Golf Vaca

Last week i was fortunate enough to take 3 days off work for a quick golf vacation in Palm Coast, florida. Matt and I made the trip down to Ginn Hammock Beach Resort home to the Ocean course by Jack Nicklaus, and The Conservatory by Tom Watson. Everything on site from the condo we rented to the golf courses were top notch. For the price we paid I truly feel we got over on Bobby Ginn, especially with the amount of golf we played.

Our accomdiations were great. We each had our own room, with private bathrooms. There was a full kitchen, dinning area, and living area with a 42 inch plasma, and plasma in each room with Dishnetwork t.v. in the main room. I caught up on all my MTV and thank god for ESPN Sportscentre, i can't stand seeing hockey every other clip as TSN or The SCore does. Needless to say the condo we had was perfect.

On to the golf. The Ocean course was in my mind the lesser of the 2 if you had to chose. It was something like 7300 yards from the tips and I think around 147 slope. The course in general left something to be desired cause it was pretty bland. I should say it was way nicer then a lot of courses I've played, just compared to the other it wasn't as visually pleasing. The playablilty of the course was another story. As matt would try to convince me of, it was a shot makers course. You could chose how risky you wanted to be by using different lines down the holes. There was water on almost every hole and not very many bunkers. Also most of the fairways were very large. Some noteable holes were the par 8th. The par 4 9th was an incredible hole. I believe it was 460 yards or so with a raised green. Each day I was driver and then atleast a 4 iron, except for the first day we played which was in 50 mph winds and I was driver, rescue, pw to get to the green. The back was a little better, and it did have 4 phenomenal closing holes. Called the "Bear Claw" you start on a long par 4 that played into the wind every day and had a raised green that added maybe 25 yards to the shot. The 16th was a short par 4 that turned almost 90 degrees on the second shot to a very small green. The 17th par 3 was a tricky shot cause it played into the wind every time but for some reason the yardage didn't change. On the first day we both played the hole by clubbing up to account for the wind and found our balls soaring way over the green and out of bounds. The next few times we played the yardage as if no wind and ended up pin high eash time. Really weird hole, can't explain why it did that. The 18th par 4 was another great finishing hole. With a huge bunker right in the landing area up the right hand side, and the ocean all the way up the left, long to the tune of 450 i think, and a slightly raised green protected by bunkers and out of bounds, it proved to be quite the challenge. All in all, the course was actually very nice. The greens were some of the best I've ever played on. Perfect true putts, and very quick, and very firm. A joy to putt on, unless your matt and it just highlighted his poor short putting, just ask him about his 4 foot and in putt making abilities.

The Conservatory course was a completley differnet experience. This course really blew my mind, and is possibly my most favourite course I've played. Watson and Ginn obviously went the extra mile to make sure this course was a memorable experience. Starting with the club house (Ocean didn't even have one) which had the feeling of being in an atrium, with all glass ceiling and marble floors (doubt it was marble, but wouldn't put it past Bobby). I would describe this club house as the palace from te movie Coming to America. The course was the true gem. Measuring 7700 yards from the tips and 155 slope it provided a challenge comparable to Oakmont. Bunkers and waste bunkers everywhere you look. The greens had insane undulation (not sure thats a word) and would punish you if you weren't on the correct tier. Every hole was satisfying to the eye. One of the course your step on each tee and say "wow, what a golf hole." I truly enjoyed playing this course 10 times as much as the ocean.

Enough about the courses cause I'm sure Matt will post the most ridiculous posts in the world that push the brink of being to long to read and go into detail that no one but English dave and himself care about. So i'll tell you about how we played.

First bet was for the king size room. I lost it in a coin flip but quickly thought I would bet it on the round of golf. Well it backfired. Playing in 50 mph winds after 8 hours of travlling and flying caused me to shoot a shitty round of 94 from the gold tees at Ocean. Mat was 87 and sleeping comfortably in a king size bed.

