MINI GOLF MONDAY: OVERLOOK GOLF CENTER

This weekend we played the Overlook Golf Center's mini golf course.  I like to refer to this one as "The Punisher"!  This is a beautiful and serene course located about 10 minutes from Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York.  This was the fourth time I have played this course and it always gets the better of me but I appreciate the challenge.

The course is beautifully maintained and right now is in full bloom with Spring plantings.  It is amazing how quickly my blood pressure can climb even surrounded by beauty and tranquility.  This is no wimpy course.  There are no storybook characters, no windmills and no whimsy.  The fairways are long and most of the holes are par 4.  This is a course for dedicated players.

The reason this course is so challenging and also the reason I call it "The Punisher" is because all of the holes have traps that are set up in a way that they require extra precision.  Sure there are the usual winding fairways and the berms and obstacles but this course goes a step beyond obstacles and obstructions.  There is a lot of water.  Some of the holes seem designed to be impossible.  This is not a "hole in one" course.  This is a course you nibble at, knowing it's best to use the par numbers rather than be over-ambitious.

The fairway pictured above has the water feature smack in the middle. At first glance it would appear that the  solution would be to take a short shot and lay-up for the hole.  The problem with this is that the sadistic designer did not merely place that large water oval in the center of a large u-shaped fairway, but that the greens surrounding the trap are all sloped towards it. 

 My golf partner has her own name for this course: "the ball washer".  I normally reply by muttering under my breath: "ball buster".

This dastardly hole is a very long down-hill slope that required dodging rock traps.  When you get to the bottom the actual hole is across a water trap.  There is a way around a large island of plants but the initial incline is pitched toward that water trap and not to the route around the island.  Another favorite punishments of this course is placing several holes immediately in front of large water features by twelve or less inches.  To  complicate the shot even more they place the perilous hole at the top of an incline.  What this means is that you first have to hit the ball hard enough to make it up the incline but not so hard as to go into the drink.  Precision is the key.  This course focuses on precision over aim.  Of course you need aim to eventually land the ball in the hole but getting to that point before the allotted maximum stroke limit [6 stroke limit on this course] is reached is where the challenge is.

"The Punisher" is a good course.  I enjoy the torture and can't wait to try it again.  I'm working on analyzing my game here.  I lost the game this weekend.  I lost my focus.  I lost my temper.  I did not lose my love of the challenge.

I rate this course an A-.  The reason I can't give it an "A" is because they do not have those great ball retrieval flags and more importantly because of an annoying design flaw.  There are no paths.  The fairways are back-to-back and impossible to walk around.  This means if you pick a day when it's crowded the group behind you is literally on top of you.  It also means that if anyone has to leave the course they have to interrupt your game in order to walk down the fairways to get out.  I don't understand this flaw because there certainly seems to be enough land that they could have spared a little more for the course.

Overlook Golf Center

39 DeGarmo Road

Poughkeepsie, NY

Open 7 days from 9 to 9

Also in the complex are batting cages, driving range and go kart driving.

MINI GOLF MONDAY: SAXON WOODS

It was an ideal Spring Saturday here in suburban New York.  It was sunny and warm but not hot.  The sun was bright and strong and there was a mild breeze.  We chose Saxon Woods as our mini golf venue.  We had played the course only once before and I was eager to get back for another round.  The course is set in a Westchester County park which features an 18 hole "real" golf course, a beautiful swimming pool, picnic area, a playground and the mini golf course.  The location is beautiful and lush and it feels like you are much more than the 15 or so miles from the congestion of New York City.

This is a pretty, challenging and well-kept course.  The greens are in great shape.  Nearly all of the holes are difficult, involving water, berms, traps and turns.  I like the challenge.  

 

There are a couple of gimmicky holes.  There is one that has a choice of three tunnels.  One has large flower pots spiraling up a steep incline making a direct shot impossible.  One has a bright yellow metal loop-de-loop  paying homage to the courses of my childhood but even the loop-de-loop is steeper and more fierce than they kiddy ones.  

One of the bonus features of this course is that the flags in each hole hold a basket which makes it possible to retrieve the golf ball without bending.  For those of us who are middle-aged with less than perfect backs this is a little touch that I wish more courses offered.  

I did manage go make two holes-in one which always makes the experience a little more gleeful.  Overall I rate this course an A-.  My only deductions are that the fairways could be a little more visually stimulating and that the huge public pool is adjacent to the course which, I'm sure, in Summer will be loud and possibly distracting.

Saxon Woods Mini Golf

1800 Mamaroneck Avenue

White Plains, NY  10604

  phone: 914.995.2618

4-The cost is $6.00 and no park permit is needed.-2618

MINI GOLF MONDAY: FAIRVIEW GOLF CENTER

Yesterday was a less-than-ideal day for a round of miniature golf.  It was below my self-imposed 65* temperature, there were wind gusts up around 50 mph and it was Mother's Day.  We had resigned ourselves to the fact that we would not be playing but we wound up in the neighborhood and could not possibly drive past without stopping in for a game.  

