Blog 67 – Inverell

Nomadic_golfer : September 2020

Par 70, 5863m, slope 121, green fee $15

5 par 3s from 153-213m, 10 par 4s from 277-420m, 3 par 5s from 467-546m

Another journey of just over 1 hour from our Kaiiwi Estate base near Glen Innes to this town of 12k people, big on agriculture and a bit of mining; known as the “Sapphire City” due to local finds.

Beautiful natural bush environment with lots of gums and scrub, high quality medium to large size bent greens that have just been re-built following the drought and have some beautiful scrub settings. The kikuyu fairways are yet to come back fully.

At 5863m it’s longish for it’s par of 70, aided by 2 par 4s over 415m and a 213m par 3. There is great variety in length, shape and fairway width also. I’d call the front nine the “gully” nine as 6 of the holes involve either crossing or playing from one of 3 grass gullies (50-60m long, 10-20m deep) that cross the property. From a layout perspective, it’s a solid 9 holes without being spectacular, with a couple of really good holes in: 2 (350m uphill all the way sweeping left with a drop off the left side of the fairway to scrub); and 7 (420m par 4 with ob right, slightly downhill, shapes slightly right to left which the fence follows and closes the gap near the green, while the fairway slopes toward the fence).

The back 9 is the ‘creek’ 9 and the layout is fantastic; some altitude changes and some excellent design. I loved this 9 holes of golf and its tough to only mention 3: 10 (huge par 5 of 546m, with OB down right, then moves away from the fence, then back toward the fence as you approach the green. The bit I love is that they have a diagonal row of trees on the left as you approach the green to catch those who shy away from the fence); 12 (main photo, above, beautiful 169m par 3 with 2 distinct retaining wall tee beds, flanked tightly by gums on both sides and takes a big step up a hill over the stream); and 14 (388m par 4 with lots of things going on, the fairway steps down at about 200m mark, and the stream crosses the fairway at about 270 in the centre & 220 on the left side, there’s a large tree in the middle of the fairway at about 250, and then the shallow green is elevated in a bush setting ampitheatre – spectacular!).

I loved this track and it will only get better once the fairways fully recover. They also have a handy little course guide and unique tee markers (pic). A big thank you to John (resident pro/ mgr) who let me on the back 9 despite it being closed while they did some work on the 16th dam – a very hospitable bloke, and that’s why you can’t see flagsticks in some of these photos.