Barnbougle Dunes

IN: COURSE REVIEWS | BY: Mike Clayton | | REGION: North-East, TAS DATE: 25 Oct 2004 | Rated

Barnbougle Dunes

Hole 12

There have been a number of highly touted courses open in Australia in the past decade but none have threatened the pre-eminence of our leading courses Royal Melbourne, Kingston Heath, NSW or Royal Adelaide.

These are my favourite Australian courses and despite all the attendant publicity surrounding most of the new offerings they have not quite matched the wonder of our best courses although Kennedy Bay and Bob Harrison's course at The National are terrific and the best of the new layouts.

Word is leaking out, however, of a new course in the sand dunes of the Northeast coast of Tasmania that promises to be the best course built in this country since the great Depression.

Here, I must admit to having more than a close involvement with Barnbougle Dunes so you should read my comments with this in mind.

The course is co-designed by the design company bearing my name and one of the best architects in America, Tom Doak.

In 2000, a 24-year-old Tasmanian, Greg Ramsay had the dream of building a course in the most unlikely of locations and he approached Richard Sattler a Bridport farmer (one hour NE of Launceston, pop.1500) with the suggestion that the dunes bordering his 13,000-acre potato and cattle farm might be transformed into a serious golf course. Sattler did not play golf, indeed he "knows nothing about it and doesn't even really like it" but at least he didn't immediately send Ramsay and his hair-brained scheme, down the road.

There have been times, however, when I suspect he wishes he had.

Ramsey organized for Doak partner Bruce Hepner, John Sloan, Bruce Grant and I to visit the site but we drove from the first meeting with the collective view of "that'll never happen".

"If I have heard that speech once, I've heard it a hundred times", said Hepner of the dreaming kid promising to "make you guys famous".

It's fair to say four years after Sattler professed to know so little of the game, he has formed an attachment both to it and the people he has met through the project including Mike Keiser, the owner of the Bandon Dunes resort in Oregon where Doak built Pacific Dunes, a course already ranked amongst the top 20 in the world. One connection between Bandon and Barnbougle is both are a long way from a big population centre and both Keiser and Sattler have had friends question their sanity. Or, at least in Keiser's case they used to question it. The Bandon resort is now the most successful in the United States and it proved great remote golf is sustainable.

Never could a design team have had, in Sattler, a more trusting, fun and passionate client determined to do something worthwhile for his local community.

Keiser has been a source of great wisdom and the man who suggested the course ought to become a public facility as opposed to Ramsay's original concept of a membership-based club.

All credit should go to Sattler who was convinced by Doak and I, he could create something of real significance for Australian golf and perhaps more importantly, Tasmanian golf. The island has a dearth of good courses but not of great land and if Barnbougle is successful it may be the beginning of something really special for Tasmanian golfers and those making the effort to travel to the island. Some are sceptical of the chances of success but they assume Barnbougle is just another very good - and probably over-hyped - golf course. If that was all it was, I too would hold fears to for its viability but it is no ordinary golf course and the experience of playing over its holes is unmatched in this country. That is the promise of Barnbougle for those who make the pilgrimage.

The wonder of great courses is that they are played over spectacular land and the layouts are made up of incredible holes, one after another, that leave golfers in awe of the experience.

There are perhaps only a couple of holes - the 2nd and the 16th - that wouldn't qualify amongst a group of the best holes in the country. The 2nd is the only hole not bordered by dunes on both sides yet I love its understated nature as the left side of the fairway leaks out into the farmland, because it will be, for some, a let down after all the pre-game hype. Many will walk off the 2nd green and comment "this course isn't that good".

Half an hour later they will walk from the 4th green with their minds changed and the promise of much more to come.

The course plays along a thin strip of coastal dunes with the clubhouse, set in the middle of the property and almost literally, on the beach.

