KeefG
Journeyman Pro
I took my son for a knock today, just a quickie up at Elemore near Sunderland. Had a look at the website before we left and noticed a note saying only trolleys fitted with hedgehogs were allowed due to the conditions.
Got to the course only to find the back 9 closed due to it being waterlogged, our intentions then were to play the front 9 twice.
Went into the clubhouse and paid our green fees and hired 2 trolleys with hedgehogs for us both and off we set.
Hit my tee shot down the first (par 5) with my driver and made a good go of it, the son went off and didnt do too shabby with his drive either.....however things went rapidly downhill, as soon as we left the gravel path onto the fairway it was disgusting!!
We could clearly see where people before us had been without hedgehogs and the grass/mud was a mess, i've never ever ever seen fairways so boggy. We got to my sons ball first which was in the middle of the fairway in about 1/2 inch of standing water, he had to go 35yds to the right and drop his ball on a bank just to get relief of the standing water.
We got to my ball which had plugged and was also in about 1/2 inch of standing water, again I had to move about 30yds to the opposite side of the fairway to have any sort of decent lie but again I had to drop on a hill. We eventually got to the green and what I found was shocking....although we hadnt had much rain in Sunderland since yesterday afternoon, there was huge puddles all over the greens, massive footprints where people had walked and not a single place you could putt without going through a lot of standing water.
We picked up and gave ourselves 2 putts each and decided to give it the benfit of the doubt and see how the rest of the course fared.
We shouldnt have bothered, the 'pathway' between the 1st green and 2nd tee was pretty much a swamp and trying to get through it the water & mud covered my shoes and soaked my feet.....at this point we decided to forget about it and went back to the clubhouse where I demanded my money back.
At this point the woman i'd paid our money to refused to refund us as she said we knew what the conditions were like, I pointed out that by them closing the back 9 they were implying that the front 9 was in a playable condition and at no point had we been told that the course was like a grass covered lake!
The secretary of the club then turned up and after a bit more arguing they eventually agreed to refund us, I must point out at this point i've played here a few times before during the summer and had nothing less than a really good game.
Anyway, my point (a bit long winded I know) is that are golf course owners greedy?
I understand they have overheads to cover etc but its completely unfair to charge people to play golf on a course that it 110% unsuitable for play and, ultimately, is wrecking the course and will render parts of the course horrible for a number of months yet.
Got to the course only to find the back 9 closed due to it being waterlogged, our intentions then were to play the front 9 twice.
Went into the clubhouse and paid our green fees and hired 2 trolleys with hedgehogs for us both and off we set.
Hit my tee shot down the first (par 5) with my driver and made a good go of it, the son went off and didnt do too shabby with his drive either.....however things went rapidly downhill, as soon as we left the gravel path onto the fairway it was disgusting!!
We could clearly see where people before us had been without hedgehogs and the grass/mud was a mess, i've never ever ever seen fairways so boggy. We got to my sons ball first which was in the middle of the fairway in about 1/2 inch of standing water, he had to go 35yds to the right and drop his ball on a bank just to get relief of the standing water.
We got to my ball which had plugged and was also in about 1/2 inch of standing water, again I had to move about 30yds to the opposite side of the fairway to have any sort of decent lie but again I had to drop on a hill. We eventually got to the green and what I found was shocking....although we hadnt had much rain in Sunderland since yesterday afternoon, there was huge puddles all over the greens, massive footprints where people had walked and not a single place you could putt without going through a lot of standing water.
We picked up and gave ourselves 2 putts each and decided to give it the benfit of the doubt and see how the rest of the course fared.
We shouldnt have bothered, the 'pathway' between the 1st green and 2nd tee was pretty much a swamp and trying to get through it the water & mud covered my shoes and soaked my feet.....at this point we decided to forget about it and went back to the clubhouse where I demanded my money back.
At this point the woman i'd paid our money to refused to refund us as she said we knew what the conditions were like, I pointed out that by them closing the back 9 they were implying that the front 9 was in a playable condition and at no point had we been told that the course was like a grass covered lake!
The secretary of the club then turned up and after a bit more arguing they eventually agreed to refund us, I must point out at this point i've played here a few times before during the summer and had nothing less than a really good game.
Anyway, my point (a bit long winded I know) is that are golf course owners greedy?
I understand they have overheads to cover etc but its completely unfair to charge people to play golf on a course that it 110% unsuitable for play and, ultimately, is wrecking the course and will render parts of the course horrible for a number of months yet.
. Fortunately I had the foresight to wear my water wings and managed to swim to the side and climb out.
