John and I went to Wilco again and ignored the closed sign. The course was actually dry enough to play. We spotted a baby deer and a jackrabbit out on the course.

I finally had a good first throw on hole 3 — probably my best throw ever on that hole. It landed right in the middle of the fairway. This hole is pretty tough. You have to throw a curving left shot that misses the wall of bushes on the left, the tree in the middle, and the cactus and brush on the right.

We ended early when it started to rain again. We didn’t want to destroy the course. It was interesting. You could actually feel the temperature drop before the rainfall. Talk about evaporative cooling…

The group decided to play Cat Hollow today. Or, should I say that John decided to play Cat Hollow and everyone else agreed. It looks like someone was out putting on hole 18 during the night. And they left a bunch of mini glow sticks taped up on the basket. And they also left about 8 laying around on the ground as well. Sigh. I wish these people would clean up after themselves…

Roxana finally played with us after about a year of an absence. Nick taught us the game of Troll (which is a five player game). An ordering of the group is determined. The last player will get to pick which one of the previous four that they will partner with. However, they must decide after each person’s first throw. If someone is picked, then they will be a team against the other three players. And if a team wins the hole, then all players on that team will get a point. If no team wins, then it is a push and the points are carried over to the next hole. The last person also has the option of deciding to go by themselves (making a team of four against that person). Whichever team wins the hole will score double. On the next hole, the ordering is rotated. So every person will have a chance to go last. Also, we only play 15 holes (an even multiple of 5) for the game (only in the case of ties will we continue playing more holes).

Some interesting dynamics come up in the course of playing this game. You may want to purposely throw into the ground in order to make the person who is choosing pick someone else (or even be forced to go by themselves).

John also decided that the group would eat at Extreme Pizza. I was not in the mood to eat pizza, so I went somewhere else…

John and I bit the bullet and bought a yearly pass at Wilco. Since the tennis pro shop closes at 1pm, we show up at 12:30ish. Which is right when it starts to rain. Gravitt calls me up on the cell phone and asks if we should abort disc golf, but I tell him to toughen up. When I park, it starts to rain very hard (at least a couple of inches per hour hard). However, after we finally pay for the memberships, the rain stops. So we head out…

I had a good approach shot on hole 1. With trees in the middle of the course, my usual throw goes off to the left and then fades much harder to the left. So when this shot angled off to the far right and missed the trees, I was happy.

The course was muddy. And this course needs a lot more improvements to be made. Like: more mulch where there is just dirt paths, concrete tee boxes, and perhaps some buffalo grass seed planted in the middle of the course. But what was really surprising today, was when we got to hole 16, the ground was completely dry! There was no sign at all that it had rained not an hour earlier. Talk about the ground soaking up all the water…

The group decided to play at Old Settler’s Park today before it got too hot (since there is scarcely any shade trees around). They have recently put some signage up. Also, there are signs at the park entrance for all of the sports (baseball, tennis, etc) except for disc golf. Glaring omission, I say.

We started out strong with our first shot bouncing off a tree and into the water. It was just not John’s day.

I had a birdie on hole 12. And on hole 9, I was almost beamed by a disc. I was out in front of the group (usually not a good thing). I heard “four.” And then “really four.” When I turn around, I see a disc about to hit me. As I duck, the disc brushes my hair!

You know, this new flood stage marker is quite scary, if you think about it. The mark just under the sign at the top is twenty one feet above the water level. Do they really think that the water will get that high? I mean, that is over my head on top of this dam! If it gets anywhere near that level, I will definitely not be playing disc golf. Instead, I will be building an ark…

Seven people made it out today. Two teams of two and Curt, John, and myself playing solo.

Stephanie managed to throw her disc in the water. And Jon took that opportunity to go wade in the water and retrieve it. He found another disc for his efforts, but didn’t keep it.

This Friday I decided to go to Wilco. As I need work on precise throws. Old Settlers with its extremely wide open areas really does a number on you. It shows when you try and keep your disc in a twisty corridor about forty feet wide. And it shows when you lose to Gravitt two or three strokes per hole. Not fun…

The group went to Wilco today and I barely made it in time. I finished biking at 9:10, quickly changed clothes, and drove out stopping by Rudy’s since I was starving.

