Bonjour Mes Amis!

Well, if the weather holds up, it looks like I'll do it, my friends. Now that a new administration is in place in France, it is safe for me to travel to the country. I have some important business in France with the Sarkozy administration, and a bit of a side trip to play golf could be in order. My passport has a new "Roissy" stamp, reflecting my recent arrival through Charles De Gaulle airport.



It has been over ten years since I have been to Paris and my transport this time was not as glamarous as the Concorde I took last time, but if things work out, this could be quite a trip.

Could it be I will be lucky enough to play my dream French course of Morfontaine this week? Stay tuned for a blow by blow account of this week's activities and please pray for good weather for me.

Baltimore (Five Farms) East Course

The East Course at Baltimore Country Club, known as Five Farms, is ranked #91 in the world. Five Farms, designed by A.W. Tillinghast, officially opened in September of 1926. Baltimore Country Club is located in two locations - one near the city and one north of the city, in the affluent horse-country suburbs. Word to the wise - make sure you go to the right campus if you are going to play the Five Farms Course, which is located in Lutherville, Maryland.

Straight to the point - the course is on the list because it is a Tillinghast gem. It has two of the best par fives he has designed: the par five 6th hole and the par five 14th hole. Tillinghast's other great par five is the 4th at Bethpage Black. The 14th hole at Five Farms is not just one of Tillinghast's best par fives, it is one of the best holes in all of golf, regardless of par or the course architect.

The clubhouse and fences

A road runs through the Five Farms course, as it does at many of the world's great courses. The first two holes are near the clubhouse and then you cross over Mays Chapel Road and play the remaining sixteen holes.

Tillinghast had a great piece of rolling terrain at Five Farms, and he made the most of it. The course is characterized by sweeping fairways, a great variety of dog legs and a nice mix of uphill and downhill shots. There is none of the hole after hole of relatively straight fairways, choked with trees, like you find at Tillinghast's Baltusrol and Winged Foot.

The course also has a nice use of cross-bunkers strategically placed on various holes, and many of the holes have back to front pitched greens. The use of elevated greens is also a characteristic of the course. More than half of the holes have elevated greens, sometimes severely elevated, so that a shot hit short will roll back to the bottom of a hill.

The par three 4th

The unmistakable classic Tillinghast bunkering is present at Five Farms, as you can see from the elevated par three 4th hole.

The par five 6th approach to the green

There are only two par fives on the course, and both are world-class. All the holes at Five Farms have a name. The sixth ("Barn") is the only par five on the front and has similarities to the Road Hole at St. Andrews. There is a red barn on the left side of the fairway that a daring hitter can try to hit over to cut the corner, similar to hitting over The Old Course Hotel on the 17th at St. Andrews. It is a classic risk-reward decision. Going for it will leave you with a shot into the green for eagle. Missing the shot will either leave you O.B. or in deep trouble. The hole is a sharp dogleg left after you drive the ball. The fairway on the hole sweeps from left to right, and there is a cross-bunker in the fairway to catch second shots that are topped.

The "Barn" 6th hole

You can land your approach shot short of the green short and the ball will roll up. A shot hit over the green leaves you with a difficult sand shot back to a green that runs away from you.

A World Class Hole

Hole #14 is a 603 yard par five known as Hell's Half Acre and is outstanding in every regard. The hole is a dogleg to the left and Tillinghast uses the terrain perfectly, following the contours of the hills. The four pictures below try to capture the majesty of this hole. After hitting your tee shot, you have to hit over "Hell's Half Acre", which is a mix of bunkers, high grasses and mounds. If you hit a successful second shot your ball is at the bottom of a hill, leaving you an uphill shot to an elevated, well-bunkered green. The green is very fast with a big front to back slope. There are perfectly sculpted, mature specimen trees framing the hole. The use of trees at Five Farms was done artfully throughout the course. They serve as focal points and backdrops and rarely come directly into play unless you are wildly off line. As an example, see the tree framing the 14th green below.

