So we had quite possibly the most bizarre interaction this morning with another golfer that I have ever experienced. A picture is necessary to understand what happened:
My group had hit our tee shots on 5 and had walked down the hill, arrived at and identified each of our balls. Dave at position A3 had taken his practice swings and was ready to hit his approach when golfer from 4 tee comes walking across our fairway pushing his golf cart. The dotted line is his walking path. As you can see, he walked past A1 (John), X (his ball) and came over to mine at A2 before continuing on to Dave's ball at A3. As he approached me, I said "this is my ball" John says "there's two balls down at the bottom, one must be yours". He says "what's going on here, one of you must have...." and walks straight towards Dave, who has addressed the ball and is waiting to hit. Dave said "this is my ball" to which guy replies "well this is ridiculous". John again says "there's two balls down there - one is mine, the other must be yours". The entire time both Dave and I are ready to hit our shots, and this guy continues to push his cart around our fairway blocking our path to the green. At this point I said to him "what ball are you playing?" to which his response was silence.
Finally, he decides to go back to ball X, which lo and behold turned out to be his. Remember, he's in OUR fairway and two of us are ready to hit. He pulls out his rangefinder, shoots the flag, pulls a club, takes a practice swing followed by his actual swing and watches the entire flight of the ball. He puts the club back in the bag, and slowly pushes his cart back to his own fairway. The worst part? We could tell by his second shot that he was not a hacker, but apparently we were inconveniencing him since we were trying to play the hole that he happened to waywardly hit his drive into the fairway of.
Has anything similar ever happened to you? What would you have done or said in this situation? If I happen to hit my ball into a fairway that someone else is using, I wait until they clear before approaching unless they motion otherwise. This guy just went about it like we weren't even there.
My group had hit our tee shots on 5 and had walked down the hill, arrived at and identified each of our balls. Dave at position A3 had taken his practice swings and was ready to hit his approach when golfer from 4 tee comes walking across our fairway pushing his golf cart. The dotted line is his walking path. As you can see, he walked past A1 (John), X (his ball) and came over to mine at A2 before continuing on to Dave's ball at A3. As he approached me, I said "this is my ball" John says "there's two balls down at the bottom, one must be yours". He says "what's going on here, one of you must have...." and walks straight towards Dave, who has addressed the ball and is waiting to hit. Dave said "this is my ball" to which guy replies "well this is ridiculous". John again says "there's two balls down there - one is mine, the other must be yours". The entire time both Dave and I are ready to hit our shots, and this guy continues to push his cart around our fairway blocking our path to the green. At this point I said to him "what ball are you playing?" to which his response was silence.
Finally, he decides to go back to ball X, which lo and behold turned out to be his. Remember, he's in OUR fairway and two of us are ready to hit. He pulls out his rangefinder, shoots the flag, pulls a club, takes a practice swing followed by his actual swing and watches the entire flight of the ball. He puts the club back in the bag, and slowly pushes his cart back to his own fairway. The worst part? We could tell by his second shot that he was not a hacker, but apparently we were inconveniencing him since we were trying to play the hole that he happened to waywardly hit his drive into the fairway of.
Has anything similar ever happened to you? What would you have done or said in this situation? If I happen to hit my ball into a fairway that someone else is using, I wait until they clear before approaching unless they motion otherwise. This guy just went about it like we weren't even there.