Next day we teed it up at the conservatory on the back tees at 7700 yards to start maybe the best day of golf I have ever had. I didn't shoot well from the backs, it was just way to long. Driver-rescue every hole and you still had to make a up and down on almost every hole. I believe I shot 94, but matt played well and was something like 85, though he would go onto to whine about that score for hours no matter how much a reminded him how difficult the course played. We then attempted to go play the Ocean course for the second 18 but found out we would be waiting to long to get on, so headed back to conservatory. This turned out to be the best thing to happen to us. We went back to Conservatory and got right on and played form 2 tee decks up at 6800 yards with a 142 slope. Still very challenging. I also decided to start drinking at this point. After a short rain delay (maybe 20 mins) we were on the course and noth of us were playing well. As each beer went down I started to improve, i think i'm on to something here. All said in done, I lost the 36 hole match badly to Matt, i think something like 8 and 7, but shot an 83 to matts 80. Of course, still not low enough for matt so i listened to him whine about it for another hour or so. Towards the end of the second round i mention to matt I would be up for playing a few more holes. Turns out we played another 18 to make it 54 on the day. Unbelievable, 54 in one day, and our last round only took us 2 hours and 20 mins cause we were the only ones on the course. As i pounded more beers it even seemed like i was gaining energy and some how shot making ability. I ended shooting my best round of the week half in the bag of 77 while matt shot 79, and i went into the next 36 hole math 1 up.

The next day we moved on to the Ocean course but had a late tee time of 12pm. We were paired up with an older guy (had to be 50 or so, so really only old to me, only a couple years older then matt) named Gord from jacksonville. We were playing the back tees this day and he joined us there which was fine. I think i shot in the mid 80's that day, gord was drinking up a storm so i joined in, didn't quite have the same effects on my game as the day before. Upon finishing we tried to get in another 18 but both kind of burned out and left at 27. Still a pretty good day. However lost yet another match to Matt.

Saturday was back to the Consrevatory. I loved that course. We played from the gold tees there which were 7300 or 7400 yards and played at a 151 slope. Today was going to be my day to beat matt. And i actually played pretty good this day. I got a little help off in the start cause matt was feaking out about missing multiple 2 to 4 footers and went crazy on the first 5 holes, but then he got his irons and driver going which helped with his mental part of the putting and we started deuling. Next thing I know, we are finishing the round and we both shoot well (can't remember scores) and he's up 1 going into the last round of the trip which we were playing at Ocean. This caused the only rift of the trip cause I had no desire to go play he Ocean course again, but Matt needed to add to his already taken 100 pictures and get more pictures of the ocean course, so we headed over there. I can't really complain about this round cause I ended up playing really well. Started off the front nine 39, but matt was playing really well and shot 36 which was really good considering how tough the course was, of course he complained about that score aswell cause he started out the round birdie, birdie. We made the turn and I believe i was something like 3 or 4 down. i kept fighting still. It seemed like everytime i got one stroke back, i gave it right back to him, and then we got to the 15th hole and i was down 4. I started to fight for my life here. Taking 15, 16, and 17 and standing on the tee 1 down with one hole to play. Unfortunatly I pressed myself a little to hard and hit the first bad drive of the round and into the huge bunker on the right. Luckly, Matt topped his to the left up against the out of bounds line. He still had a shot and came up just short of the green. I hit a 4 iron from the bunker as far as I could and found myself 20 yards right of the green and behind a trap. Knowing I had to make the best up and down of my life to tie Matt, I duffed my chip and made a boogie. Along with matts boogie we tied the hole and I lost again. 0-4 for the week sucked. But atleast I posted another good score of 78 on a very difficult course. Not much i could do, matt was playing really well (although you wouldn't know it from all the cursing and leg slapping) and shot a 77, should have been 73 but he blew up on the last 4 holes.

All in all, it was a perfect quick, cheap, golf vacation. We had an unlimited golf package, which we surely abused. Each round at these places was something like $140 american, we made that up in one day. I can defintly say I will return one day to the Ginn facility.