The approach shot on the fabulous 14th hole

The 14th hole as seen from Hell's Half Acre

14th green

I'm not sure you can pick it up from the pictures, but they are taken from atop a hill and look down to the elevated green, with a big valley in between. The 2nd shot on this par five is a blind shot since the hazards and slope of the fairway blocks your view. As you walk down the hole, the fairway and hazards become ever more visible, and the splendor and strategic options of the hole become apparent. As I walked up the fairway and the hole unfolded in front of me, I kept saying out loud, "wow", it is that good a hole.

I thought that the 6th, 7th and 8th holes were a brilliant stretch of golf, characteristic of the course. The 7th, appropriately named "Dogleg", is a 345 yard dogleg left with a sweeping hill to a well protected fast green that slopes front to back. The 8th hole ("Sidesaddle"), seen below, is a 345 yard dogleg right, also with sloping terrain to a well bunkered green. This is typical of the routing at Five Farms, a dog leg right, followed by a dogleg left, that makes for such an interesting and varied layout.

8th hole - "Sidesaddle"

Baltimore Country Club was founded in 1898, two years after Merion. The course has hosted several major championships, although the 1899 U.S. Open was played on a course that is no longer in existence at Roland Park. The Five Farms course hosted the 1928 PGA Championship, 1932 United States Amateur and the 1965 Walker Cup.

Having played seven of Tillinghast's courses thus far, I would rank Five Farms behind San Francisco and Bethpage Black but ahead of both courses at Winged Foot and Baltusrol. It's a more interesting layout than these latter four tracks.

I was hosted at Five Firms by a fellow golf aficionado who was a real gentleman and has played as many world-ranked courses as I have. We shared a real love of the same courses particularly National Golf Links of America, Yeamans Hall, Myopia Hunt Club and Sand Hills. The professionals at Five Farms are the most fashionable and well-dressed pros I have ever met. Aside from a world-class layout, Baltimore has everything I like in a course: we played fast, walked with caddies, there are no cart paths to mar the beauty, and cell phones have to stay in your car.

St. George's Golf and Country Club

Canada is a great and under-appreciated country, often overshadowed by its big, loud, boisterous and crazy cousin to the south. However, it is only right to give Canada the respect it deserves in the world. It is clean, has stunning beauty, welcomes immigrants, is tolerant of people of all races and religions and of great importance to a cigar smoker, has normal relations with Cuba. I will always remember that the Canadians helped America immensely during the debacle of a hostage crisis under Jimmy Carter. The Canadian embassy in Tehran rescued and evacuated six American hostages at great risk to themselves. It was appreciated then as now. Thank you, our friends. Canadians also played a major role in liberating Europe, taking Juno beach in the D-Day invasions along the Normandy coast. Canadian troops are also fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan. Like an unappreciated friend, it is a reliable comrade and one that we shouldn't take for granted, although they do need to rein in those Québécois, in my view.

Much like Canada in general, the golf courses of this great nation are underrated as well. Canada has some spectacular golf courses that consistently rank among the world's best. If there were more balance among the golf course raters (read less Americans), no doubt more Canadian courses would make the ranks. However, let's not get too far off on a tangent here and focus on the course at hand, which is St. George's Golf and Country Club (ranked #95 in the world), located in Toronto.

St. George's Golf and Country Club

Not to be confused with Royal St. George's in England, St. George's Golf and Country Club is located in Etobicoke, Ontario, part of greater Toronto. The course was originally known as the Royal York Golf Club and opened for play in 1929. The golf course was designed by the famous Canadian golf course architect Stanley Thompson. Thompson built or remodeled almost ninety courses over a ten year period in the 1920s, including Highlands Links, ranked #64 on the top 100 list, located in Nova Scotia. Thompson also designed the Canadian courses Capilano, Banff and Jasper. Royal York always had a great reputation as being one of the best in the world. It was ranked #62 in the world in 1939.

After reading Thompson's biography, I think I would have liked him very much. "The Toronto Terror", as he was called, liked cigars, 15-ounce steaks and whiskey. My kind of guy. He also liked to wear fedoras and three-piece suits with a watch chain hooked into his vest pockets.

Canadian architect Stanley Thompson

The golf course was built as a public golf course owned by Canadian Pacific Railways Hotel and was converted into a private club in 1934. The course played host to the Canadian Open in 1933, 1949, 1960 and 1968, and someday, hopefully, will serve as host again.

