We had three nights and two full days in Denver so the original plan was to play golf both days.  I then did a bit of googling on Denver and decided I wanted to do some sight seeing too so Steve thought we should play 36 holes in one day so we can sight see the next day.  I’ve never played 36 holes in a day before but was up for the challenge.

Steve had done some research re golf courses in the Denver area and the Riverdale Dunes course came highly recommended.  It was designed by Pete Dye who is one of our favourite designers.  There are actually two courses at Riverdale – the Dunes and the Knolls.  The Dunes is a Scottish style links course, meandering along the South Platte River. There are plenty of pot bunkers, mounds and water, and (naturally) the trademark railroad ties, are featured on this consistently top-rated public golf course in Colorado!

We teed off at 8am and it was already a fairly warm day.  We made good progress and finished the first 18 holes at 11.30am.  The course is really nice and visually appealing on the eye.  I had my best round of the tour, actually my best round for quite some time – I shot an 81 : )

After the first 18 holes we went in to check out what the afternoon field was looking like.  There were a few people teeing off between 12pm and 1pm so Steve decided we would get a sandwich to go and get back out there.  Not quite the way I was envisaging playing my first 36 holes – I was looking forward to a leisurely lunch in the air conditioned clubhouse.  As with Steve though, I also don’t like being stuck behind other players so would rather sacrifice the luxurious lunch and get back out there.

We teed off again at 11.45am and had free reign of the course until the 15th.  We were both playing really well and I managed to birdie the two holes again that I had birdied that morning.  I ended up shooting 80, 1 shot better than the morning round.  This 36 hole lark obviously agrees with me : ). Just quietly I also beleive I beat Steve off the stick although he was a bit cagey about his score : 0

We were all done and dusted by 3pm.

That night we had arranged to meet Nancy & Bill who live in HIghlands Ranch which is south of Denver.  We met Nancy & Bill in Kauai, Hawai in 2012 when we were horse riding and zip lining.  We have kept in touch via Facebook.  Nancy suggested a couple of places so we met at the Flights Wine Cafe in Morrison, south of Denver.  They have a great wine selection and serve tapas out of there 1870’s cottage.  We sat outside in the garden and enjoyed a lovely evening catching up.  I sampled a Sonoma Zinfandel called Sexual Chocolate – couldn’t really go wrong with a name like that : )