If you could only play one course...........

First topic message reminder :

Bit of fun lads and ladies.......

If you could only play one course for the rest of your life, which would it be?

Two choices, one course you have already played and 2nd choice can be any course on the planet.

I'll start us off.....

1) Royal County Down

2) Pine Valley

Lairdy wrote:I would go with Augusta, partly because the use of the par 3 course would be amazing short game practice!

Aye, the main course is rubbish

baboo800 wrote:I found the fairways quite damp

baboo

can I politely suggest that you haven't played Royal County Down? You stated in an earlier post that you thought the course was in poor condition despite the good weather at the time then you go on to say that the fairways on a links course were damp?

Think you might be on the wind up my friend.

ho hum, i've never been blessed with the means or opportunity to play any top notch courses. i have been offered freebies at toc and dornoch next month, so maybe things are on the up!

ban_bam

If you were to pick 2 great courses to have on your golfing CV then you'd be hard pressed to do better than TOC and Dornoch!

can't quite believe i turned down two or three opportunities to play dornoch as a junior in their open for a fiver!! mad mad mad. still, i know 3 or 4 members there and one of them has promised me a game.

sharrison01 wrote:1) TOC for me

2) Les Bordes. Billionaires golf in the loire valley - what's not to love!?

Pardon my ignorance but what, where is TOC ?

Set up, TOC is The Old Course, while as a local I wouldn't describe it as a "great" course, it certainly has the pull for the sentimental amongst us. There are better tests and better lay outs numbering in the teens within just a few miles.

Best I have played, or most enjoyed is either Woodhall Spa or Monefieth

Want to play the new Trump course in Aberdeen, seems it is going to be quite something???

1.Augusta

2.West Cornwall GC

super_realist wrote: Set up, TOC is The Old Course, while as a local I wouldn't describe it as a "great" course, it certainly has the pull for the sentimental amongst us. There are better tests and better lay outs numbering in the teens within just a few miles.

Would be an interesting thread - where would be the best place to live for golf? From where you are I'm guessing that you've got St Andrews, Kingsbarn, Carnoustie, Gleneagles, Muirfield, Troon all within an hour or two's drive. I've got some great home counties courses but for me doesn't come anywhere near to beating that...

Faldono1fan wrote:1.Augusta

2.West Cornwall GC

Are they supposed to be the other way around or have you played Augusta?

1) Has to be Turnbury for me,

2) Augusta though doubt I will ever get the chance

sharrison01 wrote:

super_realist wrote: Set up, TOC is The Old Course, while as a local I wouldn't describe it as a "great" course, it certainly has the pull for the sentimental amongst us. There are better tests and better lay outs numbering in the teens within just a few miles.

Would be an interesting thread - where would be the best place to live for golf? From where you are I'm guessing that you've got St Andrews, Kingsbarn, Carnoustie, Gleneagles, Muirfield, Troon all within an hour or two's drive. I've got some great home counties courses but for me doesn't come anywhere near to beating that...

Harrison, I've got the 5 St.Andrews 18 holers, Kingsbarns, Carnoustie, Gleneagles, Montrose, Monifieth, Panmure, Crail, The Castle, St.Andrews Bay, Scotscraig, Ladybank, Leven, Lundin, Downfield, Elie, Alyth and Forfar all within a 30 minute drive.
Not bad eh

Harrison - I wish! Should have been other way around.

Lot of people choosing Scottish courses. If i had to pay only one course for the rest of my life there is NO WAY it would be in a cold wet country!

For this reason I would choose PGA Catalunya for the combination of weather and challenge. And maybe an Aussie course like kingston heath

I wish people would drop this ridiculous and untrue assumption that Scotland is a wet country.
North East Fife, Angus and the Edinburgh coastal areas are some of the very driest areas in the UK, and home to some of the world's best courses, granted the last two winters have been perishing, but I've often been playing in shirt sleeves in February and for several of the last dozen or so years the winters have been pretty mild.

The west coast, e.g. Ayrshire and Glasgow areas are very wet, but saying that reflects what the rest of the country is like is akin to saying every Englishman has a Geordie accent.

Would also love to carnoustie after playing turnberry recently

seconded. east coast of scotland is good weatherwise. i believe dundee has the longest sun hours of any uk city each year. also add to that s_r, that the majority of those courses will be open close to 365 days a year, and will get a couple hours extra daylight each day through the summer compared to down south. watching wimbledon over the last few days i cant believe how early the light fades down in london!

