Golf Safari: Melbourne

I'm currently privileged to live in an area of Melbourne which is blessed with not one, not two, but four Golf Safari Parks.  You may know these parks by their more common name of 'Golf Club' but let me tell you, there is more to these establishments than meets the eye.

Exhibit entry space.  Exhibits are characterised by a fondness for big shiny things (gates, driveways, abodes, cars) and manicured lawns and gardens. The GSP seeks to replicate this environment for them, including providing unimportant people to do the shining and manicuring as required.  General drive throughs by the observational public are not welcome as this may disturb the exhibits. 

Golf Safari Parks (GSPs) are carefully curated to allow the general public to observe golfing behaviours and, in a curious twist, the exhibits usually live off-site and pay handsomely to attend the park.  While there they are provided with food and beverages, usually in a pavilion purpose-built for this.  The general public can, for a fee, attend these facilities and partake with the exhibits thereby providing a rare opportunity to see them en masse and observe more closely a sub-variant of golfing behaviour known as 'networking'.

Food and drink pavilion.

My local GSPs have provided ample opportunity to view the exhibits in their natural golfing habitat, in some cases running observation paths between two GSPs to provide a full immersive viewing experience.

GSPs to the left and right, and viewing path designed to blend in with the natural habitat.

Manicured lawns and sand traps are carefully curated to encourage the exhibits to express the full range of golfing emotions from joy and exhilaration through to rage, despair, and sycophancy.  The fortunate observer, if watching closely, may also catch a glimpse of the common but usually well-concealed cheating behaviours which manifest in many differing iterations.

The chain link fence is necessary not due to aggression on the part of the exhibits (they are usually quite passive given that they are carrying heavy metal clubs) but to ensure the observers' safety.  It is a sad fact that the exhibits tend to overestimate their ability to accurately direct the golf ball in the appropriate direction.

The exhibits usually travel in separated groups of males or females, the females being on average rarer  and slightly more colourful than the males.  Sadly, there were no female groupings on display during my tour.

The word on the street is that the opportunity to tour the GSPs is decreasing as the exhibits are donning lycra, forming large rolling packs, and moving from the safety of the Safari Parks to the open streets where the speed of their movement deems them harder to observe and the snugness of their lycra often renders close observation unpalatable anyway.  With this sadly in mind, it has indeed been a rare privilege to live so close to so many GSPs, and to be able to casually observe the exhibits as I walked the dog in the morning. 

 I hope you've enjoyed sharing these safari tour insights, and that you will take the opportunity to appreciate the exhibits when next you amble past your local golf club Safari Park while walking your dog.