You immediately know that St. George's is going to be a great golf course when you stand on the tee and see the beautiful first hole winding its way through the rolling terrain. Thompson used the rolling terrain here very well when he routed the course. His par five holes in particular are very good, demanding holes.

Why is the course on the top 100 list? For a variety of reasons, including the meandering fairways, the great use of terrain, the difficult greens and the imaginative elevated bunkers. The course is built on terrain containing a cornucopia of hills, valleys, ridges, nobs, inclines, hollows and hillocks. As Tom Doak mentions in his Confidential Guide to Golf, Thompson routed many holes alongside or through valleys rather than over them. This lead to a world-class golf course. Doak picked St. George's as one of his thirty-one Connoisseur's Choices, and I can see why.

Par three #3

The par three third hole, seen above, is indicative of the style of Thompson's work. It is a long par three that is well bunkered. The general feel on this hole standing on the tee is one of hitting your ball two hundred yards down into an amphitheatre. On many holes at St. George's, including this one, there are bunkers located above the greens. He uses all the available terrain on every hole and has an attention to detail that results in the course having a real uniqueness.

The par three 6th hole

Many Thompson routings contain five par three holes, and St. George's is no exception. The par three 6th, seen above, plays over a ravine to a well-bunkered, two-tiered green. This hole shows to great affect how many of your shots at St. George's are framed by the use of the terrain and hills.

Approach to the 4th green

The fourth hole, a par five with the approach to the elevated green seen above, is the #1 handicap hole at St. George's. Thompson made his par fives here very difficult. Unlike most courses, the par fives are the #1 and #2 most difficult handicap holes on the course.

The 14th green

The greatest stretch of holes on the course are numbers twelve through fifteen, which are routed through the hilliest part of the course. The 12th hole has a green greatly elevated from the fairway off on the left side of the hole. The 14th, above, is a picturesque hole. Again, notice the elevated bunkers above the 14th green. True to his name, The Toronto Terror left us with many downhill sand shots above greens that slope away from you.

View from the seventh tee box

In the picture above you can see some of the contours that make this great terrain for a golf course.

The fifteen hole, a 558 yard par five, is my favorite hole on the course. The fairway winds its way through the hills like a luge run, bobbing and weaving along until it reaches a highly elevated green at the summit of a hill. Thompson follows the natural contour of the land, and the fairway sweeps around the mounds, hummocks, knolls and hills as if you were riding on a roller coaster.

The meandering 15th fairway

Ian Andrew, a Canadian golf course architect, was brought in to restore the bunkers in 2002. While I have no perspective to judge on since I didn't see the course prior to the changes, to me the bunkering seems brilliant. Since Ian is a fellow Blogger, you can read about his restoration in more detail if you'd like by clicking his name above.

As you might expect for a course located in this climate, the club has a large curling facility attached to the clubhouse that serves as a cart storage building during golf season. Although the course is in an urban setting, you really don't get that sense at all while playing the course. You can hear road traffic near the 13th green, but aside from that, similar to playing courses like San Francisco Golf Club and Los Angeles Country Club, St. George's is an oasis in the city.

I found St. George's to be a very fair course, but difficult if you do not hit good shots. It is a good walking course. We played St. George's at my favorite time of day, dusk, and played at a brisk pace with a delightful host. Our host has also played many of the world's great courses, and I knew we were kindred spirits when he expressed a love of Sunningdale, which I heartily share. We finished the evening having drinks and food out on the deck with a view of the Toronto Skyline as our backdrop, as a purple-hued full moon began to rise over the CN Tower. Certainly, a more pleasant way to end the day, than say, sitting on the Cross Bronx Expressway.

St. George's can hold its own against any course on the list, and the Canucks should be rightfully proud of this gem. I can't wait to make the trek out to Nova Scotia to play Thompson's Highlands Links.

Along with the Rocky Mountains, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Molson and Ice Hockey, great golf should also be added to the short list of things we associate with Canada.

