About six years ago I saw a monkey on a golf course in the North Carolina Mountains. I wish it wasn’t true. But it is. I promise.

My dad, my two brothers, and I were playing at Highlands Cove Golf Club, which is now the Old Edwards Inn Course. Oddly enough, I can’t really remember much else about that day. I don’t remember starting the round. I don’t remember finishing the round. I don’t remember what I shot (for non-golfers, that means my score), although if I really am honest, I bet it was over 100 (for you non-golfers, that is not good).

Here are the things I remember. It was a gorgeous day in the month of June, near Father’s Day. It cost $100 per person, but I had a gift certificate that I won at the school’s end of the year party and raffle. Actually, I think I traded it with someone. Seems like I had some sort of picnic bag and the other person had no interest in playing golf. We both won. There is no way I would have paid $400 for our crew to play a round of golf.

The thing that makes me remember it was so nice out was that my brother, JR, was taking lots of pictures. There were so many amazing views that it was tough to play well (haha…golfers always make excuses for their poor play). I cannot say enough to explain how pretty it was. Sunny. Not too hot. Exactly what you want to see when you are in the mountains and when playing golf.

We were having a good time together, as we always do. Making fun of each other but all in love. Three of us, I think, were on the 5th green. I believe I was standing over my putt; probably a birdie putt…it seems like my dad was still down in a little dry creek bed in front of the green. It had tall grass so that if he were on the other side of us, we wouldn’t be able to see him. I really don’t remember exactly where he was at that point, but I know he had been down in there looking for a ball. (Later he said that he heard or sensed something was in the tall grass). He probably started there looking for his own ball, but then started scavenging, which is pretty common for the Cox boys on a golf course.

As I was looking down at my ball about to putt, my youngest brother, Anthony, started saying in an excited but confused voice, “whoa, whoa, whoa..it’s a monkey!”

Hahahahaha…just writing that now makes me laugh out loud and my eyes start watering….

Anthony is funny in a nerdy kind of way. But he is not a goofball. I and my brother JR could be classified as goofballs. But JR is also smart.
I looked at Anthony…he was pointing…his face demonstrated a look of excited apprehension. He was confused. I looked over toward the dry creek bed and tall grass at the front of the green. This little spider-monkey-looking-thing was stopped, staring at us, maybe 50 feet away. It had a snake in its mouth, biting it right in the middle with half of the the 2 foot long snake on each side of its mouth hanging down. I’m not kidding.

This guy stared at us for just a few seconds, but long enough for us to really get a great look. It was sort of like it was looking at us and sizing us up. Not to attack us. Although, I was genuinely nervous. I just assumed it could have and wanted to jump from that point right onto my face. In hindsight, it felt like it was looking at us and thinking, “are these dudes worth my time? will anyone believe them that they saw me here?….nah, nobody will believe these fools…” then he dashed off with that snake in its mouth into the nearby woods. But not too fast. He wasn’t scared. He was confident that we were not coming after him and that nobody would ever believe us.

WHAT?

I said, “WHERE ARE WE?…Are we really in North Carolina?” I seriously had to question where we were. We chattered. I don’t remember what else we said exactly. I just know we looked at each other, recounted what we saw, asked if it could have been a squirrel, a fox, or anything. We kept coming back to the fact that we just saw a monkey. The way it ran (on two feet), its size, its tail, and the fact that it looked EXACTLY LIKE A MONKEY.

We all wondered then and still wonder why JR did not take a picture. All I can say is that I completely understand. We were stunned. Shocked. Confused. All we could do at the moment was look with our mouths open and try our best to individually to process what we were seeing.

Then it was over.

When we made the turn (came to the clubhouse to go from hole 9 to hole 10…which means we were half way through our round) I approached and asked the cart guy if they there were monkeys on the course. Before he answered, I assured him with visual evidence that NONE of us were drinking alcohol (none of us really do…and I know some of you were assuming we were…completely understandable).

He said in a slight southern drawl, “Nooo. But we do have a bunch of bear.” Then started telling us about the most recent sighting. I have no recollection of that story. I said, “Well, we just saw a monkey, on #5 green.” He was unimpressed and displayed no interest in our story.

We went on, still quite confused, unsettled, laughing, but really wanting some help. We didn’t want to have just seen a monkey, unless this was a reasonably common sight here on this Alice in Wonder Land Golf Course.

A few holes later, keep in mind that I do not remember any actual golf that day except for my putt on #5 (which I missed), we saw some grounds crew guys. This was it! These guys would know. They are out early and often all around the course. No doubt they have seen or at least heard about the wildlife here.

Being the spokesperson for the group, I said to the six or seven guys, who were all lined up on there respective lawn mowing machines waiting for us to play through, “hi guys, have any of you ever seen a MONKEY out here?”. They just looked at me. They gave no sign of interest. They just looked at me. It dawned on me that they may not speak English. So, I asked if any of them spoke English, “habla ingles?” Then they started to look at each other and speak Spanish. I know SOME Spanish, but I can’t follow a conversation. They ended up pointing out one guy, and he said, “I do.” So I asked him again the same question. And before he answered, I told him what we saw. He said, “I have only been here one week.” I said, “Oh. OK. Can you ask them if they have ever seen a monkey out here?” He did. I think. Who knows what he said. Then he just said, “no…they haven’t”.

They too seemed unimpressed and uninterested.

We ended the round. Went home. Told our families. They laughed at us. Not with us. At us.

JR emailed us a picture later that day that looked like the monkey we saw. I think it was a rhesus monkey. It did look like what we saw. Look here at this picture that JR inserted.

Now picture it on a North Carolina golf course, with a snake in its mouth. Yep. That’s it. That’s what we saw.

Mistakenly I started to tell others that story. Of course, not one person believed us. There was one time when I was being forced to tell this story at a coaches get together so they could all laugh at me…well…this guy stopped me. I know the following is not going to help support our story…this guy is a great guy, sort of a southern guy, basically, he told us that his Uncle Cletus, hunts in the area and has for years told people that he has seen a monkey out there more than once.

Well, everyone just laughed even more. Uncle Cletus is always the guy you want on your side when trying to prove you saw a monkey on a golf course in the mountains.

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t care if people laugh. It is funny. Very funny. But I’m telling you. We saw a monkey.

My friend Pastor Allen Speegle uses an excellent phrase that applies here. It is best used when speaking of our relationship with God and the Truth that is known to us individually. But I think it applies perfectly here too.

“A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument.”

We saw a monkey. Your belief in our story does not make it true or untrue. Our experience is all we need.

But, honestly, if anyone out there does in fact believe our story, it would feel nice to be believed. hahahaha