52. Had Six to Go for Three Bucket Lists...now have only one

Had Six to Go for Three Bucket Lists...now have only one

We were both pretty tired after getting home the evening of May 28.  Pat had a wonderful time touring gardens with Sharon, and I was relieved to be done with courses outside of North America.  Don’t misinterpret that last statement…I still hope and plan to travel overseas, but mainly to return to the great ones I have already played.  For example, Pat and I will be going to Ireland in early September for Fergal O’Leary’s and Karen Lynch’s wedding, and while there will play The European Club, Royal County Down, Portmarnock, etc., but with some days of rest and no 36 hole days.  No more wandering around the countryside to play the likes of The K Club, Celtic Manor, Killeen Castle, or Gleneagles Centennial, just because they are on a list.  And no more of six straight nights in six different hotels.

However, I did need to clean up the six courses I had left to finish my three Bucket Lists.  Prior to leaving for England on May 16, I had planned and booked trips to Barbados and Canada to cover three of them, and a few days after my return I was able to book a trip to Nova Scotia and a round at Brae Burn (in the Boston area).  By mid June I had booked Skokie in Chicago for June 28…so everything looked to be in place.

The first weekend in June Pat and I were busy with my 50^th Reunion at MIT…which was almost as exhausting as the journey throughout Europe.  But those few days were very special and it was great catching up with old buddies.  With that behind me it was time to knock off the last six.

Sandy Lane Resort—Green Monkey Course, June 9, 2016 : Sandy Lane, located in Barbados, is about the ultimate in over the top Caribbean resorts.  It is where Tiger married Elin (strangely this piece of history is not mentioned prominently on Sandy Lane’s website).  In May I started trying to figure out the cheapest time to make the trip and given my calendar (Pat said no to this 40 hour venture) June 8-9 worked best.  I flew at 9:30am on 6/8 from Boston to Miami, and after a longish layover, flew on to Barbados, arriving around 9:30pm.  Sandy Lane met me before customs and immigration so that went smoothly, and I was in my room before 11pm.  It was quite the room…but this was to be a very short stay. 

I was downstairs for breakfast before 7am on 6/9, as my tee time was at 8:30am (first off).  For sure, I was the first person staying at Sandy Lane to bring their own cereal…which should make my endorsement deal with Fiber One/General Mills far more lucrative when I am finished. 

The golf course has beautiful views and a couple of interesting holes through an old rock quarry, but Rolex should be ashamed of themselves for publishing two World Top 100 lists with this track among the alleged Top 87 or 88 courses in the World (of course they also have placed Torrey Pines South among the Top 15 in the World!!).  In any case, the course stretches to 7389 yards and was in very good shape…not great but very good.  The first tee is only open from 8:30-9:30 each day (and that rule applies to people staying at the hotel, members, etc…although is might have been waived during Tiger’s wedding here or Rory’s recent stay).  And if you are a rater seeking a discount, good luck.

I only took one pic…see below…of the 2^nd shot on the 423 yard 3^rd holes over part of the quarry. 

Third hole..second shot over mini Quarry

The 16^th hole is a 198 yard par 3 that has a large bunker front and right of the green with a grass island in the bunker shaped like a monkey (“Green Monkey”).  Not sure which hole at The Old Course in St. Andrews this is a copy of…

Anyhow, I got the round done, paid my hotel bill, and got in their car to go to the airport.  That went smoothly, but when we landed at Miami, it was pouring as hard as can be, and the airplane gate traffic was all messed up.  We sat on the tarmac for over an hour and I missed my connection to my flight from MIA to Boston.  Amazingly and luckily, there was a later flight, which ended up getting delayed and we landed at BOS around 1:15am.  By the time I got my luggage and arrived home it was about 2:15am.  So so glad this quest is almost done.  One more crossed of the to do list (and trust me, this one was not a hidden gem)!!

Memphremagog Golf Club, Quebec, Canada, June 14, 2016:  When Golf Digest published its second World 100 in January 2016, many affectionato’s were surprised (to put it mildly and as nicely as I know how) at some of the included courses.  In my (always humble) opinion some are quite good choices for example:

Spring City-Lake, China (#75 of 100)

Anyang, S Korea (#40)

Sentosa, Singapore (#58)

Bluffs Ho Tram, Vietnam (#74)

YAS Links, Abu Dhabi (#46)

Gozzer Ranch, ID, USA (#68)

But here are some examples of courses that I do not think come close to belonging on a World 100:

            Sheshan International, China (#82)

            Els Club Teluk Datai, Malaysia (#83)

