Golf Scrapbook Blog (The Next Ones)

The Quechee Club: Highland Course

UPDATE OCTOBER 2024: So after about 30 years, I finally got back to Quechee to play the Highland course and get some photos for the blog. What a treat! We played on a beautiful Fall day so the course was in all its glory – with the leaves in peak peeping season. I think I got most if not all holes captured and will add these along with a brief description below.

The course was as I remembered and brought back a flood of great memories. It remains firmly in my top 100 and I urge anyone who gets to this blog to give it a try. It’s tough (134 slope from the whites) but fair and the scenery alone is worth the price of admission. My pro got us on as we didn’t want to fork over the $800 a night to stay in the Woodstock (or Quechee) Inn which can also get you on.

Quechee is a 36-hole facility and all but nine holes were closed for about four years in the aftermath of the flooding from hurricane Irene in August of 2011. Even early this year (2024), VT got soaked with multiple storms but the Highland course was in great shape.

So far in 2024, the number of new courses I’ve played only totals less than 25 which is light for me over the past few years. I am setting the goal now of trying to play 1,000 different courses before I hang up my golf shoes, and God- and health-willing, I need about 25 a year to get there by the time I hit 70. However, 2024 has been a year for me getting back to some of my favorite courses already played, including Quechee, Pebble, Spyglass, The Ridge (multiple times as my brother coopted a membership for the year), Pinehurst #2, Philly Cricket, Aronimink, and am scheduled to either play Galloway or Hidden Creek in the next few weeks with a friend I hosted through Thousand Greens. It was a great replay year with a lot of top ranked courses!

I’ll do hole descriptions below the original post along with some photos. I played a solid front but shitty back as my golf game is in absolute shambles and will take the offseason to work on it.

Original Post: So there’s not one golf magazine or website ranking in the world that has Quechee in its top 100. Golf Digest regularly puts it in their Best in State for Vermont but against thin competition. So why so high in my rankings and above other courses ranked in the world’s or US’ top 100? I guess nostalgia plays a huge part in this, but mind you this is a very, very good golf course.

Quechee was among the first golf courses or the first ever golf course I played. My family bought land in Quechee way back in the 70’s and we had a separate vacation house on Chester Arthur Rd. for years growing up. We shared it with my New England cousins, aunt and uncle. Mind you they were all born in Philly but they are all now traitors to the New England sports teams including the hated Cheatriots. More on that later.

So this was my very first or very early exposure to golf and a golf resort. I talk in my write-ups about golf experience and the experience at Quechee is why I rank it where I do. So I always thought that every club had an indoor and outdoor swimming pool, a huge man-made lake where you could keep your sunfishes, a private ski area, a full gym, tennis and racquetball courts, a veranda overlooking the golf course (pictured above and borrowed from the Quechee website), and of course not one but two world-championship golf courses that were as different as two courses could be while sharing the same general area. If I ever wanted to design a private club, this is the blue print. BTW I’ve never since been to a club that matched these accommodations.

I have so many great memories of Quechee. The pre-high school/high school rounds where we enjoyed doing 360’s in the golf carts more than we liked golfing, taking out the sunfish in the lake or playing racquetball, the dinners at the club, and skiing in the winter at nearby Killington or over in New Hampshire. Then from my early 20’s where this was our launching pad before heading to Montreal for a bachelor party, or playing 11-on-11 football in the front yard of our house in three-feet of snow with car lights illuminating the yard in the dark, playing balls-ball (like ass ball but a man’s game where losers flip around for their punishment), playing cards with cousin Tommy and burning his lucky yellow sweatshirt when he won too much, going to a local bar with cousin Mark where we were kicked out because cousin Mark was so loud the lumberjacks (who work ear deep against a buzz saw all day) complained about the noise. By the way this is how you get a nickname and cousin Mark is now Buzzsaw because of this. My entire youth is peppered with such great memories of this club and area.

A regret is I don’t have photos of any of this. The scrapbook page is here but it doesn’t include any original photographs. I added some photos (me in the Quechee gorge circa 1987 where I was attempting a JC Penney model pose in a really bad Mets cap owing to an awkward phase of my life) and some Patriots/Eagles game photos from more recently. I hope to get back here soon and play the courses and get some great photos to add.

To the course. The Highlands course starts out with a par three. You rarely if ever see this. It’s actually a great idea (especially considering the lack of patience of New Englanders). By the time the group in front of you gets off the green and you move to the tee, that group gets ample time to tee off on the second and move well out of your way. I’m surprised more courses don’t do this.

The second through eighth share the same land as the Lakelands course. Then the 8th takes you diagonally back across the Ottaquechee River and nine is a classic short par four dogleg. Then the course takes you through the highlands. Ten and eleven climb the mountain (ten is actually part of the Sliding Hill ski slope in the winter). Then one of the twin par threes across the ravine that both are (or at least 12 is) part of my top 18 holes in golf. Seventeen is back across the ravine and the 18th goes down the ski slope that 10 went up.

