Conewango Valley Country Club (Warren, PA)

Conewango Valley CC is a real treat for any golf affianado who loves Donald Ross. It's located in Warren PA which at one time was a very wealthy oil town along the allegheny river, and the club founders convinced Ross to actually visit the site and design nine holes. 

(Looking back down the hill at #1 417 yard par four. It's an original Ross hole. It's a very small green that usually requires a mid or long iron approach.)

Conewango was nine holes until the '70s when it expanded to eighteen holes. While the new holes are nice, they're no comparison to the Ross holes. (1,9,10,11,12,13,16,17,18)

That comes as no surprise considering the the best part of the property was given to Ross sixty years earlier. Nonetheless, six thru eight is a good stretch of holes. 

(The sixth is the class of the new holes. It's a 465 yard par four whose fairway abruptly drops downhill to the green. The play is a layup off the tee, then hitting a 220-200 approach. Short is the proper miss and leaves a makeable up n down.)

(The 190 yard seventh plays longer than it's listed yardage. The fairway short of the green will snarl balls looking for a bounce forward.) 

(The 373 yard eighth is a tricky hole. The dogleg right has a creek at the far end with a bunker near the turn. The player must take his run out into consideration or his ball could find trouble off the tee. The green is befuddling too.) 

The ninth starts a stretch of five Donald Ross holes that are just a blast to play! 

(The ninth is 533 yards but plays significantly downhill....

....most players will have a chance to reach the green in two, but there's not much room to land the ball safely...

....the view from fourteen tee shows the creek left of the green. With bunkers short and a large pronounced roll in the front portion of putting surface, there's plenty of hazards to negotiate. My favorite thing bout nine are the numerous challenging pin positions. It's a great par five!) 

A large ridgeline separates the clubhouse from the main road, and Ross used this feature to great effect, routing three holes over it. 

(Ten is only 321 yards but the fairway ends 240 yards out, the well bunkered green thirty feet below the ridgeline.) 

Eleven tee is just a few feet away, and plays to a green atop the ridgeline, the exact opposite of the shot on ten. 

(Look at that great uphill shot! Also, note the steps with rail to the right....

...the green is bi level with contours throughout. Ten green is in the background.) 

(How cool is twelve?!! The bottom green is for the ladies.... The flag atop the hill is for the men! 

...Enjoy the view after you putt out!) 

(Thirteen is a 486 yard par four.  The downhill tee shot will make it play a little shorter but it's a strong hole! This was the final hole back when it was just a nine holer.) 

The next two holes are the new ones, and while fourteen is forgettable, fifteen offers an opportunity for some drama. 

(Long hitters must challenge the water to reach the green in two. Shorter hitters must decide where to layup.)

The last three holes are Ross. 

(The 182 yard sixteenth has a creek that cuts diagonally in front of the green. The player does have the option of hitting short and bouncing the ball in. The green slopes away in the front so pins there are hard to get close. Good par three!)

Seventeen is the only hole that plays next to the main road. It's 406 yards and the player drives over the entrance road coming in. A couple bunkers guard the front of the green. Then players walk over to eighteen tee and play one of the coolest short par four finishers I've ever seen!

(The ridgeline crosses diagonally in the fairway, forcing the golfer to pick the proper line off the tee. The left side is less carry but a long drive can carry into the trees. The right side is a longer carry, but a block or mishit will find big trouble and a blind uphill approach shot. It's just a great tee shot!!!....

....a good drives leaves a short shot to the green, and an opportunity to make birdie. The green slopes towards the front right. The beautiful old clubhouse overlooking the green paints a classic image one remembers long after the round.)

Conewango turned 100 this year and I had the good fortune to be able to purchase a centenial pass that allowed me to play this private club. (With the economy hurting in this area of Pennsylvania, I would bet a simple phone call could get one on the course.) The genius of Ross is beautifully on display. It's two and half hour drive from my house, and I have no qualms with it. Of course time flies by when the countryside is as mesmerizing as it is here. I give Conewango Valley CC a 6 (very good)(worth driving two hours). Get a cabin at Kinzua or Lake Chautauqua, and make this your weekend course! 

Catawba Island Club (Port Clinton, OH)

Any golf club where you can dock your boat and play golf is a pretty cool place. Welcome to the Catawba Island Club! 

(One of the original holes, eighteen plays back to the quaint little clubhouse.)