            Haelsley Nine Bridges, S Korea (#71)

            National-Old, Australia (#87)

            Oligata-West, Italy (#100)

            Emirates-Majlis, Dubai (#95)

            Punta Espada, Dom Republic (#76)

            Querencia, Mexico (#98)

Memphremagog GC, located in Quebec about 10-15 miles north of the Vermont border generally was considered a surprise pick (at #78).  It is an extremely exclusive club (50 members) and has kept a very low profile.  A good friend from Toronto (Steve S., who was able to arrange a game for me at Les Bordes in France) knows a member, but the member’s calendar was very very busy and unaccompanied play is not allowed.  Then a few months ago, a fellow Golf Magazine rater advised that Memphremagog had a program to allow raters to play it.  I contacted the course and the rest went smoothly.

Pat and I left Boston the morning of Monday June 13 and drove north through NH and VT.  The drive to the area was about 250 miles and went smoothly.  We stayed at a hotel located on Lake Massawippi and about 15 miles from the course.  Hotel was nice as was the dinner there Monday night.  I was playing at 9am on Tuesday.  Pat was not able to play (because we were not accompanied by a member), so she enjoyed a massage at the hotel’s spa.  I played with the general manager of the club (and former head pro) David Boucher.  David started working at the club about 9 years ago, when it first opened…and served as a caddy then.  He is a wonderful guy, and may have set a world record going for caddy to GM in less than 10 years!

The course sits high above Lake Memphremagog and about one mile from the lake at its closest point.  The course is cut through a large thick forest.  The fairways are separated by thick stands of trees and are isolated from each other.  Over the past few years, the club has removed well over 1000 trees…but they need to remove thousands more to allow the land to “breathe”.  The course was very wet due to heavy rain over the previous few days... for sure the trees slow the drying process.   Plus there are gorgeous views of foothills and the lake that are obscured by the trees. 

The course stretches to a big 7498 yards (par 72) from the tips, for reasons that are not clear (no tour level events are planned and only one member is really capable of playing from the Black Tees).  With five sets of tees, it can be played from 5300 yards and up to the 7500 yards from the tips.  A number of the holes are very good and I thought the best is #6, a 525 yard par 4 rolling gently downhill and turning slightly left with glorious views of foothills and a high church steeple in the distance. 

The elevation changes are quite dramatic; for example, #9 a strongly uphill par 5 of 545 yards, turning left and is followed by #10, a 465 yard very downhill par 5 (turning right at the bottom of the hill) with a large lake on the left side of the fairway starting about 110 yards from the center of the green.

Tom McBroom designed the course and most of McBroom’s work has been in Canada (he has also designed courses in Finland and St. Kitts).  Until Memphremagog, I had not played any of his tracks. 

The club is certainly magnificent, and I believe the location, terrain and basic design have the potential to be a World 100, but to date the verdict must be “not yet”.  Keep clearing out the trees, open up the views, create more potential for heroic recoveries, perhaps modify a few holes over time, and the possibility is there.  It will be interesting to see how this club/course evolves. 

Everything about the club was first class…even to the point of securing a name label for my caddy:

(other than the above photo, no photos were allowed on the property)

And one of these days, I will figure out how to pronounce its name :-)

After the round, it was back to the hotel to pick up Pat and drive another 250 miles to a Fairmont resort (Manoir Richelieu) located on the north shore of the St. Lawrence River, about 95 miles east of Quebec City.

Manoir Richelieu-Richelieu and Tadoussac Nines, June 15, 2016: Manoir Richelieu today consists of 27 holes.  The original 18 (Richelieu and Tadoussac Nines) opened in 1925 and the third nine (St. Laurent) was added under the guidance of architect Darrell Huxham in the late 1990’s.  At the same time, Huxham renovated the original 18 designed by Herbert Strong (think Engineers on Long Island, NY and Canterbury near Cleveland, OH).  As we were here for me to finish the MacWood Spoof list, we played the original 18 (listed at #67).

The Fairmont Hotel sits high above the St. Lawrence River and the golf courses are up even higher, at the conclusion of a one mile sharply uphill cart ride.  The views are simply spectacular (see pic below).  The hotel has very similar architecture as the Fairmont Hotel at Banff…and would guess that it was also owned by the Canadian Railway originally.

View eastward toward St. Lawrence River

The original course plays at 6066 from the tips, which is where I played from.  The course was in average shape (and seemed to be over watered)…in part probably due to it being fairly early in the season in Quebec…but also perhaps because of generally questionable conditions year round. 

