rather than “chip”. We enjoyed the golf course very much and were sorry that we had to rush off. It was a fun course to play. Jim shot 86 (yardage = 5936) and Pat shot 107 (yardage = 5178). After our 18-holes the club served us an excellent lunch prior to our departure. The hospitality and gracious welcome of the people of Plentywood was way beyond our expectations, and we can only say an inadequate “thank you”. We’ll always remember our day at Plentywood. Earlier in our trip we had an email from Don and Cindy Setchell of Wichita, Kansas who noticed that we were playing Plentywood Country Club. The Setchells had played the course on an adventure similar to ours. They could only sing praises for the course. Another interesting email that we received earlier was from Randy Long. He is the golf professional at White Pine Golf Club in East Ely, Nevada. We are scheduled to play there on our Nevada stop. In an amazing coincidence, his home course where he grew up is Plentywood Country Club. Again, many thanks to everyone at Plentywood. Upon leaving Plentywood at 2:45 PM, we continued our westward journey. We headed north and picked up the Trans-Canada highway at Moose Jaw. We traveled about 200 miles to Swift Current, Saskatchewan where we spent the night. We will be playing Alberta tomorrow (Sunday) and British Columbia on Monday.