In anticipation of your first question -- No, this isn't a scene from Hidalgo.
It was the last night of our weekly golf league matches. This week we were playing MeadowWood. The skies were partly cloudy and it was very hot. The round began uneventfully enough and things were shaping up for another of our typically inconsistent rounds.
While playing the third hole, Mike pointed out a strange cloud low in the south. It was dark, but it was a strange color -- Brown. It obviously wasn't smoke. It was a dust cloud. By the time we got to the green, we noticed that it had moved much closer. Then in the minute or two it took us to walk to the fourth tee, it was clear we were just a few short minutes away from being overcome by the ominous cloud. That's when I snapped the photo. Given the immanence of the situation, we did the only thing that made sense. We played on.
We figured we'd go ahead and tee off and see what we were going to be in for before packing it in. [Hey, the playoffs are at stake here, and Mike and I are defending champs!] Before we could play our second shots, the winds suddenly picked up just ahead of the cloud's arrival. Visibility was cut severely and the wind was whipping the trees on the course. The group behind headed back to the clubhouse. We continued and played our second shots. By the time we were finishing up the hole, the winds were pretty severe. I later learned they had peaked at over 50 mph. It was tough just standing steadily over your ball with the wind doing its best to blow you over.
By the time we got to the next tee, it had seemed to level off. It was pretty much over two holes later. There was only a brief spit of rain, but no lightning. The wind was the worst part turned out to be the initial burst of wind. The best part about the whole thing was it had cooled off tremendously and was very comfortable for the last few holes. We ended up going on to finish an otherwise unmemorable round. Although the storm had been worse for many in the area, it wasn't too bad for us to deal with. But that said, it will still go down as one of the strangest storms I've ever seen first hand.