Post Script - Toronto

I have traveled several times to British Columbia and Quebec, but this was my first time to Toronto and I was surprised to find it reminded me more of Los Angeles, but with more trees. Surprised, since I was expecting a smaller, cleaner version of New York, given all you read about Toronto standing in for New York in so many movies. The city is spread out over a large geographic area with many traffic-clogged freeways. As in L.A., there is a distinct lack of hustle and bustle downtown. The Forest Hills neighborhood reminded me of Beverly Hills. Actually, it seems nicer than Beverly Hills. I don't see any of the influence of the activist/urban planner Jane Jacobs on the city, although she lived there for many years. The ghastly cement/brick residential towers surrounding the city center would be right at home in The Bronx or Glasgow.

Yeamans Hall Club

Occasionally, one of the courses I go to play takes me completely by surprise. Several "below the radar" courses have made a lasting impression on me thus far - Cruden Bay, Woodhall Spa and Myopia Hunt Club, in particular. Yeamans Hall Club now joins this group.

Located in Charleston, South Carolina, Yeamans Hall Club (ranked #92 in the world) is a treasure. This part of the country has retained its uniqueness and character and has resisted the homogenization that has largely swept most parts of the country. South Carolina is still representative of the Deep South and jealously guards its heritage. Tucked away just north of Charleston, the club is very discrete and isolated, located off a street marked "No Outlet". Reminiscent of Pine Valley, you have to cross a railroad track and immediately have to stop at a guard gate. Nowhere is there an indication that this is Yeamans Hall Club; it is an un-marked, low-key entrance. After the guard verified my credentials (I got in based on my charm and good looks), I passed through the entrance to an enchanted setting.

The entry gate at Yeamans Hall

Driving in you are greeted by a sign that says, "please drive graciously," and it is not hard to do in this setting. You drive on a long and winding dirt/gravel road for about a mile through an idyllic low country setting. The property is full of live oaks dripping with Spanish moss, loblobby pines and native grasses and flowers. Yeamans Halls is an intensely private place. There are 250 members, and the club is owned by 35 "proprietary members" who have houses on the 900 acre property.

The majestic entry drive at Yeamans

The club takes its name from a previous landowner, Sir John Yeaman, who was colonial governor of South Carolina. When you drive through and approach the clubhouse, you pass the first and seventh holes and immediately get a sense that the golf course is going to be as special as the overall property is. The master plan for this property was put together by Fredrick Law Olmstead, Jr., son of New York's Central Park designer. He originally laid it out for 250 houses, two 18 hole golf courses and a hotel. Thankfully, due to the depression, these never got built. Instead, we are left with a sprinkling of houses throughout the property and one hell of a golf course. When you turn right into the drive that leads up to the clubhouse, the intimacy and beauty of Yeamans Hall keeps getting better. There are a dozen or so imposing live oaks set around a circular driveway. Around the driveway are low-slung wooden buildings housing the clubhouse, locker room and pro shop. The trees provide a welcoming shade to keep the area cool from the sun beating down and enclose the entire area under a canopy that gives it the feel of a very large outdoor room.

Live oak with Spanish moss

 The Golf Course

Yeamans Hall was designed by Seth Raynor in 1925, and he did a masterful job. The first hole is now a personal favorite. The fairway, like all fairways at Yeamans, is wide; generously accepting of a nicely hit opening drive. The second shot plays over the dirt entry road to one of the most dramatic greens you will ever play. There is a large, false front to the green and a couple of huge humps on this "double plateau" Raynor signature hole. Hopefully, the picture below does it justice, and you can pick up the severity of the contours on the green.

The first green at Yeamans Hall

Over time, the greens had become reduced in size and otherwise changed from their original state. Tom Doak was brought in several years ago to restore the greens back to Raynor's original designs and he did a fine job. Yeamans has one of the best stretches of starting holes in golf. The first six holes provide an exciting start that showcase a unique design style.

All the greens at Yeamans Hall are as large as I have seen anywhere except the Old Course at St. Andrews. This picture of the 2nd green below is indicative of the greens here. I found Yeamans Hall particularly pleasing because I had played Harbour Town the previous day. I went from playing a course with extremely narrow fairways and tiny greens to a course with generous fairways and huge greens. There is probably no greater contrast in course styles and designs, and it was a welcome change to be able to swing more freely again.

Approach to the large 2nd green

The third hole at Yeamans (a classic "Short" hole) is a par three that plays out toward the river. It is a spectacular hole with the beautiful marsh grasses serving as a back-drop. The green has a horse-shoe shape in the middle. Raynor squared off many of the greens at Yeamans, as you will see, many are cut at 90 degree angles to bunkers and fairways. Most of the holes at Yeamans Hall feature a geometric shape on the green.

