From Chappy to Northwood

Steve and I agreed earlier that morning that he would pick me up at 6:30am. It was the middle of September and I was in town for his son’s wedding, who is my oldest friend from kindergarten. One of Steve’s other sons, Colton, was in the car that morning as we headed to the ferry.

Different from the previous day’s ferry, this one took mere seconds. We were going from Martha’s Vineyard to Chappaquiddick for a round at a 9-holer, Royal and Ancient Chappaquiddick Links. As we waited for the ferry to dock, we grabbed over a dozen breakfast sandwiches from a diner 100 yards away.

When we arrived for our “tee time” there were few other cars in the sandy parking lot. Several of Steve’s nephews joined us, and we knew that Steve’s other son, Brian, would arrive at the turn. The man working the pro shop didn’t seem to mind that one more would be coming eventually. This place didn’t really have rules.

Six of us went out that early morning, bellies almost full, for a unique round of golf. The nine features seven par 3s and a pair of short 4s, all to small greens. The course is minimally maintained, with gnarly grass in places you do not want to miss. And the greens roll about a seven.

On the tee of three, one of the legs of my carry bag broke. Thoroughly annoyed, I spent the rest of the front nine asking myself if it was even worth buying a hat from the merch shack.

I hadn’t played great on the front but was happy to see Brian when we walked off the 9th green. He was looking completely puzzled at his dad, who apparently gave the rest of the breakfast sandwiches to a group of guys who teed off after us. I was annoyed too; I had been thinking about eating another since I finished the first.

On the next nine, Brian and I played a little match for a couple dollars, but our legs lost to the black flies. However, I ended up making three birdies on the back for a 2-under nine and a reason to buy a hat.

The next morning, after an incredible wedding, I took the bus to the ferry with my golf clubs over my shoulder. I got back to the mainland and headed west. I needed to be in Portland, Oregon in ten days for another high school friend’s wedding. This groom, Frank, is a serious golfer, as is his younger brother, Will. I had friends to see and golf to play, so I drove.

A little over 48-hours later, I was turning down a narrow road to Forest Dunes Golf Club in Roscommon, MI. I had spent the previous night in Cleveland, and after three days of driving, I was ready for a walk.

The first thing that struck me was the proximity of the resort’s courses to the one clubhouse. I only had time for the par-3 Bootlegger course, designed by Riley Johns and Keith Rhebb, but from the first tee I could see holes on Forest Dunes and The Loop.

After teeing off on this ten-hole course, I watched a group hit shots onto the par 3 nineteenth at Forest Dunes. This bonus hole features a bunker in the middle of the green, like #6 at Riviera.

On the green of one at The Bootlegger I made my birdie putt as classic rock played through speakers tucked behind trees. The only thing more fun than the experience was the course.

#9 on The Bootlegger

The wall-to-wall fairways, besides occasional tufts of heather, made the course feel bigger than it played. Natural and manmade features added intrigue and gave each hole character. There was a lion’s mouth bunker on the second, six played through a halfpipe, and seven reminded me of the famous Alister MacKenzie “Gibraltar” hole at Moortown.

On the halfpipe sixth I hit a lefty hickory that I had put in my bag for the first time. Naturally left-handed but lifer righty golfer, I had long wondered how I would be on my dominant side. This was the perfect course to experiment. 

I finally got some Grateful Dead on the 9th while catching a glimpse of the first and last hole on the literal same piece of land at The Loop. It was mind-blowing to see a sliver of this reversible course in the flesh.

As I headed off the property on my way to a friend’s house in Traverse City, I was thrilled to have driven out of the way to play a par-3 course designed by two up-and-coming architects. It makes me want to go back and catch more than just a glimpse of the other courses.

After a day spent exploring the Leelanau Peninsula with my friend, I was ready to play some golf. I played Bay Meadows, a community course that featured everything I love about the game. The property has two courses, a 9-hole executive course and a 9-hole par 3 course. When I arrived, there were high school matches finishing on the executive course and kids on the driving range.

I started on the executive nine, but as I walked to the first tee a woman called out to me saying it wasn’t my time to tee off yet. She was the golf coach and had mistaken me for one of her players. I was 31 at the time.

After the fifth I jumped back to the second, which was my favorite hole so far. A 347-yard hole, the tee shot allows for anything from 6-iron to 3-wood, before a tasty downhill approach to the green.

Three was a 75-yard flip wedge. This incredibly short hole works exceptionally well on a community course and plays as a great match play hole for high schoolers and the Sunday four-ball.

This golf course felt like the center of the community. It was easy and affordable, and free of lost golf balls! It was also a challenge for the single-digit handicapper to “go really low.” And it was such an easy walk!

After finishing my 13-hole loop in under two hours, I ditched my long irons, hybrid, 3-wood and driver in the car, and went to the first tee of the par-3 as the wind began to pick up. Independent of the wind, I thought the par 3 was the more difficult course because it was much more exposed.

I had thoughts of playing Belvedere, the William Watson classic, on my way out of town, but instead decided to spend an extra day with my friend. I figured he and Belvedere Golf Club would be living in northern Michigan for the foreseeable future.

A day later I headed north across the Mackinac Bridge and into the Upper Peninsula. I had a beautiful drive along Lake Michigan before entering the heavy forest of the U.P. I then reached the shores of Lake Superior and spent the night in my tent along a small tributary.

