These were the days when you could down something a bit stronger than that ginger beer and didn't even think about plotting a course home to avoid being picked up by the local constabulary.

But, please take me back even further in time, to hickory-shafted clubs and the old gutta percha golf ball. Back to a time when the golfers' apparel included an inner pocket specifically sewed into the waistcoat that would hold a flask of the finest scotch whiskey to help ease the nerves when trying to hole a six-inch putt on greens prepared by a herd of goats.

Back to when you carried half a dozen clubs at most, and walked to and from the course with your lightweight leather golf bag slung over your shoulder.

Back to the days of Old Tom Morris, the mashie, the cleek, the niblick and a time when the course superintendent was that herd of goats.

And that's what it was at The Old Course - not in St Andrews, Scotland - but along that magnificent coastline from Beilbys Beach to the Pilot Hill lookout west to where Pilot St is now located.

A course with no finer backdrop on Earth! That par 3 where the green is still visible atop the headland at Beilbys Beach. You could easily imagine you were playing the 7th hole at Pebble Beach!

Yes, the old course was five holes of golfing perfection, with a clubhouse that should have been heritage listed and a garden which is still visible today, filled with Dame Edna's favourite flowers, gladioli.

And then progress swept through the golfing scene well before the Great White Shark started devouring opponents on his way to another tragic loss at The Masters.

Suddenly, five holes of golfing anxiety wasn't enough. We needed nine holes!

And that was available on The Island, Stuart Island, named after an early European settler.

The decision to start playing golf on an island in the middle of the Nambucca River instead of beside Beilbys Beach was obviously that of a golfing masochist. Instead of losing your golf ball and your marbles on only the coastal side of the course, now you had 360 degrees of out of bounds and water trouble.

Who in their right mind would go from a beautiful seaside location to an island in the middle of the river surrounded by mangroves, oyster leases, tidal waters, plovers, floods etc

But to their credit those golfing smarties all those years ago did lock up a piece of heaven and earth for the benefit of the local community and all future golfers with metal drivers who could hit the ball almost up to Pelican Park!

But developing anything on an island does come with a few drawbacks.

And the first was, how do you get over there?

If you owned a rowboat, fine.

A ferry service, although quaint, was obviously ruled out. So instead of building a bridge the local brains trust decided on a causeway.

If you look up the word causeway in the dictionary it refers to an island reached at low tide by a raised roadway.

What then happens at high tide?

Well what has happened is that many golfers over the years, whether by studying the tide charts and weather reports or by luck, have been trapped in the clubhouse. Not able to traverse the causeway due to king tides or rising floodwaters, their only course of action has been to have one more for the road.

As we are now well aware, Donald Trump likes to Golf. Does that mean that Roger Federer likes to tennis or that Don Bradman liked to cricket?

The Burns clan certainly liked to golf - and they ruled over the nine hole course. Cecil, Syd, Bob, Russell, Brian and Wayne were sticklers for the rules of golf and for playing the game hard and fair.

And they were champion golfers. When they were at the peak of their powers with all the golfing gods lined up, the combined handicap of those six blokes was about 5! Basically, they were bloody good at hitting a ball around the place.

I know Bob alone was on about plus-5 and that was after having a few schooners before he hit off.

Throw in Brian, who I believe was the best of the lot, before his car accident - and it really was a golfing dynasty.

Then there was Rick Channels, the only bloke who could hit a drive with the trajectory of the flight path of the Concorde, and Ian Vidler, a master tactician and golfing maestro.

These blokes liked to golf and unlike many of us other imposters, golf liked them!

But there was some light hearted gamesmanship between the two elder statesmen of the Burns clan. I remember one day, on the 1st tee of the original nine hole course, Cec was at the top of his backswing when Syd rattled the keys in his pocket. Cec was completely undaunted. Unbeknown to brother Syd, Cecil was already planning his revenge.

Cecil and Syd Burns were golfing opposites. Cecil was Bob Charles, a lefty with a well worn set of clubs but with a great eye and fine touch. Syd on the other hand was a bit more flash. His golfing apparel, clubs and bag always seemed to say, Doug Sanders, that 'peacock of the fairways'.

Like the local tycoon, Hughie Waugh, who was very flash, sporting a gold tooth and always immaculately dressed on the course with long socks that never fell down around his ankles even after two laps of the nine hole layout.

Hughie had a motorised golf buggy at a time when lots of blokes didn't even have a push cart, and he wore a copper bracelet and a gold chain. Add to that a finely sculptured moustache and when the sun twinkled on his gold tooth he was 'dripping 10 pound notes'.

Hughie was a gentleman and always encouraged us young blokes to be aspirational.

There was another Syd playing golf at the time, Syd Brassington. Poor old Syd had a severe hearing loss and his hearing aids didn't always function as they should. But we soon cottoned on to his ploy. Whenever his ball rolled into the rough or a sandy lie he would turn his hearing aids off before kicking his ball into a more favourable position.

We all saw it as a bit of a laugh, including Syd.

Playing on an island brought with it interaction with estuarine creatures. One day on the riverside of the old 6th fairway, a bloke was getting set to hit a 3 iron into a strong nor easter when his concentration was broken as a mullet jumped out of the river and landed on the fairway.

Quite regularly the opposite happened. Golf balls, rather than landing on the fairway more often than not splashed into the Nambucca River. In fact, a school mate of mine, another one with the name of Burns. Shane 'Bruiser' Burns could hit a long straight drive. Only problem was - long and straight into the water, especially on the Par 5, 2^nd.

Talk about things flying off the course and that 2^nd hole ... one day, as told to me by Cec Burns, many years ago, a club manager in the early years on The Island had finally come to his wits end with the game. He said to his playing partners: "That's it, @#$% golf", and proceeded to throw each individual club, ball, tee, the bag and finally his buggy into the creek and was never seen on the course again!

And then, another change swept through the golfing landscape when the breathalyser arrived in town, when we began hitting metal woods, when the golf ball became bigger and when The Island became 18 holes.

It was a different world!

On reflection, take me back to a leisurely five holes beside the seaside with the goats, a club whittled from the driftwood behind Wellington Rock, a ball made from chook feathers and shark skin, a leather bag over my shoulder and that flask of whiskey.

Put a split cane fishin' rod over the other shoulder with a few fresh beach worms for bait and a short walk home from a day's golf with a bit of a glow up - no problems with the coppers and a couple of freshly caught bream from behind Johnson's Rock near Shelly Beach.

A Thank You

Us young blokes were very lucky in the days of the nine hole course. Doug and Muriel Channels, Cecil and Syd Burns, Peter Jackman, Bob Ellis, Val and Mike Ryan and many others either ran the sub-juniors or were always available to support us all with a friendly word of encouragement.

The pace of progress in Nambucca

Macksville lighting up for Christmas