It has been some three years since I enjoyed the pleasure of playing golf in Wales, so when we decided to cover this week’s Wales Open the first item of luggage packed into the car was the golf clubs.
What was a surprise was the number of golf courses in and around Celtic Manor and host venue for this week’s penultimate European Tour event ahead of the Ryder Cup next week in Scotland.
Welcome to Green Meadow Golf & Country Club.
We are staying the week in a wonderful self-catering B & B named – Ty Capten – that when translated into Welsh means simply ‘The Captain’.
However just along the road from our dwelling this week is the Green Meadow Golf and Country Club.
I dropped into the club on Tuesday afternoon and introduced myself to Leon Clark, the professional attached to Green Meadow who very kindly afforded me the courtesy of the course.
Leon mentioned he grew-up playing alongside leading Welsh golfer, Jamie Donaldson who next week will make his Ryder Cup debut.
There’s a guard of honour to greet you stepping onto the first tee.
It was a superb afternoon and also quite balmy given here we were into the third week of September.
Leon pointed out the club was in the process of ‘coring’ the greens but that didn’t deter me on the excitement of again playing golf in Wales.
The Green Meadow Golf and Country Club was opening in 1979 so this year it’s been celebrating its 35th anniversary.
The course is a rolling hills parkland course commanding wonderful views out over the Welsh farming and grazing countryside. The course measures 6,078 yards off the white tees, 5,501 off the yellow and 5,085 yards for the ladies.
The superb view from the side of the second tee at Green Meadow.
There’s a mix of five par threes, including the 135-yard uphill first hole, along with three par fives but with the sixth a par four off the yellow tees.
In stepping onto the first tee there’s a rather unusual line of small trees to welcome you, and standing more like a guard of honour with the trees cut into the shape of golfers and all but one ‘holding’ an iron.
The opening hole, and 18 index on the scorecard, offers a gentle introduction to the course before the first of the par fives at the second but for this first time visitor to Green Meadow it was the marvelous view of the Welsh countryside at the second tee that immediately captured my attention rather than the very generous second hole fairway.
One of the toughest holes I found on the front nine was the par five sixth hole, a tee shot off the white tees that has to be hit across the 12th tee box but needing to position your ball well enough on the dog-leg for the all important second shot. Not familiar with the landing area my drive off the tee ran through the fairway but then I still managed to squeeze out a par despite the ‘coring’ process that was in fact taking place the very afternoon I was playing.
The eighth hole tee shots presents its own challenge.
Another challenging tee shot was at the downhill par four eighth – The Oaks – not long at 331-yards but a shot akin to trying to thread a needle as you can see from the photograph above.
The 10th is another hole requiring a precise tee shot to the corner of the dog-leg before trying to avoid a water hazard to the left of the green, that I failed to do. At 414 yards it is the longest of the par 4s albeit by a yard from the third.
The No. 1 index at Green Meadow is the 384-yard 15th hole named – Amen Corner – where there is a 143-yard carry off the white tees over water but with out-of-bounds down the left side. The hole doglegs to the right with the second shot needing to avoid a bunker front right and then anything long and right will find ‘OB’.
Green Meadow is a wonderful example of parkland golf and it’s one of those courses, on this particular warm late September afternoon, that the views were so good of the Welsh countryside to easily distract this particular golfer away from the task at hand.
My special thanks to Leon for the opportunity to play Green Meadow Golf and Country Club.
* Click on photographs to enlarge.