OK let’s discuss the embarrassment of the family’s Patriots fans. So we all grew up together outside of Philly until my uncle moved to Mass. Uncle Bob taught us all how to ski by bribing us with blackberry brandy – he always had a flask and would say if we got down to a certain point we would meet up, take a nip, then head down to the next meeting point to take another nip. While coaching the kids with a nip of brandy is not the Dr. Spock way of motivating kids, it shit sure as hell worked with us. Uncle Bob passed a few years ago and we still do a toast with blackberry brandy on the anniversary of his passing.

So my Uncle Bob and family moved up to Mass sometime in the 70’s. All was quiet in the 80’s and 90’s as the Patriots went suckily along their merry way and nary a Patriot Pat peep from the Andover mouths. Then all of a sudden, the Patsies luckily pull off the miracle against the Rams and for the last 15 years we have had to hear from the Andover mouths about Tom Brady and the Pats. Then the Bruins, Red Sox and Celtics win and even more misery blows down from the Massholes. Thank God that as I write this, the Pats are in disintegration mode and the Red Sox were the only team worse than the Phillies.

If you can, I think you can arrange a stay on one of the QLLA resident properties which gives you access to the club. Do this. Play both clubs and Green Mountain and Rutland nearby. This is a great couples/family trip if you’re looking for one though I may even suggest this as a future work buddies’ trip over the next few years.

October 2024 Photos

Hole 1 is a unique starter – a short, big-greened and friendly (18th handicap) par three. It’s kind of a Redan design. The entire course (and Lakeland) is a Geoff Cornish design opened in 1970 or thereabouts. Cornish does a lot of work in New England and of the courses of his I’ve played, he has some hits (like here and Lakeland) and some misses like Sugarloaf in Northeastern PA and Portland in Portland, CT. As mentioned in the original post, opening (or closing) on a par three is pretty unique. I kind of like it as an opener as it keeps traffic moving: we played quick here and barely saw anyone else on the course all day. Anyways, I have been having a mental block on par threes and my original shot was a weak fade but thank God for the breakfast ball, I hit a great shot to about ten feet and despite missing the birdie, tapped in a satisfying first-hole par.

Two is a 500-yard par 5 (all yardages are from the whites: 6,128/70.4/134). Dogleg left. Great drive but put it in the bunker right on my approach (below is approach photo after extricating myself from the bunker). I stayed just right of the bunkers on the left on my drive but burned a shot out of the bunker 100 yards out which caused a bogey.

Three is straight-away but long!!! It’s 411 yards from the whites – the traps on the right are imminently reachable (220 yards) from the tee though I think I hit a Huckabee off the tee (way right). Everything slopes right here so don’t do that.

Minor complaint: Three and four are eerily similar just like nine and ten at Pebble. But that’s like critiquing the smile on the Mona Lisa. 362-yard par four and took a bogey. We played three 6-hole matches, different two-some on each, and would end up even on all three!

Approach on five (coming back now towards the clubhouse). Short par five. Should be makeable birdie or gimme par. I fucked up with a double. Christ I suck.

Six is a short par four, 310 yards. Dogleg right up along the Ottaquechee river, Bogeyed after a three putt.

Seven is a ‘lil dogleg left with the Ottaquechee river along the left. It’s 382 yards from the whites so not short but hardly deserving of the #2 handicap. I bogeyed with a stroke to start off our second six with a win.

Eight and another of my favorite golf holes: 185 yards back over the Ottaquechee. Great thing about Fall golf is the foliage. Bad thing about Fall golf are the leaves on the ground. What is your interpretation of the “leaf” rule? We take a pretty liberal interpretation. BTW, we parred to go up one in our match.

How fucking awesome is that? Nine. Short par four. Coming back into the clubhouse. Dogleg that you can just keep it left or middle (cousin went too far right into the crap). I knocked a great approach but went too far – up and down from the bunker for a par though.

I must’ve missed 10 (a short 290 yard par four (17 handicap) and parred). This is 11 which is the appetizer to the mountain holes. I bogeyed for net par but cousin Steve parred for net birdie.

Twelve. 175 yards. One of my personal top 100 holes in golf. What a fucking hole over the abyss! Of course I shit the bed into the gorge and took a double.

Cousin Steve, me and my brother on 12.

Not sure the where and when, but this is me, my brother and buddy Russ.

Fourteen. This is yet another example of why Quechee is worth it if you just want to tote along the bride for leaf-viewing. For the golfers this is a 500-yard par five and the photo is from my approach. Another double on the way to a super stinky 49 on the back.

Fifteen. Number one handicap at 402 yards. Perfect drive and this is from my approach. Was able to bogey for the stroke and net par win.

I missed 16 (305-yard par four where cousin Steve dunked a 120-yard birdie) and this is the 17th over the gorge, another par three and one of my faves. I had a great shot just short of the green but somehow doubled. Went down one and had to scramble on 18 to get back to even.

Looking into the abyss on the 17th. They cleared some 200-foot-tall trees from here that was fun to hit over.

Eighteen is a par five back down the mountain. After a great drive and approach, I fucked it up for a seven and 49 on the back. Luckily, brother Joe parred and we ended up even on the match. All in all, Quechee is an awesome course and one of my favorite golf experiences of all time.

Photos from original post