Founded in 1928 as the Catawba Cliffs Beach Club, the course was simply a few holes where members could hit balls when they grew tired of being on the water. Thankfully, for golfers, The Stouffer family bought the property in the late '60s with a vision to being a club that offered a variety of anmenities, and in 2008, that vision was fully achieved when Art Hills renovated and expanded the course to eighteen holes. 

(Hills par three sixth is unlike any other I've seen. A huge slope separates the upper shelf from the lower shelf. If you look at the bunker fronting the green, you can see how dramatic the elevation is.)

The new nine plays inland from the clubhouse. Hills dug out several lakes and routed the holes around them. I guess when the terrain is flat, one has to figure a way to make it interesting. 

(The par five fifth is a reverse S shaped hole with water guarding short of the green. Playing to the outer edge leaves an angle that doesn't have to carry the water.) 

Catawba is a solid course. The principles and strategies are consistent with other Hills designs. What makes it stand out is the conditioning. It's superb! The fairways are tight, and the greens are fast. The ball rolls beautifully on them, and the player better be cognizant of the slopes and pitches.  

As nice as CIC is, I don't have any interest in playing it. Port Clinton is on a spit of land that stretches out into the lake like a penisula. The wind is a constant here, and sometimes it blows very hard. In my mind, I feel Art Hills should have taken that more into consideration. Low shots should be more accessible, yet the architecture demands high lofted shots. It makes no sense to me. My friend who hits it far loves the place, but only because his ability to hoist short irons is to his advantage. 

(Back to back par threes over the water is the highlight of Catawba. This is the fourteenth 157/136....

(....then fifteen follows with 167/157 par three. Don't be fooled by the yardage. These holes can play very long. Notice the housing in the background. They weren't there a few years ago.) 

CIC does have one thing going for it, and that is it's location. Put-in-Bay, Cedar Point, Marblehead...this is one of the best regions in Ohio. You can also watch perfect sunsets! Regardless how I feel bout the course, CIC is well thought of, and I'm sure some golfers in the Toledo Golf Association would rank it high in the district. I give it a 5 (good)(worth driving an hour). 

(The par three ninth 180/160 yards)

Lake Forest Country Club (Hudson, OH)

For many years Lake Forest was thought  to be a Herbert Strong design. Then in 2013, the club was looking to renovate the course and Richard Mandell discovered, while looking through the archives of Hudson Times and Plain Dealer, that the architect was really Tom Bendelow. 

(The grand clubhouse at Lake Forest welcomes golfers before the round.)

Bendelow is an interesting character, and is considered to be one of the founding fathers of American golf, designing more than 800 courses. His pairing with A.G. Spalding & Bros during the turn of the century saw Bendelow "stake" out numerous courses for municipalities in an effort to bring golf to the masses. Tom eventually left Spalding and when he joined American Park Builders, his designs became more challenging and strategic as his clients had bigger budgets and more expectations. 

(Many of Bendelow's greens are simply extensions of the fairway.) 

Learning that Lake Forest is a Bendelow course answers some of the questions posed by the layout. Herbert Strong was such a well established player that his designs feature heavily bunkered greens with severe contours. Lake Forest doesn't possess greens or bunkering like that. Instead many of the holes have fairways that bleed straight into the greens. The bunkering is placed to the sides should the do anything except advance forward. 

(The view from the back tee shows the main challenge of Lake Forest. Look how narrow the fairway corridor is as players prepare to hit from the middle tees.)

The playing corridors are narrow, and in some cases, extremely narrow. On the 441 yard second, the fairway between the trees was no more than twenty-five yards wide! This places total focus on accuracy, and usually results in a very long approach shot. The fourth (pic above) is 450 yards from the back tee (388 from the middle tee where players are hitting). It's amazing how little room the player has to get his tee ball in play. 

(The short par four fifth is just a drive n pitch hole, but an approach from the fairway is needed to take advantage of the back right to front left slope.) 

Lake Forest is muscular in places where most golden age courses are subtle. It has three par threes that are well over two hundred yards. Ironically, the best one is the short one that plays downhill to a small green. 

It's also a blast to play! The bunkering allows the pin to be moved to several challenging hole locations. The longer par threes are simply shots where a ball in the middle of the green is cause for celebration. The third hole is nearly 240 yards! A ball even on the fringe is a good shot! 

(The par five eighth is a beautiful tee shot. All four five pars are reachable in two. It's important to take advantage of them, especially considering how difficult the one shotters are.) 

The tenth is the one hole that stands out! 