The par three 3rd at Yeamans

The horse-shoe 3rd green

The 5th is Yeamans rendition of an "Alps" hole, modeled after the "Alps" at Prestwick, although more suited to the terrain here, which is pretty flat. There are hazards in the middle of the fairway as you can see below, which creates a nice optical illusion off the tee.

"Alps" hole from the tee

The green on the fifth hole is also very large with big humps running through it and a ninety degree angle at the corner.

Squared off green on the 5th

Raynor used his imagination and the terrain to great effect at Yeamans Hall. See the big dip in the 11th fairway below, a "Maiden" hole, modeled after the original at Royal St. George's.

"Maiden" hole at Yeamans

The "Biarritz" hole, the 16th, is a super rendition of this classic hole with a large swale protecting the front of the green.

"Knoll" green at Yeamans Hall

The overall feel of Yeamans Hall is magical. The place has character, old-world charm and a sense of complete isolation from the outside world. More or less, everything is perfect. The small building that houses the locker room is understated and has the feel of a small hunting lodge (seen below). I like their philosophy and approach, as exemplified in their recommended pace of play, "3 1/2 hours is adequate for four ball match." After our round we had sandwiches - shades of Augusta National - I had a delicious pimento cheese sandwich.

Yeamans is much more than a golf course set in an old plantation surrounded by a marsh; it is an experience in Southern charm and hospitality that is hard to beat.

I have previously been a critic of Raynor's design, particularly at Fishers Island, which is generally viewed as his masterpiece. I still think Fishers Island is over-rated relative to its merits. It has a half dozen really good holes but I think it gets too much credit as being great simply because it's on the water. To me, Yeamans Hall is a much better design and I would rate it as Raynor's masterpiece, particularly because the conditioning of the golf course here is so fine.

Raynor hit the nail on the head when he wrote, "one is bound to fall in love with golf at Yeamans Hall."

The unique tee markers of Yeamans are cut-up railroad tracks

 
Interested in learning the methods I used to play all these spectacular golf courses around the world? then my forthcoming book may be of interest, in details how a mortal golfer may be able to do the same. The book is available from Amazon.com. Click on the image of the book below to order on Amazon:

Chicago Golf Club

As my regular readers will remember, my last trip to Chicago was less than satisfactory when I played Medinah. I had a much better trip this year.

So, I'm checking into my hotel and my cheerful mid-western bellman asks me as he carries my clubs into the room, "So where are you playing?"

Me: "Chicago Golf," I said, expecting him to be impressed.

Bellman: "Where is that?"

Me: "Wheaton."

Bellman: "Never heard of that one, is it new?"

I just let it drop. Clearly he was not into golf. Chicago Golf (ranked #31 in the world) is not a new golf course. In fact, quite the opposite. Chicago Golf was one of the five founding member clubs that formed the U.S.G.A. The Chicago Golf Club is credited with having the first 18 hole course in America - although it is not the current course. The original course of the Chicago Golf Club was located nearby in Belmont. The Chicago Golf Club was founded in 1892 by our friend Charles Blair Macdonald. Before he moved to New York and helped organize the Links Club and The National Golf Links of America, Macdonald lived in Chicago. Although Macdonald was born in Canada, he grew up in Chicago and was a successful businessman and a member of the Chicago Board of Trade.

As it turns out, Chicago Golf Club is a club of many firsts - not only did it establish the first 18 hole course in the U.S., it was the first to adopt out-of-bounds as a rule in the United States, and it was the first club that organized a "caddy-shack" for its caddies to stay in. At the time Chicago built its first 18 hole course, many clubs in the U.S. were still experimenting with courses of various length - some built six hole courses, others nine, and still others 12 hole courses.

C.B. Macdonald designed the original golf course here in Wheaton in 1895. Macdonald was a famous slicer of the ball so he built the course to favor a slice. The course sits on roughly 200 acres on a rectangular piece of property. As you can see from the original course layout pictured below, the holes essentially are routed in two loops that run clockwise around the property. There is an old, unused polo field in the middle that now serves as a very large driving range.



