GOLF.

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 74, 27 March 1923, Page 8

GOLF.

ROTORUA GOLF LINKS. OPENING DAT. (From Our Own Correspondent.) ROTORL'A. Monday. The official opening of the Rotorua golf season took piace on Saturday afternoon (March 24), when a large number of golfers assembled on the links at Wbakarewarewa. Mr. F. W. Wllkie. the president, declared the links open for play and Mrs. Wllkie planted the 1923 Golf Club colours on the edge of No. 18 green. The piny for tbe day was a mixed foursome, and the winners proved to be Mr. and Mrs. Hingle. About sixty players took part, and all were loud in their praise of tbe work done by the new mowing machine, which has made the fairways almost like putting greens. The services of an expert are to be obtained in order to devise means of lengthening the course by about 1000 yards, so as to make it a full championship course. It should then rank as one of the best in the Dominion. The soli Is so porous that play is possible even In the rain. The surroundings are Ideal, with glimpses of Lake Itotorna and Mokoia Island, while Ngonga-I taha mountain and the timber clad hills of the Forestry Department show tip plainly j from all narts of the links. ' The hazards consist of boiling steam and mud holes, sulphur chasms, an alum lake, and an alum stream, and the whole course is well laid out with trees. The late Lord Northcliffe is credited with having said that It was tbe finest course he had played on. and the number of xipitlng golfers who use the links is increasing every year.