The opening four holes play away from the clubhouse and into the prevailing wind but at the far point of the front nine the golfer turns from the 4th green around a high dune to the most spectacular of views across the ocean. The run back to the clubhouse is through the steepest dunes closest to the water and only the tiny 120 metre seventh interrupts the succession of holes down the prevailing breeze. The 7th is a fearsome short hole sure to be a favourite with its small green guarded by a deep bunker on the left and a sharp, long bank that sweeps the ball far away from the green if the shot is too long.

The two other personal favourites on the first nine are the short par four, 4th and the long; two- shot 8th that is either a par four of a par five depending on the conditions of the day. The 4th has a huge fairway and a strategy dictated by a massive bunker embedded into the dune one has to carry if the green is to be reached. Only the longest of hitters could contemplate pulling of that risky shot but there are multitudes of options for those laying back from the tee.

The 8th is a hole of almost 500 yards in the old money with a huge expanse of fairway split by a central dune. The upper fairway is the best option but only a great drive will find it and most will play down the low side and be confronted by a long second shot up to a narrow green protected by a spectacular, square topped, dune to the right.

The back nine like the front begins with a run of holes not right along the water but only the single fairways running parallel and back to the clubhouse separate these holes from the waterfront and all are magnificent holes.

The 11th is a par five with a fairway at least ninety metres wide for the second shot but the position of the pin dictates the correct place to lay-up the long approach. It is a characteristic of the course that nothing is dictated to the player and he of she is free to decide how best to tackle a particular hole.

Too often we are confronted with holes where the line is simply dictated by the architect and these holes may expose an inability to hit straight but there is little emphasis placed on trying to figure out the best way to tackle a hole of a particular day. The greatest example of a never-ending puzzle is the Old Course at St. Andrews.

The short par four, 12th is a hole very similar to the 10th West at Royal Melbourne in terms of the decisions one must make on the tee. This hole turns to the right as opposed to the left but the green sits on the edge of a dune and those flying at the green face one of the most tempting yet fearsome looking shots in the country.

The final four holes play back into the wind and along the ocean and the 15th is a wonderful medium length par four with a bunker in the middle of the fairway that gives the player the option and space to play over, left, right or short.

The 17th and 18th are long two shot holes that into the stiffest of winds can barely be reached with two woods.

The 6200 metre course is not long by the standards of today but it is all at about but the conditions and the wind and temperature will be the determinants of how long the holes play and yardage means little. In my first time around the course, I hit a five iron 200 metres onto the par three, 5th and the same club onto the 120 metre 7th.

This is not a place for yardages on the sprinklers or golfers not prepared for the rawest of elements. The weather can be as miserable here as it is on a bad day on the Monterey Peninsula or the coasts of Scotland or Ireland.

Almost by definition, the best land for golf is found the world over on the coastlines of countries battered by high and heavy winds and that is certainly the case at Barnbougle.

The Verdict

What it promises, is a golfing experience unmatched in Australia and one equal to almost anything in the world. It is a place of spectacular beauty and the holes themselves are a wonderful collection of the best the game has to offer.

Barnbougle deserves to be successful enough to at least pay Sattler's wage bill and repay some of his investment but my suspicion is he, like many others, have little idea of what Barnbougle has in store for the country's golfers or just how good it is.

Finally, we have a course to challenge Royal Melbourne as the country's premier course and so long as the seas don't warm and rise too much, golfers decades from now will owe a great debt to Sattler and Ramsay and their passion for a project that is not predicated on the selling of real-estate or great profit.

Mind you, Richard wouldn't like to hear me say that and I'm sure he wouldn't object to collecting more than a few bob from all the stress of trusting Ramsay, Doak and Clayton.

The Barnbougle Dunes Golf Links officially opens on 10th December 2004, including practice facilities, 15 villas and public clubhouse with cafe bar, pro shop, and restaurant/function room. Green fees will be about AUD$80.

The holiday resort of Bridport, 2 kilometres from Barnbougle Dunes, is located in a sheltered corner of the Bass Strait coast fringed with attractive beaches. For fishing fanatics, ocean and river fishing is excellent and there are 7 kilometres of beachfront, accessible only from the property, for walking and fishing.

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