The Walking Scorer

The Pete Dye course (there are 4 courses) at French Lick Resort is on the top 100 list, but the web site says you have to stay in the resort in order to play. The 2 nd best course in Indiana is the Donald Ross course, so I played there. This is the 100 th anniversary for the golf course, and also for moon pies, so they are giving a free round of golf if you buy a moon pie for $120. Or something like that. The cart attendants were dressed as Ross would have dressed while playing. The course is typical Donald Ross, with nearly every approach shot going uphill, to large elevated greens with severe undulations. I had this putt on the 9th, and couldn't get it close.  (View it on full screen, so you can see where the balls end up.) There was hardly a level lie in any fairway, and lots of uphill shots from downhill lies. I made birdie on the #1 handicap hole, and I don't have to say anything else if I don't want ...

This one didn't make the top 100, but is the best you can play in Wyoming.  It was built in 1961 by Bob Baldock, and redesigned repeatedly;  twice, and most recently, by Robert Trent Jones Jr.  The white tees at 6793 yards seemed too intimidating, even considering the altitude, so I played the RTJ1 combo (pink) tees at 6142.  I thought that, given the address, there would be some elevation features, but the course is quite flat and many of the members were walking.  Jones likes bunkers, though, so threading your way through the fairway bunkers is somewhat reminiscent of the target golf common in desert courses. The scenery is surely not desert, with tree-lined fairways and the snow-capped (even in August) Tetons in the background, and water in play on 9 holes. The conditions were great, the weather perfect, the greens fast and true, with considerable contour and a variety of shapes, and ample opportunities for "sucker" pin placements. Ther...