Ugh. And today was another poor day for me. But at least other people were doing poorly as well, so I wasn’t that bummed. I actually didn’t finish a hole after throwing into a bush, getting spider webs on my glasses, throwing it into another bush, getting my glasses covered in spider webs, and then throwing it across to the other side and into some more bushes…

We ate lunch at Chuy’s. John tried to get us to play a game (Nicht die Bohne!). This is a good game and I was willing to play it. But the huge table full of drinks, chips, dips, and food kinda precluded us from playing it. John was amusing though and used a tortilla to cover the heavily smoking fajitas.

Afterwards, John and I stopped by Old Settler’s park for a tournament. They were running late (no surprise there). But I was glad to take some pictures as we sat in the shade next to hole 1’s tee box. Most of the people that we watched throw are able to throw farther than us (within range of the basket). And they make it look so easy.

The group met today at Cat Hollow for some disc golf. Eight people were in attendance, which is definitely too large for my tastes. John surprised me by buying a small seat for disc golf. I had jokingly told him to get one. But I never thought he would actually go out and buy it. With the large bag, many discs, the harness, the shoes, and now the seat, I think that he owns every disc golf accessory.

Notice the blue tooth receiver dangling off of his ear? Even almost losing it last week was not discouragement enough for today.

I got my first birdie on hole 1! I had to squeeze back into a grape-vine covered bush to putt, but that was not going to stop me from trying. And on hole 3, I had a good throw as well, but was not able to convert that one into another birdie.

As well with this shot too. Close, and challenging but unable to follow through.

We ate lunch at Extreme Pizza. And ended up playing a simultaneous round of Tichu and mini Bridge, a round of Mu, and then finally a game of Tichu. Where John called, and made, a Grand Tichu on the first hand. Way to be aggressive, John!

John and I then drove up to Temple to scout out the disc golf courses up there. We heard that there were two of them. Unfortunately, Temple is 50 miles north east of Round Rock. Which puts it about the same distance away as Dripping Springs would be.

The baskets were the professional disc catchers by Innova. They have informative metal signs. And concrete tee pads. All are good things for a course to have.

But we came at a really bad time. With all of the recent and heavy rains, the course was majorly flooded and unplayable. At least Old Settlers is playable when it floods. Notice that tree and brush line on the left? And the wide open space on the right?

Well, John found the tree line. With a vengeance.

Hole two was unplayable. And, unfortunately, we could not figure out where hole three would be since the tees were also flooded. We eventually found hole 6.

We played the rest of the course. Jumping across a raging stream or two. Sadly, both myself and John lost a disc at that course.

One of the roads was closed in the park (presumably due to flooding). But we needed that road to drive to the other course. So we wandered around Temple for a bit. And finally connected up to a road which lead to the other course. Which was much more open and less challenging. So we ditched it and drove home.

After the cruise was over, Jon and I went to play disc golf at Pease Park since it was so close. It seems that the Poison Ivy warnings are up in force…

It seems that they changed a couple of holes here. Hole 13, instead of being a short run up a hill, is now a much longer hole.

And hole 14 is also a tighter run through the cedar trees.

All in all, it was a fun day and it sure beats working.

I seem to be on the outs with the group. They purposely schedule the starting time earlier than I can make. Oh, well. This morning, I only got 5 hours sleep. But I felt fine and up for a ride. I knew that I wasn’t going to make the deadline so I opted for a longer ride of 30 miles. I ended up playing disc golf at 11.

As soon as this throw left my hand, I knew it was going to be good: low, straight, and far. And an easy birdie to make.

The group went to Wilco today. We had two new players with us. The first was Traci, who is new to disc golf. And the other was Wayne, who has been playing disc golf for some months now.

Someone spotted a disc stuck on the top of a tree. Can you spot it in this low quality picture? Sadly, Jon refused to climb up the tree to retrieve it. Has he lost his super powers?

We had three teams today and I was playing with the women in the group. One of whom is a pro now after playing in a tournament at this very course! I was throwing quite poorly today.

At hole 16, Traci sat down and complained about heat exhaustion. Nick was kind and rescued her. He stopped playing, went out to the parking lot, drove his SUV (which he bought for 10 dollars or something really low) out onto the course to pick up Traci, and then drove her to Rudy’s to wait for us.

On the way out, we came across this tiny grass snake. Who had a paparazzi moment when we started taking pictures of it…