Friday was a gorgeous start to the New Year’s weekend at Nonesuch River Golf Club in Scarborough, with green fairways, bright sun and clear skies. Except for a thin sheen of ice on the ponds and the bundled-up golfers, it could have been a mid-fall day instead of the final moments of December.

For friends Barry Ross of Kennebunk and Bruce Crawford of Gorham, golfing nine holes on Dec. 29 – in Maine – was as much about the novelty as it was about their love of golf.

“It’s fun to be able to say we’ve played on the last days of December,” said Crawford.

So far, rather than a winter wonderland, most people have been wondering about winter. The only snowfall to hit Maine this season was the paltry storm last Saturday. One to 3 inches fell across Maine and New Hampshire, with 3 to 5 inches accumulating in some areas. Rain on New Year’s Day turned the snow to slush, and most of that melted on a sunny Tuesday.

Records from 1940 kept by the National Weather Service in Gray show that this December is unseasonably warm. As of Friday when Ross and Crawford hit the greens, the average temperature for the month was 35.3 -7 degrees above the normal December average. The warmest winter was in 2001, when the average temperature for the entire season was 34.8 degrees.

Daniel Hourihan, the owner and general manager of Nonesuch, said that the oddity of golfing in Maine during the winter draws people in. On Friday afternoon, he added, about 35 golfers came to shoot a few holes.

“It’s kind of a novelty,” said Hourihan. “They’re out here because they can say they’ve golfed in December.”

“We keep putting our clubs away for the season,” said Ross. “First we put them away at Halloween, and thought that was the last time,” he added. “Then we thought Thanksgiving was the last time – and here we are, after Christmas, and we’re playing.”

This coming week shows no signs of cooling down either, said Butch Roberts with the National Weather Service in Gray.

“We’re going to be warm for the next week,” said Roberts. The Weather Service predicts temperatures that will hover in the high 30s to mid 40s for the rest of this week and into the weekend.

“It’s going to be a fun year to study,” said Roberts. “Though it’s kind of scary, too.”

The problem, said Roberts, is that for some reason, all the cold air is staying in Canada – though it’s only a matter of time before it finally makes its way to Maine.

“That cold air is going to build up and eventually break through,” said Roberts.

Nationally, said Greg Romano with the National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center, based in Washington, D.C., a milder winter can be partially blamed on a weak El Nino in the Pacific Ocean.

For Hourihan and all the avid golfers, warmer weather means more time to get out on the course.

Hourihan, who began Nonesuch 10 years ago, remembers staying open until January back in 2000, and in recent years has typically kept the course open until December. This year, Nonesuch opened in March and will stay open until the first real snowfall finally forces him to close up for the season. Until then, if the weather is nice, said Hourihan, the course will be open, run by a smaller staff of six to 10 people.

“We’re known as the course that stays open,” said Hourihan, who managed to fit in a nine-hole game himself the day before. “Our motto is first to open and last to close.”

Outside, Ross and Crawford decided to call it quits after nine holes. The weather may have been too warm for snow, but the biting wind still managed to make its way through gloves, parkas and hats.

“We just ran out of steam,” said Ross. “It’s just too cold. With the wind chill, it feels like it’s zero.”

Golfers at Nonesuch River Golf Club in Scarborough took advantage of warmer weather and a lack of snow to play a round last Friday. Barry Ross of Kennebunk lined up a shot at the ninth hole before calling it quits due to the cold wind. Barry Ross, left, and friend Bruce Crawford were able to continue their golf season into the final days of Decemember and plan to play until stopped by snow.