Fairview Golf Center is located in Elmsford, New York and is nestled in an industrial complex.  There are two courses along with a double-deck driving range, a pro shop and a small snack bar. We like this place.  This is not a kiddy, amusement center.  There are no pinball machines.  There is no Dance Dance Revolution blaring.  OK, I miss the giant windmills and 10 foot tall rabbit, but that's just me.  These are two very challenging courses.  

 

This weekend there was no decision to be made.  Only the Legends course is open as the Masters course is being spruced up for the season.  As a bonus the price is reduced to $5.00 from the normal $7.50 per round/per course.  The Legends course has longer holes, steeper inclines, drops and dog leg holes.  The course is in good shape but the water features are currently dry.  This is a pretty course to play.  There are lush surroundings and it is peaceful.  It is not so relaxing once you begin the game.  

The par for this course is 39.  Forget it.  If you focus on that par number you will find yourself doing quite a bit of swearing.  This course is tough.  There are no square angles and using geometry is difficult here.  The fairways often bend making it difficult to even see the target.  Many of the actual holes are raised and/or sloped.  This is not hole-in-one territory although I have gotten lucky a few times.  "Lucky" is the key word here.  As much as I would like to take credit, "holes-in-one" are not a skill shot here, they are strictly a matter of happenstance.  

The most difficult holes are the up-hill battles.  The inclines are steep, the turf is slow and the landing is precarious.  Add super-strong wind into that mix and you have the perfect recipe for frustration.  Yesterday I made a perfect shot up one of the very steep fairways, the ball landed perfectly just a foot shy of the hole and stopped.  Seconds later the wind laughed at me and sent the ball back down to the tee.  Yes I swore.  No, there were no kids nearby.  

I played a pretty lousy game but so did my golf partner and so I managed to win by a couple of strokes.  No matter how many times you play this course it remains a challenge and therefor retains its charm.  I like a challenge.  Overall I rate this golf center very high on my list.  I would give it a B+ for the layout, location, amenities, cost and upkeep.  Adding to the charm is that it is twenty minutes from my home.  It's great to have an outstanding pair of courses as the local default location.

Here are some more photos of the center.

Fairview Golf Center

300 Waterside Drive

Elmsford, NY 10523

Phone: (914)-592-1666

MINI GOLF MONDAY

A series for Summer 
[weather permitting]

I'm going to make a confession: I have a Peter Pan complex.  That's right, I don't want to grow up.  As soon as there is a hint of warmth in the air and the sun is shining, my inner child wants to shed this fifty year old body and play.  My thoughts immediately turn to beaches, salty air, candy apples, shorts and amusement parks.  But more than anything I think "mini golf".  I know that regionally some people refer to it as "putt putt" but to me it will always be mini golf.  

My earliest memories of my fascination with the game [game, not sport] are from Cape May, New Jersey.  My family vacationed in that charming Victorian seaside resort.  There is a boardwalk along Beach Avenue with a convention hall, a few stores, Morrow's Nut House, and two arcades.  That's all good but across the street from the boardwalk is the real attraction.  Nestled among the restaurants and surfer shops are two mini golf courses a couple of blocks apart.  One glance from the boards and your eyes are drawn to the giant guardians of the courses.  The ten foot tall bunny, the windmill, the huge [but happy] polar bear are all there calling out to me.  This has remained mostly unchanged.

I was a lucky kid.  I had one particular uncle, Artie, who indulged my curiosity for those bigger-than-life brightly painted characters and crossed Beach Avenue with me and introduced me to mini golf.  Artie wasn't known for his patience but with me and mini golf he had endless patience.  He taught me the fundamentals of the game without bogging me down.  He let me play and experiment and experience for myself with only hints as to what might make me better at the getting that shiny bright ball all the way [maybe 8 feet] down the green carpet, under the creature or up the loop-de-loop, and into the hole!  

I was hooked.  There would never be another summer without a visit to Cape May but more importantly there would never be another summer without mini golf.  For a brief period of my childhood there was a mini golf course one town over from my hometown.  It wasn't as grand as any of those from the New Jersey shore but it was local and it had a frozen custard stand attached as a bonus.  Summer nights of mini golf and lemon ice are about as good as it gets for distraction from the real world. It was a sad Autumn when the custard stand and beloved mini golf course were demolished and replaced with car lot.  

The warm weather has arrived and has once again worked its charm.  My mini golf playmate Carol and I have already begun hitting the local courses.  Over the past couple of years a round of mini golf has become a Sunday ritual.  We usually stay within an hour radius from home and that encompasses quite a few courses for us to choose from.  The courses vary from the kiddy courses with their big characters, reminiscent of those very first courses I played, to the austere, carpeted no-nonsense courses which lull adults into thinking they're more akin to "real" golf.  

My goal for "Monday Mini Golf" is to give reviews and photos of the courses we play along with anecdotes and obligatory rants on the subject of parents not disciplining their misbehaving, screaming children.  

"To live will be a great adventure."

j.m.barrie [peter pan]