Golf courses managed to escape any serious damage from a harsh winter that saw a series of storms batter the region with heavy amounts of rain or snow depending on the day of the week.
Avid golfers have been out in full swing at Harmon Seaside Links in Stephenville since the 18-hole facility opened May 4 and club secretary Roger Hulan said the course proved to be in better shape than was expected after a crazy winter on the west coast.
Lush and green were the words he described the course, and he said there were a couple of holes that traditionally have water build-up on them starting off the season but workers at Harmon were able to get them drained pretty swiftly.
“There’s not a lot of pooling water like we’ve seen sometimes in the past,” Hulan said.
Deer Lake course expected to open Saturday
Outside crews at the Humber River Golf Course have been busy preparing the course for opening day on Saturday with any repairs that had to be made already completed so the only thing standing in the way of golfers hitting the fairways is Mother Nature.
The club lost a bridge coming from Hole 8 to Hole 9 that has been replaced and several areas of the course lost some trees that had to be cut up and removed, but there wasn’t any other real challenge other than the fact there is a lot of water on Nos. 4, 7 and 8 (although all are considered playable at this point in time.)
Club spokesperson Derrick Wagg said they may have to use a couple of temporary greens for a few days but having golfers on the course Saturday is the objective.
Humber Valley Resort comes through winter in great shape
Humber Valley Resort, with managing director of operations Gary Oke the man at the helm, opened on Thursday with rain and chilly temperatures.
Oke was impressed with how the course held up over the winter and expected things to be much worse than they were.
“We didn’t know what to expect after all the strange weather we had, but everything came through really well, and I’m hearing that all the courses across the province are good so that’s nice to hear,” Oke said. “We had no winter kill at all and that surprised me.”
Gros Morne Golf Course will open Friday
The 18-hole facility located in St. Paul’s, owned by Alphonse Hutchings, is expected to open Friday.
Hutchings said his crew have been aerating the greens all week in an effort to hit his target date for opening and he was happy to report that the course held up great over the winter months.
“We never had no dead grass or no floods or anything so the course is in excellent shape,” Hutchings said.
May 25 is target date for opening of Blomidon
Blomidon had to deal with damage to the course thanks to snowmobilers and all-terrain vehicle users tearing up the course over the winter, but that’s been all fixed up and club superintendent Andrew Margeson is looking forward to the course being in great shape on opening day.
“Considering the winter we had we came out fairly decent,” Margeson said. “The course needs to dry up a little bit but we should be ready to go by next Friday.”