It's 338 yards from the back tee and is driveable if one can carry it 270+ yards. I think it's even more challenging trying to figure out the landing zone and carry distance. 

A perfect drive leaves this angle and view to the green. The fairway slopes towards the water, so the player must be able to hit a quality shot from a sidehill lie. It has to be one of the best holes in northeast Ohio! 

(Like most golden age courses, Lake Forest has been modified by other architects. The greenside bunkers are a different style here at the twelfth.) 

(The uphill par five fourteenth has a hazard that crosses the fairway, and makes this 500 yard par five a little bit more thought provoking.) 

(The 401 yard fifteenth reminds me of the NLE Aurora CC second. The boundary line is down the left with the green sloping towards the front right. Good golf hole!)

Lake Forest is one of the few courses that ends with a par three. As stated earlier, three of the four one shotters are over two hundred yards, and the last hole requires a well struck long iron to make par. 

(Eighteen is 214/180 yards downhill to a green that sits alone atop the hill. It's such a good hole that I think many are okay with it being eighteen. Notice the great views across the property. Lake Forest has taken out many trees.) 

Lake Forest demands good shot after good shot. There's not many breather holes, and the key to a good score is taking advantage of the par fives. Besides being tight off the tee, the greens can be vexing, both in slope and speed. I saw more short putts missed. Lapse of concentration can easily cost a stroke. In terms of the private club scene around northeast Ohio, it falls into the "B" category. I give it a 5 (good)(worth driving an hour to play). I thought it would be the best course in the ICPGA (Inter-Club Public Golf Assc) but that honor goes to Silver Lake down the road. 

Shepherd's Hollow Golf Club (Clarkston, MI)

I've played more Art Hills' courses than any other architect's designs. The best I've played is Bay Harbor in Petosky, but I've also played Pipestone and Brookledge, two munis in Miamisville and Cuyahoga Falls. Typically with Hills, if you see a bunker, then that is the preferred side and/or angle. 

(Drive the ball over the inside bunker...

....and be rewarded with this view of the green.)

Since I see so many Hiils' courses, I don't get overly excited when I play a new one, but at Shepherds Hollow, I saw some different design features. This piqued my curiosity and made the round more exciting than it normally would be. 

(The par three second is slightly downhill. The bunker that dominates the pic is a good fifty yards short of the green, but it's such a massive hazard that it influences one's perspective and shot selection. It caught me by surprise!) 

Hills has always been good at designing masterful short par fours. He likes to dogleg them, and then give the player the option to carry the corner. (And a chance to drive the green) Here the short par fours are more the drive n pitch variety. 

(The player must really commit to a gameplan on this short par four. With several different options from the tee, one  doesn't wanna get careless and hit into the rough. This small green demands a well struck shot from the fairway.) 

The par five fourth:

(These bunkers are more a directional aid than a hazard...

(...the terrain gathering the ball towards the bowl green. The player who can carry those three bunker in previous pic has good chance to reach this in two.)

(The long par four fifth has a bunker at the end of the fairway signaling the break in the terrain.)

(Look how the bunkering visually sharpens the drive on the par five seventh.)

Strong par fours are sprinkled throughout the round at Shephard's Hollow. One of my favorites is the tenth. 

(The fairway cants left to right, suggesting a draw be hit from the tee. The green is over the hill, and is open in front for a running approach. Beautiful golf hole!)

(Is this a Redan? Possibly. The twelfth caught my attention because the large mound short right can be used to slingshot the ball onto the green. With bunkers guarding the left, bringing the ball in from the right is an attractive option.)

Art Hills has always designed good par fives. The second shot is challenging for both the long hitter and the precision player. 

(There's plenty of room short of the two bunkers in the rough, but for a view of the green, the second shot must carry them.)

(The par five eighteenth curls around the lake, providing many lines of attack. This is a reachable green if you hit a good tee shot. Many different numbers in play for the final hole.)

Shephard's Hollow has 27 holes, making this a great one day getaway.  It's a 3 1/2 drive for me, so playing all three nines would be the only way I would make the trip back up. A few years ago it was ranked #42 on "Best Public" list. 

(The terrain and vegetation is awe inspiring at Shephard's Hollow.) 

The only knock is the limitation of walking. It reminds me of Royal New Kent in Virginia. Great holes with some long walks in between. (Not always but enough) I give the course a 6 (very good)(worth driving two hours). If you're playing all 27 holes, then I'm willing to bump it up. 

(Shephard's Hollow is probably the second best Hills course I've played, just slightly ahead of Longaberger.)