Consistent with Macdonald's design philosophy, the course doesn't have many trees. Macdonald didn't think trees made a good hazard. He was heavily influenced by his love of the game as it was played in Scotland and preferred firm and fast conditions without trees. The primary defense of the golf course is the wind, which can blow quite strong here without any trees protecting it. It is a different sensation you get standing on the first tee at Chicago Golf Club. It doesn't really look like most other American courses, most of which are tree-lined (unless they are links-style and near the water). Chicago is a links-style golf course, but it was not built on classic links-style land. Thus, it is a bit of an enigma in the world of golf. The picture below was taken from the 4th fairway and shows how a typical vista looks at Chicago Golf with the wide-open look.

Wide-open layout at Chicago Golf

The golf course was redesigned in 1923 by Macdonald's protege Seth Raynor. The course has a definite Raynor feel to it, especially the horse-shoe greens that wrap around many of the greens. Their combined designed has many of the signature holes they have become famous for designing including a Road Hole, Redan Hole, Biarritz Hole, Punchbowl Hole and two Cape Holes.

Chicago Golf Club offers a difficult start. The first four holes contain the one, three and five handicap holes. Typical of some of the mounding and hills present throughout the course, see the mounds off the 2nd fairway below ("Road" Hole).

Mounds off second fairway

The third hole is a "Biarritz" hole and plays over 220 yards to a green with a false front and swale in front. It's a very good and demanding golf hole. Notice the classical bunkering around this hole.

3rd hole "Biarritz" from the tee

The fourth hole is one of the two "Cape" holes, the other being the 14th. This hole has a high elevated green with a green that is difficult to hold as it has a false front that feeds balls back onto the fairway.

4th hole green and fairway bunker

The 7th Redan hole is a very good rendition of a Redan hole. Probably because Chicago Golf doesn't get as much play as other world-class courses with Redans like Shinnecock, National and North Berwick, it is often overlooked as a good Redan hole. Consistent with Chicago's big greens generally, it probably has the largest green of all the classic Redans.

A big Redan - 7th hole

I found the defining characteristics of Chicago Golf to be: a links-style feel due to the absence of trees, large greens and the distinctive horse-shoe bunkers. There are many "deceptions" present also, such as the false fronts on many greens and bunkers placed so that they look to be closer to the green than they really are. Several of the greens (the 14th and 18th in particular) were squared off; that is, they were designed so that the beginning of the green is cut at a 90 degree angle to the fairway. I've never seen this before on any greens.

Chicago Golf Club has a lot of good golf history. It has hosted four U.S. Amateur Championships, two Walker Cups and three U.S. Opens - 1897, 1900 and 1911. Bobby Jones holds the course record of 66, set in 1928 at the Walker Cup. Chicago Golf Club is not as well known as Macdonald's other masterpiece, The National Golf Links of America. This is because unlike The National, Chicago doesn't do outings, and it has a very small and private membership. It has the smallest membership I have heard of for a world-class course - only 125 members.

The general feel at Chicago Golf Club is intimate but not flashy. Like at Pine Valley, there are no frills. This is just about golf. The clubhouse is comfortable and not extravagant. It is all very understated.

The clubhouse at Chicago Golf

My favorite hole on the course was the "Punchbowl" twelfth hole. You hit a blind tee shot over a slight hill. Your second shot on this par four is to an elevated, well bunkered green. The green, like other Punchbowl holes, such as the 16th at The National, rises up on all sides and feeds into the middle of the hole. If you look closely at the picture you can see the many humps and bumps on this interesting green.

Punchbowl Green - 12th hole

The 14th hole, the second "Cape" hole, I also enjoyed quite a bit. It is one of the many greens that has a horse-shoe bunker. Other holes with horse-shoe bunkers are the 7th, 9th, 10th, 13th and 14th. Macdonald, a very successful businessman, built a "mansion" in Wheaton. It is visible on your left as you stand on the 14th tee here. It is a big white house with columns on the porch.

The horse-shoe bunker on the 14th hole

8th hole horse-shoe bunker

The Chicago Golf Club has one of the best caddy programs I have ever seen. Taking a caddie is pretty much mandatory. The polite young mid-western kids that serve as caddies wear distinctive red bibs with the Chicago Golf logo on them.