Weather can cloud ones judgement

I've played Pebble in a 3 club wind where an inch and a half of rain fell during the round. I've also played it in brilliant sunshine and no breeze. In terms of a pleasurable round there is no comparison.

I've also played Dornoch on a November morning where by lunchtime I was in short sleeves and the Firth was like a mill pond....Absolutely idyllic...But between October and March those kind of days must be so rare.

At the end of the day though I suppose what I'm getting at is if I only had one course to play for the rest of my days, it must be in a place where on the balance of probability I'd be playing in year round 80 deg sunshine (give or take 2 or 3 degrees either way). I'd also want it to be a bit challenging but playable hence my earlier choice of Kapalua. The only drawback it has is that it has to be a buggy course due to some of the green to tee distances and gradients. I'd defy anyone to stand on any part of that course and not feel glad to be alive and glad that they play golf.


On the balance of probability though

Pine Valley

TOC

"glad to be alive and glad that they play golf" when playing Kapalua. Completely agree.
Would still choose PB though!

1) Wentworth West
2) Augusta (for the pure aura)

1) Saurines in Spain

2) The Old Course. Almost played there once. Got lucky with the draw & got allocated 8am tee-off. Up early next morning reversed car out of driveway, into 1st & kerplunk. Thats as far as I got. That was over 20 years ago when it was cheap to play. As Shakespeare once wrote "O me miserum".

most of austrian skiing is at a much lower level than france, so definitely doesn't knock france into a cocked hat in that respect.

val d is not really a toilet, the majority of development is pretty good but you do need to be in central val, not la daille. tignes is indeed concrete city.

graeme wrote:most of austrian skiing is at a much lower level than france, so definitely doesn't knock france into a cocked hat in that respect.

val d is not really a toilet, the majority of development is pretty good but you do need to be in central val, not la daille. tignes is indeed concrete city.

Graham, i'm sorry but in my extensive experience it certainly does.
I've spent a year of my life (6 months at a time) in the Austrian Alps and another year in the French Alps.
French resorts often tend to be higher, but have many resorts on the edge of the alps so suffer from inconsistent ambient temperatures (like the dismal Avoriaz), so it doesn't necessarily follow that being higher always leads to better snow.
Many Austrian resorts are right in the interior of the Alps and I've always found snow to be of a much higher quality due to being protected from warmer air. Lighter, fluffier and drier snow than many French resorts. Also the lift systems are more modern, better laid out with a greater carrying capacity with very little difference in snowfall records.
Off Piste is not tracked out as quickly and is epic in the Arlberg region in particular certainly the best out of the 40 or so European resorts I've been too, not humdrum like in the 3 Valleys or Espace Killy.
Pubs are cheaper than France, shops don't shut at lunch times for the workshy French to get 40 winks, transfer times are shorter between the airport and resort and transport links better (ie in some resorts you can get a train right into resort). Apres is undeniably better than in France and the resorts in Austria are picteresque and photogenic unlike the concrete hellholes designed by the lazy French.

So although there are undoubtedly those who will prefer one over the other, there are many very good reasons why Austrian resorts absolutely knock French resorts into a cocked hat, and I for one will never visit another French resort.

Super, its daft saying you wont visit another French resort. Say you get offered the deal of a lifetime, you would be crazy not to go, Ive had some great times skiing in France and will certainly do so again. I certainly wouldnt restrict myself to skiing in just one country though, Ive skied in Canada, Italy, Austria, France and even Andorra and in their own way they all have plenty going for them. Apres is certainly different in Austria, I wouldnt say it was better though.

Guys

what has the merits of French ski resorts got to do with golf courses? Please start a new topic if you wish to have that discussion.

Diggers, I don't like French resorts, the terrain isnt that good, they are too busy, too expensive and too antiquated, they are generally ugly and I'm unlikely to be offered a great deal as they simply don't exist. I can sort out a holiday in Austria extremely cheaply and even if I couldn't I'd rather pay more to go to a resort that wasn't just a council estate on a mountainside.

There's hundreds of resorts in Austria, 99% of which will have barely been heard of on these shores, I'd much rather work my way through them (or ones in Switzerland, Italy, US or Canada) then go to a country that doesn't really do the whole "ski resort" as well as others do. Of course it's my opinion.

super_realist wrote:I wish people would drop this ridiculous and untrue assumption that Scotland is a wet country.
North East Fife, Angus and the Edinburgh coastal areas are some of the very driest areas in the UK.

