Martinborough Golf Round-Up

9-holers celebrating 21 years – (founding members left to right: Nita Edwards, Dinny Pearce, Jenny Tucker, Denise Sandall, Carole Butler, Ann Parkinson, Sherryl Howie, Maureen Thurlow & Carol Parkinson).

Goodbye winter, see you next year; hello spring, and already the ends of the day are creeping slowly longer – hooray!! The course is looking great and has been playing well, although some challenging days have provided some competitive scores.

Grumpies will kick us off, and big news in August was Terry Blacktop –  Grumpies head honcho and organiser of the Grumps scoring a hole-in-one on number 6, I think it’s his 3^rd on our course, plus one in Australia…not a bad tally Terrence!! Other winners have been Alan Eagle, Pete Price and Gary Cuttance.

The 9-holers celebrated a special event in August – 21 years since their first event, the founding members were there and all participants enjoyed a round of golf with cake, followed by dinner then breakfast at the Village Café.  Winners in August have included, Sherryl Howie and Jaquee Read.

Ladies golf winners last month were, Lyle Griffiths…and yes…. Julie Weber…three times; is this woman unstoppable?! … Continue Reading

Martinborough company takes a cycle tour to France

Biking beside the canal de la Garronne.

The Martinborough based business Green Jersey Explorer tours recently supported a group of fourteen people to cycle tour across south west France from Bordeaux city on the Atlantic coast, to the city of Sète on the Mediterranean coast, over 15 days. The group had an amazing experience, immersed in French countryside, culture and history as they cycled from village to village along purpose-built cycle ways or canal pathways on the Canal de la Garonne and Canal du Midi, covering about 50 to 60 kilometres a day and 850 kilometres all up on the tour.

All meals and accommodation were pre-booked and prepaid in the tour and the groups baggage was transferred forward each day by a van. Four of the fourteen people had electric assist bikes, the rest used normal hybrid bikes supplied by a French company.

Di Anderson of Eketahuna said that most of the group were “on the sunny side of 60” with no previous international cycling experience.  Whilst we all did a bit of training riding most of us would admit that we could have done more! However, we all coped and were fitter at the end than we were at the start. All we had to do was jump on our bikes each day, cycle the pre-planned route following the leader and take in the scenery”. … Continue Reading

MARTINBOROUGH’s MUSE is MOVING ON

Yes, it’s true. After forty-five years in our town, Maree Roy, Martinborough Star’s regular muse, is moving South. This will mean taking lots of memories, and the basics needed for simple living, but regretfully leaving her home here. She would love for it to ‘go to a good home’, so it’s up for sale. If you are interested, you are welcome to call/txt Maree on 0274329634, or email maree.greenfrog@gmail.com.

Our STAR readers will hopefully be pleased that Maree will still be hard at work musing on all sorts of issues and her column will continue to feature each month. Thank goodness for that!

Maree’s musings

ONE for the BIRDS

I’m probably (and hopefully) not alone in having a liking for our bird population in town. I know that can be rather a nuisance at times. If they could learn to avoid the vineyards, building nests and crapping where they shouldn’t, that would help. But they often bring joy, at least to me.

In my garden I have two hanging feed bowls for birdseed, one of those fancy pine-cone things slathered in a pot-pourri of fat, peanut butter and more birdseed, and a very classy apple-holder complete with a convenient perch. As well, there are  seven redcurrant bushes and a few cranberry shrubs which I carelessly planted under one of the birdfeeders. A garden border of strawberries too. (Note to self: think ahead when planning my next garden.)

We all know birds love bird baths and water dishes to drink from, so I’ve included three of those too. And then there’s the fishpond. Part of the morning routine involves replenishing the above. The birds are usually waiting for breakfast (that’s probably a misnomer, as they’d eat all day I reckon) and it’s only a few seconds before there’s a rush to the tuckshop. They completely ignore my cat who sits close by before grumpily giving up and coming back inside for his biscuits. Much less effort!

All this carry-on has at times inspired me to jot down a poem or two (one of my other time-wasting passions); so I thought you would like to share the ones here. For the experts, they are ‘haiku’ – which are three line verses of five, seven and five syllables, and contain a single idea. A bonus: they don’t take long to write down, though thinking them up is sometimes not so easy.

Enjoy! … Continue Reading