This is also the third time in as many months I have bumped into C.B. Macdonald in my travels. He looked down at me intently from his perch in the giant painting in the C.B. Macdonald room at The Links Club in New York. He gave me a suspicious glare in the library at The National Golf Links of America where his big portrait again looks down at you and a life-size statue looms in the back of the room. And finally, between the pro-shop and locker-room at Chicago Golf is another statue of Charlie, making his presence felt once more.

If you appreciate history and tradition in this great game, playing Chicago Golf is a real treat, although with only 125 members, getting onto this gem is about as difficult as any course in the world.

Interested in learning the methods I used to play all these spectacular golf courses around the world? then my forthcoming book may be of interest, in details how a mortal golfer may be able to do the same. The book is available from  Amazon.com. Click on the image of the book below to order on Amazon:

Course Writeup Pending

I have played the courses below, however, have not yet written a post. Many of the early courses I played without my digital camera and will return someday to do a proper writeup.

9. Pinehurst #2 - A true golf mecca.

40. Portmarnock - Pure links golf. Read my Kiwi friends impressions of the course: here.

42. Oak Hill (East) - Played it a long time ago without a camera. I do remember it has a lovely clubhouse. Check out what my friend The Itinerant Golfer has to say about Oak Hill.

57. TPC at Sawgrass - One photogenic hole does not a golf course make. Tricked up. Too hard, front nine is boring. Bermuda grass impossible to hit out of. If you must, pay the pricy greens fee and take a shot a 17 just to say you did.
79. Kiawah Island (Ocean) - A great location, a great resort and a great golf course.

83. World Woods (Pine Barrens) - A nice Fazio course in Florida. Not sure why it was ever ranked in the top 100.

Harbour Town Golf Links

Thus far on my quest, I have found Pete Dye designed golf courses have been a mixed bag. I don't like The TPC at Sawgrass, although I like Whistling Straits and The Ocean Course at Kiawah. Casa de Campo has nine really good holes and nine average holes.

This summer I traveled down to the South Carolina Low country for some R & R and golf. I scheduled an early morning tee time at Harbour Town Golf Links (ranked #67 in the world).

In general, I have found it a good rule to be suspicious any time words are spelled out in old English like, "Harbour" or "Olde". Normally this is a red-flag that screams 'tourist rip-off'. Generally, it means a place is set up well for the silver-haired set and can be a great place to go if you are looking to over-pay for cute little Christmas tree ornaments and lots of other useless drivel.

Did I go to Harbour Town with pre-conceived notions? Yep, but it's hard not to, having seen the course on TV so many times, and I have several friends that have played it and complained that it was so tightly packed with condos that it was difficult to appreciate the course. In addition, Harbour Town is like a golf factory with group after group going off at regular intervals and pushed along the course. Plus, you have to ride in a cart here, which I'm not a big fan of.

Low country live oak with Spanish moss

Harbour Town is located in the Sea Pines resort on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, which, for such a small state, is golf rich. South Carolina features three of the top ranked courses in the world: Harbour Town, Yeamans Hall in Charleston and The Ocean Course on Kiawah Island. Hilton Head is one of the most successful real estate development ventures in U.S. history. There are over 20 courses in Hilton Head and the density of the housing is in fact alarming and omnipresent throughout the golf course.

Harbour Town has many public roads running through it. The most common sighting on the golf course when I played were scores of families riding bikes around and amongst the condominiums. I found that Harbour Town had a certain kitschy quality and sense of real Americana to it, that, in the end, I found hard to dislike. Like watching a Jerry Lewis movie, it is so bad, it's good. No matter how much you try, you can't stop watching and you end up enjoying it. Such was my experience at Harbour Town. I came to appreciate the uniqueness and subtlety of the golf course despite the intensive housing development.

The Golf Course

To summarize Harbour Town: narrow fairways and small greens. The design, layout and routing are imaginative and good, even though the course is completely flat. You can't just get up and hit driver on every hole. It is designed to really make you think about the type and shape of the shot before hitting each one. The narrowness of the fairways and the over-hanging trees force you to have to hit a certain side of the fairway in order to have a decent shot at the small greens. In this regard, Harbour Town reminded me of Merion.