We played the Richelieu Nine very quickly but when we made the turn onto the Tadoussac Nine, things slowed down considerably.  The golf itself was not pretty but by 1:15pm, the MacWood Spoof List had been completed!

We headed back to the hotel, picked up a take out lunch, packed our car, and headed west hoping to get through Quebec City before the rush hour.  No such luck!  The drive was a long one, at just over 500 miles.  Splitting the driving between us helped but the drive still took over 10 hours including stops.  We rolled into our driveway around 12:15am and were both very tired. 

Sooo, where were we at that point?

Top 100 Ever—ONE to go…Cabot Cliffs scheduled for July 8

MacWood Spoof List--DONE

US Open Venues—TWO to go…Brae Burn CC (MA) and Skokie CC (IL) scheduled (and already played) June 27 and 28 respectively.

Brae Burn CC, West Newton, MA, June 27, 2016:  Founded in 1897 the club started with a nine hole course.  Shortly thereafter, the club was playing on an 18 hole course and had hired young Alex Ross (who then became the 1907 US Open Champion) as its head professional.  Alex’s brother, Donald, fresh from his work at Pinehurst, returned to Boston (where he had designed his first course…Oakley CC, where MIT played its varsity matches in the early 1960’s, and where he had been head pro at Essex County Club) to redesign Brae Burn first in 1912 and again in 1928.  Brae Burn hosted the 1919 US open won by Walter Hagen, the 1928 US Amateur, won by Bobby Jones, three Woman’s Amateurs (1906, 1975, and 1997) and two Curtis Cup Matches (1958 and 1970).  Not many clubs have hosted seven USGA events.  Historically somewhat short in length (6672 yard par 72 from the back today), Brae Burn has never been included on any World or USA Top 100.

I had the opportunity to play Brae Burn thanks to a member, Jerry M., at a member guest June 27.  It was a superbly run event followed by a very fine dinner.  

The primary defense of Brae Burn is its greens, which are a wonderful set of true Donald Ross creations.  Primary rule here is do not get above the cup.  I thought the greens were great, but in a couple of cases, wondered if things had gotten a little out of hand with Ross’ original green slopes featured on greens rolled, cut and manicured to speeds to up to 12+ feet.  Frankly, these greens were never designed to run at these speeds and on the 18^th in particular (and to a lesser extent on #9), it is pretty much impossible to stop a ball putted downhill.  This situation reminded me of some of the greens at Brookside in Ohio.

The terrain at Brae Burn is very hilly and it was interesting to see how Ross dealt with such a difficult property.  He did a brilliant job of making good use of this land…except perhaps for #16…a par 4 totaling 405 yards, uphill off the tee and with the fairway also sloping sharply right to left until the crest of the hill.  With the crest sitting at least 230 yards from the back tee on the right side of the fairway (with a tree line encroaching on the right, and more like 250-260 yards in the center of the fairway) most drives end up rolling left and backwards ending up in a small area on the left side of the fairway and 175 to 200 yards to the green…with a blind second shot.  Not a wonderful hole…but to be honest, this is one of those transition areas found on many courses where the architect must take a player from “Zone A” to “Zone B” and in this case, a big hill was in the way.  In 1912 and 1928 it was not practical to remove the hill…and even after looking for a while, I could not think of another way around this situation.  In any case, #16 is followed by a brilliant par 3 #17 of 255 yards…downhill to a deep but narrow green guarded by bunkers left and right, but appropriately with good opportunities to run a shot into the green.  #17 is the best hole on the course, closely followed by #4 and #14.

For quite some time I have wondered why older courses were often built on less than good land many decades ago when with lower population density, more land was typically available.  While playing Brae Burn I realized that flatter land parcels were surely required for farming and therefore golf courses, even those constructed for clubs started by very wealthy members, were often relegated to secondary parcels.

Shortly after Brae Burn built its eighteen hole course, it built a magnificent clubhouse that had nothing “secondary” about it.  The clubhouse has of course been renovated since and is now filled with wonderful photos and memorabilia from the pre-Depression era, including a pre-1910 photo of the clubhouse…which appears to have been about the same size as the current clubhouse.

Got home at a reasonable hour...had to fly top Chicago the next day to finish my US Open quest.

Skokie Country Club, Glencoe, IL, June 28, 2016:  In July 2015 I contacted a friend in Chicago to try to arrange a game at Skokie to help me on my way towards playing all of the US open Venues ever.  I had a few Venues to play (including Skokie and Brae Burn) and was hoping to complete this bucket list in the summer of 2015.  Then I learned that Skokie was planning a major restoration including a complete re-grassing of the entire course commencing July 27, 2015.  With no time available before that date, my US Open goal was moved back to 2016.

