It's been a long three months for Taylors Lakes resident John Williams, but on Saturday morning, he packed up the car and made it to the Trentham Golf Club to have a swing in the open air.
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"(I played) awful this morning, but it doesn't matter, I don't care about the golf, it's just about getting out there," he said.
"It's a bit of exercise and fresh air, and catching up with some guys that are regional - we're metropolitan, so we haven't caught up in months."
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The club was packed on Saturday, with more than 120 golfers taking to the course in the sunshine, many of them from metropolitan Melbourne.
"Trentham's easy to get to, it's a good course with good amenities, and terrific people in the club house, it's very relaxed," Mr Williams said.
"We just had lunch here, spending a bit of money on a bite to eat, then I'll stop at Woodend on the way back."
Club volunteer Graeme Smith said membership numbers had shot up since the pandemic began, almost doubling in 18 months.
"Through COVID, we've noticed people reconnecting with their local course - we thought the numbers would go down, but they've done exactly the opposite," he said.
"We have quite a lot of members from metropolitan Melbourne, and Bacchus Marsh and Melton that have also had challenging times.
"I have no doubt that at 6pm (Friday) night, people were lined up at McDonalds somewhere on the freeway ready for it."
Trentham lost power for most of Friday, as the township recovered from a second massive storm, however there was a notable positive energy.
On the main street, Mark and Ruth Mills and their team at the Plough Trentham was preparing for its postponed grand opening - the power outage had caused a bit of a scramble in the morning, but it was all systems go for a sunny afternoon in the refurbished beer garden.
"It's actually a relief, it's like now is the time that we aren't going to be locked down, we shouldn't be, we're going to open up and have business as normal," Mr Mills said.
"People come here and stay for the whole weekend, they get in their car and drive to the next town for lunch and shopping, then they drive to the next town the next day and do the same thing."
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Ms Mills added she felt "like we were about to go on stage" ahead of a fully-booked Sunday.
"We've invested everything we could knowing that we've got the support of the double-vaccination - Melbourne is coming out to the regions, a lot of people are coming," she said.
"Before lockdown, we had 80 bookings, but when Melbourne was locked down, regions only, we had four - these are Melbourne people, it's a great day trip.
"We're ready for them, we're excited, it'll be good."
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