The picture below shows both the narrowness of the fairway and the omni-present housing lurking behind the trees.

2nd hole narrow fairway and houses

Although the fairways in reality are not that narrow, they give the appearance of being so. This is because so many of the holes have overhanging trees that encroach over the fairways, making it a visually difficult golf course to drive the ball. Harbour Town represents the type of short, shot-makers course that seems to be out of vogue. It's nice to have world-class courses like this that are not all about length and brute force.

The other thing I appreciate about Harbour Town as a student of golf history is that this is one of Pete Dye's earliest designs and one of the first he used railroad ties on. As essentially the first course of its genre built in the modern era, this makes it a historically important course. Jack Nicklaus was a co-designer, and it was the first course he was involved with from a design standpoint. Also, I like the Low country setting with all the live oak trees with their hanging Spanish moss. The course also has a very interesting combination of palmetto trees, pine trees, elm trees, pampas grasses and other native plants.

Railroad ties on par three 4th

My two favorite holes on the course were the 13th and the 16th, which showcase Dye's bunkering abilities. The 13th has a narrow landing area off the tee (seen below). It is critical to hit your drive to the right-hand side of the fairway to have a reasonable shot at this unique green. The green itself is 'Y' shaped, with an imposing railroad-tied bunker half-way around it.

13th hole from the tee

13th green

13th green

The 16th hole is a sharp dogleg-left and has a long bunker down the entire left side and is a good risk/reward hole. The bunker is a magnet for balls. Even those of us in my group that avoided the bunker off the tee, ended up in it eventually.

The mental image I had of Harbour Town, based on the pictures I have seen of it, is that it plays along the water, which it doesn't. It is an inland course. The iconic picture of the lighthouse is a bit misleading. You expect the course to be mostly along the water. In fact, you don't see the water until you reach the 16th green. I found the 18th to be an interesting hole but not really as good as all the hype surrounding it. It has O.B. all the way down the right side and the Calibogue Sound on the left the entire way. Comparisons to the 18th at Pebble Beach are not in order.

I played a good paced round at Harbour Town, with a cart and a fore-caddy to move us along. We played in 4 1/4 hours and as much as I don't like riding in a golf cart, in scorching heat and high humidity, it makes sense that they use them. Overall, I enjoyed Harbour Town.

The Carolina Low Country

As I've said, I am a fan of the Carolina Low country. It is hot, humid and sultry and has a lot of charm. I enjoy having grits with breakfast and the other distinctive regional cuisine: She crab soup, crawfish, cornbread and the local seafood. I like the distinctive Southern drawl they speak with and the slow pace of life here is a nice change. Plus, how can you not like a place that sells "worms and shrimps" in gas stations and convenience stores.

After I finished playing Harbour Town I drove up to Charleston to play Yeamans Hall. Those of you that have been to Hilton Head will appreciate that I made the classic driving mistake on my way out. I turned into the wrong housing development, which actually isn't hard to do, because many look alike and with the low hanging trees it is always somewhat dark. I got lost and drove in circles for 30 minutes around the various neighborhoods that you need a satellite navigation system to get out of.

As you will see in my coming post on Yeamans Hall, the two places are on opposite ends of the spectrum. Harbour Town was the easiest course for me to play thus far. I went on-line prior to my trip and had the round completely booked within five minutes. The very private Yeamans Hall has almost no houses around it, gets little play, is the picture of proper Southern gentility and was very difficult for me to get on to play. Rather than just driving up to the bag drop like you do at Harbour Town, at Yeamans you have to get through the guarded entrance, seen below.

The entrance gate to Yeamans Hall

On my drive up to Charleston I took the back roads to soak up the atmosphere. It is an eclectic mix of tidal salt marshes, rivers, swamps, plantations, antique shops and fireworks stores. There is good reason they call this the Low country. Hopefully, the pictures below can give you a good feel for what it is like. It has a Fellini-like mix of high and low.

Plantation entrance with a beautiful allée of trees

Low country antiquing

Low country entertainment

Oh yea, I almost forgot, I have to put in the obligatory picture of the signature lighthouse hole.

P.S. I did manage to get excellent prices on a couple of new Christmas ornaments while at Hilton Head and spent well less than the $270 that the greens fees cost me.