It was colder than I anticipated the next morning. I quickly packed up my gear, heated a bagel on my grill, and boiled some water for tea. I had a tee time at Nemadji Golf Course.

I only had time for nine holes that morning as I wanted to be in western Montana the following night. The course was already bustling when I arrived for my 8:20am tee time. I played the East Nine, one that climbs up and down ravines through the forest.

The first and ninth holes are only intended to get you away from and back to the clubhouse. They are not particularly interesting holes, at least not compared to the rest of the nine. While the second and third hole work through more undulating terrain than the first, the ride gets wild across the road on holes 4 through 6.

The fourth is a dogleg par-4 around a ravine that plays to a wide fairway. It then turns left towards series of hummocks that hold the green and protect errant shots from going into the ditch. I found this hole visually pleasing from both the tee shot and approach.

The fifth requires a tee shot over the most dramatic portion of the ravine to a severely sloped fairway below. While the green appears lower than the tee box, the second shot plays entirely uphill and is guarded by a pair of towering trees abutting the fairway. I was half-expecting to see a black bear.

Six runs parallel to the road and is a 165-yard par-3. It was here that I began to appreciate how no other holes were visible from the hole the player was currently on. While I do not always prefer this type of routing, every tee box presented another great reveal.

This was the perfect walk before a 500-mile drive. It was great exercise along with being a mental test and it had me wanting to play the other 27 holes.

I got to Montana the following night, but not before picking up my first ever speeding ticket. I paid the $40 fine, made some (vertical) hot dogs at a rest stop, and arrived in Missoula with plenty of daylight. Golf took a backseat to hiking that weekend, but that would change in Portland, Oregon.

Had I arrived any earlier to Portland that Tuesday we probably would have done something golf-related. But instead, we all went out to dinner.

The next morning, Frank, Will and I played 18 holes at Wildwood Golf Course. In unconventional scheduling, we had previously committed to having his bachelor party at Bandon Dunes the following month, so we used this as a practice round to test the format for our upcoming tournament: Stableford scoring.

We immediately learned the importance of birdies when Will rolled in a 40-footer on one for 4 points. This course played up and down hills and under telephone wires. The back was closed for renovations, so we looped the front twice. Frank ended up winning a close match 31-27-23 and confirmed that this was the format for Bandon because of its importance on pars and birdies.

After lunch with their parents and the fiancé’s family, Will and I snuck out for another 9 holes at the local par 3. On this first hole, Will made a 70-foot putt for birdie. He had totaled over 100 feet of putts made on the first hole of the two courses played that day.

This course was an assortment of long and short par-3s. Some required carries over water while others featured greens that only work on a par-3 course. And we ended up playing quickly enough to lap a couple extra holes before the rain arrived.

After a beautiful wedding in the forest above downtown Portland that following morning, the three of us played some miniature golf at a local bar. Yes, the groom joined. The course was untraditional, featuring a spin-the-wheel on several tees to determine if you would be hitting your putter or a baseball bat.

A few days later, Will and I drove south towards Los Angeles. In the days between the wedding and heading south I went up to Seattle to see some camp friends and wave at a Chambers Bay sign.

Something that stood out to both of us on our drive from Portland to central California was how significantly drought affects the entire west. This was early October, but once the descent began into California and Mt. Shasta was behind us, the land was as arid as I have ever seen in my near ten years living in California. We wanted to pull over for a swim but could not find any worthy watering holes.

We found a campsite on someone’s property and, immediately after exploring our zone, busted out the putting green that lived in the trunk of my car. We hit wedges off hardpan and then made putts under the lights. The next day, Will and I ended up driving five hours out of the way for nine holes that neither of us will ever forget.

We arrived in Monte Rio at Northwood Golf Club, a nine-hole course designed by Alister MacKenzie, in time to eat turkey clubs before we went off. We played as a twosome which allowed us to walk the course that plays through a redwood forest at our own pace.

It was on the second hole where you could really feel the magnitude of the megaflora. This hole played under a covered chute, and Will exclaimed “it feels like we are playing in a National Park, not a golf course.”

Northwood was both the most and least parkland-style course I had ever played. All the holes were tree-lined, blocking out the sun. However, the branches started so high up that they were rarely in play. Because of the height of these trees, it looked like the ball was going nowhere. The ball was such a small speck that a towering iron looked unimpressive and a nuked driver looked like it went nowhere.

#8 at Northwood Golf Club

It did not take long that afternoon for Will and me to realize it was well worth driving out of the way. The spectacle of playing a golf course that winds through the redwoods and was laid out by Alister MacKenzie is something I will never forget.

Northwood Golf Club was my fifth MacKenzie course of the summer. I had played four in the UK a few months prior and found similarities in the courses. MacKenzie had a penchant for building courses on impeccable sites. Whether it be a redwood grove, the Monterey Peninsula, or the rolling hills of Britain’s Peak District, he allowed the landscape to determine where the golf course played.   

It was surreal having Los Angeles, my home, as the last stop after five months of traveling. The last ten days especially had been wedding-, golf-, and travel-packed. Each course on the drive felt like the center of their respective communities. I was not focused on the rankings of the courses I was playing, or their length. I wanted to play “different” golf”. I was just focused on hitting a little ball wherever and whenever I could, with lifelong friends nearby.