In early June 2016 I scheduled a game for June 28.  While I would have preferred a trip of a couple of days, I wanted to get this done.  So early last Tuesday I flew to Chicago with a return flight scheduled for 5:30pm.  Skokie’s head pro, Paul Bumbaco, had said that there was a woman’s shotgun going off early in the morning, and that he expected to get me out (with no one in front of me) by 11:30 latest.

Skokie was founded in 1897 and constructed a nine holer at that time.  In 1904 Thomas Bendelow (Medinah #3, Olympia Fields #1 and #2) designed an 18 holer on the property.  Then in 1914 Donald Ross made major alterations to the course and it retains its “Ross feel” today.  Since then there have been four restorations.  First, after the purchase of some additional land, in 1938 by Wialliam Langford and Theodore Moreau (think Lawsonia Links in WI).  Second, some alterations by Rees Jones in 1981.  Third, major work by Ron Prichard in 1999 to bring the greens and bunkers back to Ross’original intent and remove unnecessary tees.  Finally, last year’s bunker and regrassing work. 

In terms of Top 100’s Skokie appeared once on the Golf Digest list at #97 in 1993.  It has consistently been in GolfWeek’s Classic Top 100 since 2005, but not high enough to make the “merged’ GW USA Top 100.

I arrived at the club about 10:35am and met Paul who said I could go off at 11am.  By the time I reached the first green, it was clear that this was no ordinary restoration.  The fairways were in fabulous condition with a deep deep root structure and strong grass that gave great support to any resting ball.  Paul later said they already had root structures a full 8” below ground surface and had achieved a 99% germination rate.  I am not sure how that is measured, but the results were impressive.

But as good as the fairways were...they paled in comparison with the greens.  The greens were rolling at about 11-11.5’ and were literally perfect.  I cannot remember ever playing better greens.  They were perfectly firm and fast…a well struck shot took one or two hops and then stopped; a less than well struck shot from the fairway would generally run out 30-40’; and a shot out of the rough seems to bound along forever.  There was no discernable grain on the greens, and as such, old cup outlines were invisible.  Additionally, there were almost no visible ball marks on the greens, and my putts rolled perfectly (even the many that were misread or miss struck by your truly).  The greens were smoother than about any carpet I have seen, and this made lining up putts very difficult…with no marks or bumps or other imperfections, finding a spot to aim for proved very difficult.  In one simple easy to understand word…the greens were perfect. 

The new bunkers were very fair and consistent is both looks and the way they played (flat sand surfaces and grass walls).  And the fairway/rough differentiation was beautiful and consistent throughout the property.

I found the course itself to be excellent.  The bunkering was well placed, the fairways wide enough to offer options, and the use of angles, trees and other features well done.  While the course is short by any standard (6593 yard par 72) it is simply fun to play, and of course Ross greens certainly offer a good defense.  Best holes to my mind were par 5 #3 and par 3 #12. 

In 1922 the club hosted the US Open, won by Gene Sarazen.  At the clubs’ centennial celebration 75 years later, a 95 year old Sarazen stood on the green addressing the membership gathered to honor the man.  To start his address, Sarazen stated “My grandfather won the US Open here in 1922.”

Time will tell if conditions remain as pristine as they were last week.  In the meantime, I highly recommend this course.  To my mind, the course I played last week is either the 2nd or 3rd best course in IL (with Chicago GC the clear #1).

Status:  I am DONE with both the US Open Venue Bucket List and the MacWood Spoof Bucket List.  My World Top 100 Ever (9 sources) has only one unplayed course on it…Cabot Cliffs which Pat and I are scheduled to play with Ben Cowan-Dewer this Friday July 8.  Assuming that goes well, plan to provide you with a full listing of all of the courses on all three lists…thereby allowing you to go out and try the same thing.

Speaking of that, while I am sure others have completed the US Open Venues before, I have a strong sense that no one else has completed the other two lists.  The one person who I thought might have, Golf Magazine panelist Tom Clasby has not.  He had completed the Golf Magazine EVER list 1979-2013 (190 courses) but is still missing one new course from the GM 2015 list (Ayodhya Links in Thailand)…and he has not even thought about the other sources (although my guess is that he has played most of the 101 courses that these other sources add to the list).  As I progressed on my objective, his continuing accomplishments were a source of inspiration to me.

Hopefully, more within about 3-4 days.