The first part of that statement is absurd. Face it, Scotland is cold and wet! Fife may be one of the driest areas in the UK, but the whole of the UK is cold and wet when compared to Spain, Australia etc! The area without doubt has some of the best courses in the world, just wish it wasn't so bloody cold all the time.

super_realist wrote:

graeme wrote:most of austrian skiing is at a much lower level than france, so definitely doesn't knock france into a cocked hat in that respect.

val d is not really a toilet, the majority of development is pretty good but you do need to be in central val, not la daille. tignes is indeed concrete city.

Graham, i'm sorry but in my extensive experience it certainly does.
I've spent a year of my life (6 months at a time) in the Austrian Alps and another year in the French Alps.
French resorts often tend to be higher, but have many resorts on the edge of the alps so suffer from inconsistent ambient temperatures (like the dismal Avoriaz), so it doesn't necessarily follow that being higher always leads to better snow.
Many Austrian resorts are right in the interior of the Alps and I've always found snow to be of a much higher quality due to being protected from warmer air. Lighter, fluffier and drier snow than many French resorts. Also the lift systems are more modern, better laid out with a greater carrying capacity with very little difference in snowfall records.
Off Piste is not tracked out as quickly and is epic in the Arlberg region in particular certainly the best out of the 40 or so European resorts I've been too, not humdrum like in the 3 Valleys or Espace Killy.
Pubs are cheaper than France, shops don't shut at lunch times for the workshy French to get 40 winks, transfer times are shorter between the airport and resort and transport links better (ie in some resorts you can get a train right into resort). Apres is undeniably better than in France and the resorts in Austria are picteresque and photogenic unlike the concrete hellholes designed by the lazy French.

So although there are undoubtedly those who will prefer one over the other, there are many very good reasons why Austrian resorts absolutely knock French resorts into a cocked hat, and I for one will never visit another French resort.

i lived for over 5 years on the edge of the austrian alps near munich. "i was there for 6 months...". ffs. i've skiied extensively in austria, france, italy and switzerland for 20 years (that's not counting time before reaching 18, which doesn't count). i've ski-toured from switz via italy into austria for 5 days twice and several times just in austria (and a bit into italy).

unless you ski at above 2000m you're skiing in sh!t. ergo, the majority of austrian skiing whilst fun is sh!t. the arlberg region is a tiny proportion of austrian skiing and don't tell me that ishgl and stanton are "classy" resorts! they're full of p!ssed russians and brits, respectively. there are the finer resorts of the arlberg (lech, zurs, stuben) but they're so ridiculously overpriced and also full of the "better" class of rusky that they're unbearable.

as for your geographical references... what a bunch of toss. val is embedded in the mountains, as are all the best high level french resorts. the majority of easily-reachable austrian resorts are really just into the alps from the north and as such subject to lower level weather patterns. even the next level of resorts are still at too low a level to be considered reliable. the truly reliable resorts are a real hike from the nearest major airports, ie munich. don't tell me that innsbruck is a major airport or even salzburg!

i've spent god knows how many weekends driving to and from from the austrian alps, so i call your bluff. wet, wet wretched snow at low levels to the extent that in ski-welt (sol, hopfgarten), zillertal (mayerhofen), kitzand several other areas we used to get the lift back down to the bottom. if that's what you call powder, you're bullsh!tting everyone. i've known the streif to be shut/ delayed due to lack of snow. do you know the "streif"? that's what you probably call the "hahnankamm". that's actually the name of the mountain, the runs is called the "streif". oh yes, that's at kitz...

if you want to debate this, feel free but i suspect that you know f*** all about good snow, good "resorts", back-hill runs, huetten... i leave it to you but i've never read so much rudey poo in my life.

i've just deleted the final 3 paragraphs. they were too personally insulting. but as an opinionated n0b-jockey, you'd win the derby, the goldcup and the grand national... phe-Flip-nomenal

Right then ....so anyone fancy a 606 ski trip ?

.......but where to go?

The Lecht can be wonderful when it's not raining and you can get Tennants Special at the wee shop in Braemar. I would also recommend the caravan park.

I want French snow in a Swiss resort with Italian food and Austrian hospitality at Andorra prices.

Strange how a thread on golf courses can get into a rather uninformative and petty argument over which ski resort is best. I would thus deduce that skiers are the real problem, not ski resorts...